It's a question that I ask myself on a daily basis. The origins of this affliction however, are as common today as they were for our ancestors, for it is the morbid (and totally irrational!) fear of Friday 13th. So irrational, that even my hearty spell check questions what the funk I’m talking about, when I write the word.
Over the years, there have been many theories as to why Friday 13th is the most common 'Oooga Booga' superstition and in more recent times, our own medical professionals have thrown their two penneth into the mix.
"Friday 13th is unlucky for some. The risk of hospital admission as a result of a transport accident may be increased by as much as 52 percent. Staying at home is recommended." British Medical Journal
But what are the origins of this event that have so many people believing it to be true? With scientific fact and no conjecture whatsoever, I shall try to enlighten you with some of the reasoning behind what gives people an answer for anything out of the ordinary happening on days like today.
If 13 people sit down to dinner together, one will die within the year.
Many cities in the USA (a country where over 50,000 people have Alien Abduction Insurance...reminds me, mine just lapsed, I should check out Moneysupermarket for a good deal) do not have a 13th Street or a 13th Avenue.
Many buildings don't have a 13th floor, I’ve seen the movies and they don’t lie, see Titanic/Braveheart etc...
If you have 13 letters in your name which, not including my middle name, I do - you will have the devil's luck. For this occasion only, I’ll roll out the use of my middle name. Whew, now I feel better.
There are 13 witches in a coven. No there isn’t, there’s 12. My wife’s sitting next to me!
So who and what do we turn to, to try and offer up some actual fact based research on this subject. Why the Da Vinci Code, of course. This proven work of nonfiction states that the origins of Friday 13th came from a single historical event, some 700 years ago. That event was the decimation of the Knights Templar.
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.
Finally, I hope that none of you have changed your beds today as you will have brought bad dreams upon yourself, which also happens if you eat cheese late at night. See, all fact.
Rob Denholm
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