What is Day of the Dead?
Day of the Dead, also known as Dia de los Muertos, is a multi day festival for commemorating of friends, relatives, family members and beloved people who have passed away. Day of the Dead’s origin based upon Mexican culture. It is celebrated annually from 31st of October to 2nd of November. Day of the Dead focuses on coming together with all the family members and friends to pray for beloved people who have died. Its purpose is memorializing and remembering them. The tradition and rituals of Day of the Dead was inscribed in the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization.
It is believed that the origin of Day of the Dead based upon Aztecs culture. As distinct from Halloween, Day of the Dead does not have the aim of giving people a scare. The skeletons which are used in Day of the Dead, symbolize the dead people and do not use as a scary item. According to the belief, the dead people only will be dead in the strict sense when they become forgotten by every human being. That’s why, people created a day with a lot of different rituals to remember their loss.
People make some skeleton trinkets made by candies and build different altars in Day of the Dead. They believe that dead people can see their effort and they can make them happy by remembering and commemorating them.
There are some different celebrations which are very similar to Day of the Dead but have different names and different dates. For example, Brazilian people celebrate Finidos in 2nd of November but the purpose of Finidos is nearly same with Day of the Dead.
When is Day of the Dead?
The next Day of the Dead will start on Wednesday, October 31,2018.
Dates for Day of the Dead from 2019 to 2023
- Day of the Dead 2019 - October 31, 2019 - Thursday
- Day of the Dead 2020 - October 31, 2020 - Saturday
- Day of the Dead 2021 - October 31, 2021 - Sunday
- Day of the Dead 2022 - October 31, 2022 - Monday
- Day of the Dead 2023 - October 31, 2023 - Tuesday