At the stroke of 13!

Perhaps amongst all the superstitions that still exist, no superstition is more popular or rather unpopular, than that of the number ‘13’.

It is estimated that in the US alone, over 20 million people still believe in the superstition to an extent that it disrupts their normal and routine activities. And the fear has a name, ‘Terdeka-phobia’ or ’Triskadeka-phobia’, i.e. the fear of the number thirteen.

It is not very clear though as to how a supposedly ordinary number got mixed up with evil and misfortune, but the most popular theory stems from the ‘Last Supper’, where Judas, one of Christ’s twelve apostles, was the thirteenth on the table. Judas betrayed Jesus, leading to his crucifixion and from thereon thirteen became unlucky. The connection became so strong that it was assumed that if thirteen people sat down at a table for a meal, one of them would die within the year.

A Viking legend with a similar conclusion is as follows. Twelve gods were having a banquet at Valhalla; not amongst the guest list was the god of mischief, Loki, also known as the evil one. He nevertheless gate crashed the gathering and brought the total to thirteen. The others gods were not pleased with the intrusion and asked Loki to leave. This angered him and true to his name, he retaliated by asking Hod, the blind god of water to attack Balder, who was the favourite of all the gods. Hod took a spear of mistletoe given to him by Loki and hurled it at Balder, killing him.

An interesting add-on to the ‘thirteen at the table’ is that the one who leaves the table first will invite evil upon himself and misfortune can be avoided if the entire group arises from their seats at the same time. To avoid such a situation, in case there are thirteen guests, one of them is requested to dine at a table on the side.

Scientists though claim that according to a well-researched study, if a relatively large number of people of diverse ages and backgrounds are considered, the probability of one of them dying within a year is almost 50 %.

The superstition slowly rose to cover a group of thirteen in any context, not just at a table but also for instance in a room or on a ship. And by the end of the 19th century, people began to avoid anything connected to the number thirteen - houses, hotels, cars... There are many written instances of people avoiding or objecting anything related to thirteen.

For instance during a car race, a driver had to halt because of some problem. The mechanic refused to touch it saying that it would be useless to even try and driving the car further could endanger the driver’s life. The number on the car, you guessed it – thirteen.

There was of course no escaping the number and so people began to find ingenious ways of getting around it, hotels would avoid numbering any room as thirteen while in case of floors, the eleventh floor would be followed by the twelfth floor, while the floor after would be not the thirteenth but the fourteenth. Soon the thirteenth of the month was considered to be a bad day and no new ventures would begun on that day.

Of course, there were some who soon realised that certain thirteenths would fall on a Friday, which was also considered to be an unlucky day. And so began the curse of ‘Friday, the 13th.’ Although a fairly recent phenomenon, as late as the start of the twentieth century, it soon took the masses by storm and Friday, the thirteenth was a day when evil roamed freely and fearlessly.

The association between the two omens goes much further though. According to a legend, Freya, the goddess of Friday once came down to a group of witches who numbered twelve and were performing a rite and gave them one of her cats, making them thirteen. Since then it is assumed that any witches' coven comprises of thirteen members.

Paradoxically the ancient Chinese and Egyptians considered the number to be lucky. For the Egyptians, life was a cycle of spiritual ascent, which was divided into steps, twelve in this life and the thirteenth in the after life. The number thirteen thus defined the phase of death, but as a very coveted phase as it represented the culmination of everything that was to be achieved by a human soul. Unfortunately after the demise of the Egyptian civilisation, future civilisations associated death as an unwanted part of life and to them thirteen represented death.

Whatever the legends, scientists claim again and again that the fear of the number thirteen is baseless and there is absolutely no basis for us to continue to take the superstition into the 21st century.