Weird And Wonderful World Of Superstitions

[uk666]

Weird And Wonderful World Of Superstitions

From rabbit's feet to broken mirrors, try your luck with these supernatural stories. Irrational as they may be, we all have a superstition or two. 

Whether it's a lucky pair of pants or an aversion to Friday the 13th, superstitions are important to us because they give meaning to the often-random nature of luck and put us in the driving seat of our destiny. 

Stevie Wonder famously sang 'When you believe in things that you don't understand, then we suffer… Superstition isn’t the way'. But psychologists suggest that the everyday superstitions we know and love, knocking on wood, crossing our fingers, and carrying lucky charms, may actually may help us out, particularly if we're feeling a loss of control. 

Chris French warns against anything which puts our sense of control outside ourselves in difficult situations: 'Belief in possession and exorcism can result in tragic cases of child abuse and even death.People can become totally psychologically dependent upon advice from expensive psychic hotlines and middle-class fads like feng shui and crystal power, will have a very negative impact on your bank balance.'

Despite such warnings, perhaps we can conclude by returning to poet John Clare. If superstitions are indeed 'engrafted on the human mind', they are likely to be a fruitful area for psychological research for many years to come.

Here we run through the surprising cultural histories behind some of the world's most common supernatural beliefs.

1. Knocking on Wood
Any list of superstitions would have to begin with arguably the most well-known and universal superstition: ‘to knock on wood.’

The actual origins, and even meanings, of the phrase are as varied as the cultures which use it, with some suggesting roots in the Indo-European or Celtic belief that spirits good and bad resided in trees, who could be either called upon for protection or chased away by knocking on their home, and others (particularly Christians) linking the practice to the magical power of the wooden Crucifix. 

Most likely among the different theories, historians have attributed the superstition to a 19th-century British children’s game called “Tiggy Touchwood” in which young players claimed immunity from being tagged by touching the nearest piece of wood. 

2. Throwing Salt Over Your Shoulder
Perhaps the next most common superstition, at least in the West, involves tossing salt over one’s shoulder. Like ‘knocking on wood,’ this superstition also involves the idea of ‘warding off evil’ - in this case, the Devil himself. 

In Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper, Jesus’ betrayer, Judas Iscariot, is portrayed as having accidentally spilled salt. Since Judas was associated with doing something bad, the argument goes that, ipso facto, so was salt, and throwing it over your shoulder would blind the devil waiting there.

3. Black cats crossing your path
As companion animals for humans for thousands of years, cats play all sorts of mythological roles. In ancient Egypt, cats were revered; today, Americans collectively keep more than 81 million cats as pets.

So why keep a black cat out of your path? Most likely, this superstition arises from old beliefs in witches and their animal familiars, which were often said to take the form of domestic animals like cats.

4. Walking Under a Ladder
The superstition of not wanting to walk under a ladder also has roots in Christian symbolism: the “Holy Trinity” of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit led to an association of the number three with something sacred. 

The triangle, with its three sides, came to be regarded as sacred as well, and a ladder of course forms a triangle, so, naturally, to walk under that ladder would be to destroy the sanctity of the Trinity and thus incur punishment.

The ladder’s resemblance to gallows also didn’t help matters, nor did the fact of the obvious danger of something falling from it.

Finally, the Egyptians apparently thought that one might accidentally spot a god going up or down on a ladder and so avoided it. Must have made building all those tall pyramids difficult.

5. Broken Mirror
The belief that a broken mirror brings bad luck most likely has its origins in the simple fact that reflections of ourselves are uncanny and often unnerving (particularly on a “bad hair” day), so humans have long had bad associations with them. 

Take, for example, the Greek myth of Narcissus, or the idea that a crack in a mirror would somehow break its charm or trap one’s soul.

It was the ancient Romans, however, who contributed the notion that a broken mirror would bring seven years of bad luck, since it was believed that only poor health would cause a mirror to crack, and the number seven was seen by the Romans as the number of years required to complete a full life-cycle of sickness and renewal. 

As a result, a broken mirror meant you were headed toward a death-spiral that might take seven years to pull yourself out of! But, then, those same Romans felt you could prevent that horrible outcome by gathering the broken pieces of the mirror and burying them by moonlight, so should we really trust them about all the bad luck stuff?

6. Step on a Crack, Break Your Mother’s Back
Another superstition involving something cracked or broken being associated with bad luck is the superstition of “stepping on a crack” as foretelling, or even causing, harm to a family member. 

As with mirrors, cracks, in the earth, on a sidewalk, or almost anywhere, have long been seen as portals to the realm of the supernatural, for both good and ill. To step on those cracks might be to invite or release unwelcome spirits into the world ready to do one harm.

7. Lucky Pennies
The idea that finding a penny would bring good luck also originates in folk beliefs, in this case based on the idea that metal, regarded by many ancient cultures as quite valuable, was sent by the gods to protect those whom they favoured. Pennies being made from metal, find them and you’ll have good fortune. 

But, be careful: some say the luck could break either way, and that if you find a penny tails up, you should turn it over and leave it for the next person or you’ll actually have bad luck.

8. Beginner's luck
Usually grumbled by an expert who just lost a game to a novice, "beginner's luck" is the idea that newbies are unusually likely to win when they try out a sport, game, or activity for the first time.

Beginners might come out ahead in some cases because the novice is less stressed out about winning. Too much anxiety, after all, can hamper performance. Or it could just be a statistical fluke, especially in chance-based gambling games.

Or, like many superstitions, a belief in beginner's luck might arise because of confirmation bias.

Confirmation bias is a psychological phenomenon in which people are more likely to remember events that fit their worldview. If you believe you're going to win because you're a beginner, you're more likely to remember all the times you were right, and forget the times you ended up in last place.

