Freaky Facts Behind Friday the 13th

You wake up and turn on the lights only to have the bulb burn out it in a flash. As you stumble in the darkness, you bump into a mirror, causing it to crash to the ground and shatter. Now you are late to work and as you step out into the rain, you wonder how it all went wrong.

Then it dawns on you--it’s Friday the 13th. Now you know it can only get worse.

Friday the 13th is as innocuous as an everpresent storm cloud overhead, or at its worst, it’s a homicidal maniac with a butcher knife waiting in your shower. So how is it possible to assign every wrong turn taken, from the freaky to the truly frightening, on one single day? The answer is, no one really knows for sure. But a look back into the superstitious past can help shed some light on a dark day.

Considered so unlucky that hotels have been known to skip it when numbering floors and rooms, 13 has a bad rap in Western culture. Covens of witches were once believed to consist of 13 members, and the number of people attending the Last Supper was, you guessed it, 13.  

In comparison, 12 is almost divine, a number so wholesome that it can be found in various religions: 12 Apostles of Jesus, 12 Tribes of Isreal, 12 successors to Muhammad in Shia Islam and 12 gods of Olympus. It’s no mistake that there are 12 hours on a clock or 12 months in the Gregorian calendar. It seems that to incite chaos, one needs only add one to the solid numeral.

Based on the Gregorian division of time, it can be calculated that the 13th of the month is most likely to fall on a Friday, and on average, this occurs every 212.35 days. This year, there are three Friday the 13ths, with the next to fall in July. As the old adage goes, bad luck comes in threes.

While 12 is the preferred measure of months in the Gregorian calendar, countries like India have traditionally relied on a lunar calendar consisting of 13 months.

For the ancient Mayans, 13 was more than a way to keep time--it was sacred. Not only was it a root number that made up the four spiraling arms of their calendar, it was believed that like Dante’s Inferno had nine rings of hell, heaven consisted of 13 levels where their sacred lords resided.  

Mayans also thought that disease and illness could enter the major joints in the human body, of which there were 13.

Some Native American tribes associate the number 13 with the planet Venus, due to their observation that Venus orbits the sun 13 times for every eight years the Earth does. Interestingly, Venus was also the Roman goddess of love and beauty, and Friday was dedicated to her.

The word Friday is actually derived the Norse goddess of love and beauty, Freya. In fact, Norse mythology may be the original purveyor of bad luck in connection with the number 13, predating the Last Supper by several centuries.

According to legend, 12 Norse gods were happily enjoying a feast in the sacred hall of Valhalla when a 13th guest showed up uninvited. This disturbance led to quarreling and in the resulting chaos, one of the gods was killed. To this day, the superstition persists that inviting 13 people to a dinner is to invite misfortune, and will result in death for at least one guest.  

One of the earliest known accounts of a really bad Friday the 13th was in 1307, when hundreds of the prestigious Knights Templar were arrested in France on the orders of King Philip the IV who, like many leaders in the 13th century, feared the power and influence bestowed upon the far-from-chivalrous knights by the Church, according to The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown.

Charged with crimes ranging from heresy to homosexuality, the unfortunate knights were summarily tortured, sometimes to death, in an effort to extract confessions, and at least a hundred were burned at the stake.

It was financial disaster, however, that made Friday so ominous in the minds of Americans, starting with the original Black Friday on Sept. 24, 1869. A failed attempt by gold speculators to corner the gold market sparked its collapse, causing the stock market to nose-dive.

Nearly four decades later, a novel entitled Friday, The Thirteenth written by Thomas William Lawson and published in 1907, popularized the date and its association to the dark side of humanity as it delved into the depraved world of the stock market.

“All the wide world was to him during those periods a jungle peopled with savage animals and reptiles to hunt and fight and tear and kill,” reads a line on page 13 in the book, describing one of the most powerful men on Wall Street, a character named Bob Brownley.

Other notable Friday the 13ths have occurred since, with at least one possibly catastrophic one still lurking in the future:

• Feb. 13, 1970: Black Sabbath's debut album was released in the UK.

• Sept. 13, 1996: Revered rapper Tupac Shakur died.

• Aug. 13, 2010: An engineering train in the London Underground went rogue for 13 minutes after it became uncoupled, travelling solo from Archway Station to Warren Street station. Fortunately, none were harmed.   

• Jan. 13, 2012: 16 people and were killed and 64 injured when the Costa Concordia cruise ship sank near the island Isola del Giglio. The disaster is famous due to the fact the captain did not remain onboard to go down with his ship.

• April 13, 2012: Unfortunately for North Korea, the satelite launch attempt of the Kwangmyŏngsŏng-3 failed, (though many countries count this as a fortunate outcome.)

• April 13, 2029: An asteroid known as 99942 Apophis will come so close to the Earth that it will actually travel within the orbit of communication satellites.

There is a light at the end of the tunnel, however. A Dutch study conducted in 2008 found that fewer accidents, crimes and even fires occur on the auspicious day, most likely due to the fact that many people are extra cautious. So be careful not to break any mirrors, walk under ladders or let black cats cross your path, and you should be in one piece on Saturday the 14th.  

Do you take any extra precautions on Friday the 13th? Let us know in the comments.