There are a number of intriguing connections between events, practices and beliefs attributed to ancient cultures and the superstitious fear of Fridays and the number 13. However, there is yet an explanation of how, why or when these separate strands of folklore converged to brand Friday the 13th as the unluckiest day of all.
Maybe a simple explanation can be explained as…no one really knows the answer.
One theory suggests that the date is cause of one unfortunate event in history known as the decimation of the Knights Templar, the legendary order of “warrior monks” formed during the Christian Crusades to combat Islam. Renowned as a fighting force for 200 years, by the 1300s the order had grown so pervasive and powerful it was perceived as a political threat by kings and popes alike and brought down by a church-state conspiracy, as recounted by Katharine Kurtz in Tales of the Knights Templar (Warner Books: 1995):
“On October 13, 1307, a day so infamous that Friday the 13th would become a synonym for ill fortune, officers of King Philip IV of France carried out mass arrests in a well-coordinated dawn raid that left several thousand Templars — knights, sergeants, priests, and serving brethren — in chains, charged with heresy, blasphemy, various obscenities, and homosexual practices. None of these charges was ever proven, even in France — and the Order was found innocent elsewhere — but in the seven years following the arrests, hundreds of Templars suffered excruciating tortures intended to force ‘confessions,’ and more than a hundred died under torture or were executed by burning at the stake.”
Not so fast!
Is Friday the 13 a thoroughly modern day phenomenon? The proof may be found by taking a quick trip in history. If you were to go back 100 years “Friday the 13th” isn’t even mentioned in E. Cobham Brewer's voluminous 1898 edition of the Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, which is the definitive bible of myths and fables during it’s time. However, on the book does have entries for "Friday, an Unlucky Day" and "Thirteen Unlucky." When the date of ill fate finally does make an appearance in later editions of the text, it is without extravagant claims as to the superstition's historicity or longevity. The very brevity of the entry is instructive: "A particularly unlucky Friday. The idea suggests that the day so infamous with misfortune derives account from the accrual of two bad omens.
Unlucky Friday + Unlucky 13 = Unluckier Friday
(See explanation below)
If that's the case, we are guilty of perpetuating a misnomer by labeling Friday the 13th "the unluckiest day of all."
From: *E. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898.
Thirteen Unlucky.
The Turks so dislike the number that the word is almost expunged from their vocabulary. The Italians never use it in making up the numbers of their lotteries. In Paris no house bears the number, and persons, called Quartorziennes (q.v.), are reserved to make a fourteenth at dinner parties. 1
“Jamais on ne devrait
Se mettre a table treize,
Mais douze c’est parfait.”
La Mascotte (an opera), i. 5.
Sitting down thirteen at dinner, in old Norse mythology, was deemed unlucky, because at a banquet in the Valhalla, Loki once intruded, making thirteen guests, and Baldur was slain. 2
In Christian countries the superstition was confirmed by the Last Supper of Christ and His twelve apostles, but the superstition itself is much anterior to Christianity. 3
Twelve at a dinner table, supposing one sits at the head of the table and one at the bottom, gives a party to these two, provided a couple is divided; but thirteen, like any other odd number, is a unicorn.
Friday, an Unlucky Day.
Because it was the day of our Lord’s crucifixion; it is accordingly a fast-day in the Roman Catholic Church. Soames says, “Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit on a Friday, and died on a Friday.” (Anglo-Saxon Church, p. 255.) 1
“But once on a Friday (’tis ever they say),
A day when misfortune is aptest to fail.”
Saxe: Good Dog of Bretté, stanza 3.
In Spain, Friday is held to be an unlucky day. So is it esteemed by Buddhists and Brahmins. The old Romans called it nefastus, from the utter overthrow of their army at Gallia Narbonensis. And in England the proverb is that a Friday moon brings foul weather.
Interesting fact:
Those who are supersticous or are fasinated by queer facts will find this interesting. All these serial killers have 13 letters in their name:
- Charles Manson
- Harold Shipman
- Frederick West
- Saddam Hussein
- Jeffrey Dahmer
- Theodore Bundy
- Jack the Ripper
