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The Wicker Man is set ablaze. Picture courtesy of St Fagan’s National History Museum.
As darkness begins to fall this Halloween, visitors at the St Fagan’s National Museum will be treated to a sight few have seen outside the cinema – the burning of a ghoulish wicker man.
Each year, the staff and visitors at St Fagan’s museum construct the figure out of chicken wire, straw and kindling. Harking back to Roman times, some believe the Gaul’s practice of burning the wicker man, and those sacrificed inside it, were invented as Roman propaganda. Fortunately, this one is empty.
“The wicker man ties back to Julius Caesar” said Ian Daniel, educational interpreter at St Fagan’s. “The image we have is always the wicker man standing up, but it could have been lying on its back. It’s always depicted with a very human face. It’s become a St Fagan’s tradition to burn on Halloween, and I hope we’ll be burning it next year!”
