JACKSON, Wyo. — Día de los Muertos, or the Day of the Dead, is a Mexican holiday traditionally observed from Nov. 1 to Nov. 2.
According to National Geographic, Día de los Muertos originated in Mexico but is celebrated throughout Latin America and the rest of the world. It’s a time for people to honor and aid the return of the souls of deceased family members for a brief reunion with the living.
According to the History Channel, from midnight on Oct. 31 to midnight on Nov. 1, the spirits of children can rejoin their families for 24 hours, known as el Día de los Inocentes, or the Day of the Children. The spirits of adults return for the same amount of time starting at midnight on Nov. 1 to midnight on Nov. 2, what is traditionally called Día de los Muertos, Day of the Dead.
The tradition involves setting up a candlelit altar with some of the favorite foods of the deceased so spirits can find their way back to their relatives from the Land of the Dead. Items like books or toys that were important to the ancestors when they were alive are also placed on the altar, as are candles and marigolds. Smoke from copal incense, made from tree resin, transmits prayers and purifies the area around the altar.
Families will often also go to the graveyard where their relatives are buried for a big feast and party, scattering marigold petals from the altar to the grave to guide wandering souls back to their place of rest.
According to The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organizations (UNESCO), which added Día de los Muertos to the representative list of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, it is believed that the dead are capable of bringing prosperity or misfortune upon their families depending on how satisfactorily the rituals are executed.
The History Channel confirms origins of the holiday date back at least 3,000 years, to the rituals honoring the dead in pre-Columbian Mesoamerica.
“The Aztecs and other Nahua people living in what is now central Mexico held a cyclical view of the universe and saw death as an integral, ever-present part of life,” the History Channel writes on their website.
Upon dying, those cultures believed a person traveled to Chicunamictlán, the Land of the Dead. Only after getting through nine challenging levels, a journey of several years, could the person’s soul finally reach Mictlán, the final resting place.
The holiday often blends in many cultures with the Catholic celebrations of All Saints Day on Nov. 1 and All Souls Day on Nov. 2.
“The Day of the Dead celebration holds great significance in the life of Mexico’s indigenous communities,” UNESCO says. “The fusion of pre-Hispanic religious rites and Catholic feasts brings together two universes, one marked by indigenous belief systems, the other by worldviews introduced by the Europeans in the sixteenth century.”
The holiday also involves calaveras or skulls as a common symbol, and uses calaveras literarias, light-hearted poems, to mock or poke fun at people.
According to PBS, calvera literarias, which translates to “skull literature,” are inspired by the iconic “La Catrina” skull imagery, derived from the Mesoamerican queen of the underworld Mictecacihuatl. In the 20th century, La Catrina was re-imagined by Mexican artists José Guadalupe Posada and Diego Rivera as an elegantly dressed female skeleton. This feminine figure quickly became associated with Día de los Muertos.
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