Samhain is a religious celebration and a day of great magical importance to the Old Religion. During Samhain people praise to their deads and everyone who departed. It's the End of Year Eve.
Gallery
Celebrations
During Samhain the people of Camelot would prepare a feast to mourn their deceased and those who departed. The feast would be preceded by a speech from the current ruler before a toast.
To the practitioners of the Old Religion, the High Priestesses would gather in the Isle of the Blessed where they would sacrifice a living human to tear the veil between the worlds of the living and the dead, unleashing evil magical creatures into the world. The sacrifice would unleash a vast deal of mystical power into the world which sorceresses can tap into for a limited time (The Darkest Hour).
History
Samhain is a pagan celebration where the spirits of the dead would came to the world to haunt the living. In some religions the religious caste would use the day to channel magical energy to cast spells. However as the religion of Christianity took over the pagan regions, Samhain was Christianised into the All Hollow's Eve, which was secularized into Halloween.
Currently neopagan religions, specially those who claim Celtic and magic practise, such as Wicca, use it to symbolise to End of the Year, which was Samhain place in the religious calendar.