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Beware Friday 13th !
Is Paraskevidekatriaphobia, Fear
of Friday the 13th, a modern
phenomenon ?
Number 13 has long been
considered by the superstitious
to be unlucky. Many towns and
suburbs don’t have 13 as a
street number, or 13th Street,
and most hotels don't have rooms
with 13 on the door. Many tall
buildings skip the 13th storey,
with the lift going straight
from Floor 12 to Floor 14.
But when a Friday falls on the
thirteenth of the month the
superstitions increase.
Why is Friday 13 considered
unlucky ? There are all sorts of
explanations in our modern
times, from the alleged
inability of ancient people to
count past twelve, to witches
covens of 13, biblical allusions
and the massacre of the Knights
Templar.
For some reason there is a
theory that early people counted
only their fingers and feet and
so any number greater than 12
was beyond their reckoning. The
number 13 would then be
mysterious and magical. Let's
dismiss that straight away as a
patronising view. Our ancestors
could certainly count a lot
higher than twelve !
The association of Friday the
13th with being unlucky is
popularly linked with the
Knights Templar, and the date of
Friday, October the 13th, 1307
CE. (And that's another story in
itself.)
In pre-Christian cultures Friday
was often a day of worship. It
was considered lucky in Northern
Europe as a day to get married
because of its traditional
association with love and
fertility. Our name for Friday
comes from the old Norse deity
worshipped on the sixth day,
Frigg/Freya who corresponds to
Venus, the goddess of love of
the Romans. The Latin for the
sixth day of the week is "dies
Veneris", the day of Venus.
All that changed when
Christianity came along. The
goddess Freya with her sacred
animal, the cat, was recast in
post-pagan folklore as a witch.
Her day was no longer joyous and
passionate, but associated with
evil doings.
Despite all of the reasons and
derivations for the unlucky
Friday 13, no one has been able
to document the existence of
such beliefs prior to the 19th
century. If people who lived
before that perceived Friday the
13th as a day of special
misfortune, there's no evidence
to prove it.
Perhaps the idea of a bad luck
day is a thoroughly modern
phenomenon. Like most
superstitions, the real origin
of Friday the 13th is subject to
great speculation.
Personally I chose to treat all
superstitions with a great deal
of salt -- thrown over the left
shoulder of course
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