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Paranormal Terms - H |
Halloween: 'The Eve of All Hallows,' also known by Pagan Celts and Wiccans as 'Samhain' (pronounced, 'Sow'-an'), October 31, the night preceding the Catholic Church's 'All Saints Day.' For a millennium, in much of Europe and the British Isles, this was held to be the night when departed relatives were especially remembered, and the veil separating the realms of the living and the dead was rendered thinner than usual. Jack-o' lanterns were placed on stoops and window-sills to frighten off malicious spirits. Halloween is presently celebrated as a night of revels and masquerading, and in Mexico it is part of a traditional annual festival known as 'El Dia De Los Muertos' ('The Day of the Dead'). Haunting: To inhabit, visit, or appear to in the form of a ghost or other supernatural being. This can be sounds of activity, objects being moved, sightings of apparitions, etc. in a location when no one is there physically. Hellhound / Black Shuck: A spectral death omen in the form of a ghostly dog. Hex: A magical working, or "spell," cast to influence a person's will or fate, most often referring to a curse rather than a blessing or healing. Hexagram: 2 interlaced equilateral triangles, one apex pointing up and the other down. Hobgoblin: Mischievous sprite (fairy, spirit) who delights in perpetrating pranks upon hapless humans, once widely believed in and dreaded throughout Europe and Celtic regions. (Caution: It is theorized that these diminutive denizens of the netherworld will, upon occasion, interfere in psychic investigations by devices such as misplacing directions and telephone numbers, draining flashlight and camera batteries, and even pulling keys right out of investigators' pockets!) I assume that anyone who reads the preceding caution will realize it is farcical! Hot Spot: An area or place where frequent paranormal activity occurs, such as hauntings. Homunculus: A form of miniature human supposedly produced (for purposes unknown) in the laboratories of medieval alchemists. Huna: A Hawaiian religious practice involving clairvoyance, precognition, healing, miracles and magic. Hyperesthesia: An abnormal or pathological increase in sensitivity to sensory stimuli, as of the skin to touch or the ear to sound, exceptionally acute sensory awareness. Hypnosis: An artificially induced altered state of consciousness, characterized by heightened suggestibility and receptivity to direction. An Altered State of Consciousness involving a heightened degree of suggestibility. Hypnotism: The act of inducing hypnosis. |