The Legend of Stingy Jack

The Irish tale behind the jack-o’-lantern tradition

By Donovan Darling, Active Media

Long ago in a small Irish town, a drunkard named Stingy Jack earned his nickname after tricking the Devil himself. Jack was notorious in his little town, and Satan had heard of his mischievous deeds. Jack may have been known for being a drunken scoundrel — “scuttered and bollocksed,” so to speak — but he was also a clever lad, so he convinced the Devil to take him to his favorite pub as a last request and pay for the bill. When the tab came due, Jack convinced the Devil to turn himself into a coin so Jack could pay for the drinks, then they could leave for the underworld. 

However, the Devil was fooled. Instead of paying up, Jack dropped the coin into his pocket alongside a silver crucifix, trapping the fiery foe in the form of a coin. The Devil begged Stingy Jack to release him. And so Jack released him, but only on the condition that the Devil would not bother him for another year, and should Jack die, Satan could not claim his soul.

True to his word, the Devil didn’t return for a whole year. When the Devil finally reappeared to claim his soul, Jack tricked the Devil to climb a fruit tree and pick him a last meal to eat before traveling to Hell. Once the Devil reached the top of the tree, Jack carved a cross into the bark of the tree trunk, trapping the Devil high among the branches. Again, Satan begged Jack for freedom, but this time Jack made the Devil promise to not bother him for another 10 years. Of course, the Devil agreed to his terms and was freed once again. 

Jack died soon thereafter. Because of his mischief and sins, he was denied entrance to Heaven. Upset by Jack’s trickery and scheming, and true to his promise to not claim his soul, Satan cleverly denied Jack entrance into Hell, too. As a parting gift, the Devil gave Jack a lump of burning coal to light his way and sent him off wandering in the night. Jack placed the burning coal in a hollowed out turnip, and so the story goes, he has roamed the earth ever since. The Irish began calling this eerie creature “Jack of the Lantern,” or “Jack O’Lantern” for short. 

In Ireland and Scotland, people began carving their own unique versions of Jack-o’-lanterns, cutting terrifying faces into turnips, potatoes, beets or rutabagas, and lighting and displaying them near doors or windows to frighten away Stingy Jack and other evil spirits. In the mid-1800s, Irish and Scottish immigrants brought the jack-o’-lantern tradition with them when they moved to the United States. And they soon found that pumpkins, a large fruit native to America, made for perfect jack-o’-lanterns.

Since then, there have been many attempts in popular culture to revive this long-forgotten tradition of carving jack o’lanterns from turnips. In 2015, due to a severe pumpkin shortage caused by severe rain, the charity English Heritage called for British citizens to rekindle their love for turnip carving and return to the original tradition of turnip jack-o’-lanterns, even installing many turnip jack-o’-lanterns at Dover Castle to inspire others to do the same. 

This Halloween, whether you’re American, Irish, Scottish, or English, keep carving those pumpkins and turnips to frighten away the lost soul of Stingy Jack. Happy Halloween!