It’s that time of year again. The decorations are coming up, the weather is getting colder, and there’s candy and costume sales everywhere. Halloween is upon us. Though we all celebrate it every year, not many of us actually know much about it other than the chocolate and the stomach problems the next day. So here are 7 facts you probably never knew about Halloween.

1. Full moons on Halloween are actually surprisingly rare, despite the classic depiction of a witch flying on a broomstick in front of a full moon.

The last Halloween full moon was in 2001 and the last one before that was in 1955.
2. The fear of Halloween is known as Samhainophobia.

The beginning of this term originates from the Celtic celebration of Halloween known as Samhain. They believed that on that day, spirits would come to the realm of the living. As a result, people would dress in costumes and leave treats out for the spirits, and thus trick-or-treating was born.
3. The Jack O’Lantern is usually carved out of pumpkins nowadays, but was actually originally carved out of beets, potatoes, and turnips.

This was in order to scare away the spirit of “Stingy Jack”, who tricked the Devil into never claiming his soul once he died. God deemed him unfit for heaven, and he was thus banished to Earth as a spirit. The Jack O’Lantern was thus born to try to scare him away.
4. Some animal shelters do not allow black cats to be sold on Halloween, as they are scared that the cat will be sacrificed.

It is unclear whether sacrificing actually takes place, and as a result, the number of shelters that still ban the selling of black cats is shrinking.
5. Black and orange are the colors of Halloween.

The reason is that black represents death and darkness, which symbolizes the original superstition of the Celts that the barrier between the living and the dead starts to weaken temporarily. The orange represents the strength and endurance and also symbolizes the fall harvest.
6. According to a Halloween myth, if you wear you clothes inside out and walk backward on Halloween, you will see a witch at midnight.

No one really knows where this myth came from, but many think it originated in England.

7. Despite parents’ fears of poisoned Halloween candy, there have only been two instances of people dying from Halloween candy, both of which weren’t even caused by strangers.

The first person died due to an overdose of heroin from his uncle’s stash, which his family tried to cover up by sprinkling heroin on his candy. The second person died when his own dad poisoned his Pixy Stix with cyanide in order to obtain the insurance money.