9. Bad luck comes in threes
Remember confirmation bias? The belief that bad luck comes in threes is a classic example. A couple of things go wrong, and believers may start to look for the next bit of bad luck. A lost shoe might be forgotten one day, but seen as the third in a series of bad breaks the next.

10. A rabbit's foot will bring you luck
Talismans and amulets are a time-honoured way of fending off evil; consider the crosses and garlic that are supposed to keep vampires at bay. Rabbit feet as talismans may hark back to early Celtic tribes in Britain. 

They may also arise from hoodoo, a form of African-American folk magic and superstition that blends Native American, European and African tradition

11. Lucky Horseshoe
Another object commonly thought to be lucky is the horseshoe. Earliest origins of the horseshoe’s function as a good luck charm reside in its vulval shape (seen upside down) and the invocation of the pagan moon goddess Diana and her ‘sacred vulva’.

As with pennies, metal being seen as both valuable and magical, iron in particular was thought by early Europeans as something capable of warding off evil spirits. And, as with the Romans and the lucky number seven, horseshoes frequently featured seven nail holes.

The most famous story of a horseshoe bringing good luck, however, refers to the story of Saint Dunstan, who apparently worked as a blacksmith prior to attaining sainthood. 

The story goes that, one day, the Devil rode into Dunstan’s shop requesting new shoes for his horse. Dunstan, recognizing the Devil, played it off nonchalantly, and, rather than nailing the shoes to the horse, nailed one to the Devil's foot instead. 

In agony, the Devil agreed never to enter a house with a horseshoe nailed above the door if Dunstan would simply agree to remove the shoe.

12. Friday the 13th
Like the number 7 for the Romans, magical significance has been attached to the number 13, but this time, it’s unlucky rather than lucky. 

The number 12 has frequently been seen as positive (12 months of the year and 12 signs of the zodiac, for example, or 12 days of Christmas and 12 tribes of Israel), naturally making its nearest neighbouring number to the north negative.

Like other superstitions surrounding the Last Supper, the 13th is also seen as unlucky because, once again, the Great Betrayer, Judas Iscariot, was the 13th member of the dinner party that led to Christ’s crucifixion. 

Dude couldn’t catch a break! In addition, on Friday the 13th of October 1307, King Philip IV of France arrested and put to death hundreds of the Templar Knights.

13. Fingers Crossed
The superstition of crossing one’s fingers bringing the lucky “finger-crosser” good luck comes from pre-Christian, Pagan times in Western Europe, when the practice of making a cross with your own and the index finger of another person was thought to concentrate the forces of good spirits and to seal a pact or a wish with the fellow-crosser.

Over time, people realized they could simply bless their own wishes by crossing first their two index fingers, and then later simply the index and middle fingers of one hand, which is what we do today.

14. The Number of Four
As we’ve seen with numbers like thirteen and seven, numbers are frequently assigned different magical significance or status depending on the culture in question. For the Chinese, the number “four” is a no-no, due to the similarity in its pronunciation, in Chinese, to the word for “death.”

15. Curse of the Evil Eye
It's a common belief—spanning the Mediterranean, Middle east, and South Asia, that's been held for thousands of years that to achieve too much success would be to invite the anger or inspire the envy of the gods, who would then smite the unfortunate individual with a reversal of fortune. 

In response to the fear of this curse, people across the ancient Mediterranean began fashioning amulets and beads with an image of an 'evil eye', sometimes referred to as nazars, which would then help ward off that horrible, untoward fate.

16. Itchy Palms
Depending which palm of yours begins to itch, you may find yourself in the Caribbean with a bit of extra spending money, or in the red. It is a common belief that an itchy left palm means you will owe money soon, whereas an itchy right palm means money is coming your way. 

There is an explanation that might tell us why such a distinction. The left-hand seems to hold passive energy, and the right-hand active energy which symbolically could explain the coming in and out of money.

17. 666
Three sixes in a row give some people the chills. It's a superstition that harks back to the Bible. In the Book of Revelation, 666 is given as the number of the "beast," and is often interpreted as the mark of Satan and a sign of the end times.

According to State University of New York at Buffalo anthropologist Philips Stevens, the writer of Revelation was writing to persecuted Christians in code, so the numbers and names in the book are contemporary references. 

Three sixes in a row are probably the numeric equivalent of the Hebrew letters for the first-century Roman Emperor Nero. [End of the World? Top Doomsday Fears]

18. Make a wish on a wishbone
The tradition of turkey bone tug-of-war goes back a long way. Legend has it that first-century Romans used to fight over dried wishbones, which they believed were good luck and would accidentally break them, ushering in the idea that whoever has the largest bit of bone gets their wish. 

Bird bones have also been used in divination throughout history, with a supposed soothsayer throwing the bones and reading their patterns to predict the future.

19. No umbrellas inside
And not just because you'll poke someone's eye out. Opening an umbrella indoors is supposed to bring bad luck, though the origins of this belief are murky.

Legends abound, from a story of an ancient Roman woman who happened to have opened her umbrella moments before her house collapsed, to the tale of a British prince who accepted two umbrellas from a visiting king and died within months. 

Like the "don't walk under a ladder" superstition, this seems to be a case of a myth arising to keep people from doing something that is slightly dangerous in the first place.

20. Blessing a sneeze to blow away an ill wind
We have to go back to Pope Gregory the Great and the 6th century for the origins of this superstition. 

There was an awful illness throughout Italy, and the main symptom was someone sneezing chronically, followed by death soon after. 

So, Pope Gregory encouraged those that were free of the illness to pray for others, ordering them to say 'God bless you' if they heard someone sneeze and 'God help me' if they were sneezing alone... that's eerily familiar!