Bad Luck Superstations

For hundreds of years all over the world people have believed in superstitions. Both bad

and good. Many people think that superstitions are nonsense that they are beliefs not based on

reason or logic. The definition of superstition is; excessively credulous belief in and reverence

for supernatural beings. A widely held but unjustified belief in supernatural causation leading to

certain consequences of an action or event, or a practice based on such a belief.

Many bad luck superstitions have come to be because of people’s ignorance while others

were told to influence peoples lives and behaviors, to scare them into doing or not doing

something. The same superstition changes from culture to culture, country to country and

different time eras.

Bad luck superstitions can be based on animals, objects, numbers or even an action of

someone. Some of the most common well-known superstitions are black cats crossing your path,

Friday the 13th, the number 666, walking under a ladder, breaking a mirror, things that come in

threes and one of my favorites is a horse shoe hanging upside down. (6)

Many people believe that if a black cat crosses your path then bad luck will come your

way. As a young girl I remember my mom turning the car around and going a different direction

because a black cat had run across the road. Black cats have played a long-time role in bad luck

superstition, folklore, and mythology for centuries.

Starting back in the middle ages black cats were considered too be affiliated with evil,

they were connected with being a servant of witches or a witch that had transformed herself into
the black cat. Black cats were believed to spy on people for the witch. During the 16th-century in

Italy, people believed that if someone was sick, they would die if a black cat came in and laid on

their bed. If a black cat was seen at a funeral procession it was believed that another member of

the family would die. Years ago, railroad workers were afraid that if a black cat crossed the train

tracks at night it was a bad omen that one of the workers would die. I Germany they considered

black cats an omen of evil and kept them away from their children. (1) Many of these

superstitions were brought from other countries to America. The folklore of the black cat has

been as popular symbol during Halloween as is the witch or jack-o-lantern. (7)

The fear of Friday the 13th has been given a name called “paraskevidekatriaphobia”

which is from the Greek words Paraskevi (meaning Friday) and dekatreis (meaning thirteen).

The superstition is believed to have been started from the superstition based from the number 13

and dating back to the middle ages from the story of Jesus last supper and crucifixion, where

there were 13 people present and was held on the night before his death on Good Friday.

One theory historian’s have come up with is from a tragic event that happened almost 700

years ago. When on Friday October 13, 1307 King Philip IV of France carried out a raid and

arrest of several thousand Knights Templars. (4) There have been novels written and movies

made about devastating bad things and death happening on Friday the 13th. These have kept the

superstitions alive. A few myths about Friday the 13th are; that if you are born on Friday the 13th

you will have bad luck for life. You shouldn’t travel on that day or you will have problems

during your travels. Some sailors said that ships should set sail on the Friday the 13th or their

ships will sink into the sea. (3)

 Just as the number 13 is considered bad luck so is the number 666, which is considered to be

the number of the beast or mark of the devil. The number is believed to be able to summon satan.

Because of this many people fear the number. This is called Hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia

(fear of the number 666). But other people seem to be fascinated by the number 666. I know a

lady who’s house number is 666, I asked her if that ever bothers her, she told me no, its just a

number. But when President Ronald Reagan bought a home in Bel Air, CA, its original address

was 666 St. Cloud Rd. The Regan’s had the address changed to 668. The former owner Johnny

Carson had no issues with the house number.

The legendary “Highway to Hell” Route 66 was originally numbered highway 666 in 1926.

The highway starts near Gallup, NM, goes through Colorado and ends at Monticello, UT. The

states of Utah, Colorado and New Mexico agreed to change the highways number to 491 in

2003. This was largely due to the folklore and legends that followed the highway from,

gruesome accidents, demon dogs, people vanishing, mad truckers, shape-shifting native medicine

men, and people suddenly appearing in the back seat of cars driving down the highway. (8) I

remember how scared I was after watching the movie “The Omen” which was about a bout who

was born with the 666 birthmark on the back of his neck and was possessed by the devil.

The superstition about walking under a ladder will bring you bad luck is said to date back to

medieval times, this was because back then the ladder symbolized the gallows where they hung

people. If someone walked under the ladder they surely would be hung. Another early origin of

the superstition dates back to the Egyptians who believed that the ladder resembled the pyramids
and if you walked under it the pyramids sacred power would be broken. More recent it is

believed to have been told to children to keep them from running under the ladder and jarring it

which could cause it to fall over or things to fall off of it.

This superstition has a reversal, it’s said that you can undo the bad luck by walking back

through the ladder or crossing your fingers until you see a dog. (5)

If you break a mirror it will bring you 7 years of bad luck. It was the ancient Romans who

started the length of 7 years back luck if a mirror was broken. The Romans believed that it takes

seven years for a life to renew itself. If the person wasn’t healthy when they looked into the

mirror their image would break it and they would have bad luck for seven years, at the end of the

seven years they would be renewed, become healthy, the curse would end and their luck would

be good afterwards.

The superstition was told as a scare tactic back in the olden days, mirrors were not cheap so

to avoid negligence it was told that breaking a mirror bring seven years of bad luck.

The romans thought to avoid the seven year curse the person who broke the mirror

needed to take all of the pieces and bury them in the moonlight. (2) Other remedies they could do

are to take all pieces and throw them into running water, another way was to pound the broken

mirror into tiny pieces so that none of them can reflect anything ever again. If the person was too

lazy they could leave the broken pieces the way it was for seven hours (one for each year of bad

luck) and then pick them up immediately after the hours are up or the bad luck wouldn’t leave.

You could light seven white candles and blow them out at midnight in one quick breath. Another
one is to touch a tombstone with the broken piece of the mirror will help you avoid the seven

years bad luck. My mother said you needed to bury the broken mirror pieces upside down with

the reflective side facing downward.

Bad luck comes in threes. Many people also believe that death comes in threes. So, if a

couple things go wrong people that believe in this superstition will start looking for the next bad

thing to happen. Or if two people die many believers will start speculating who will be the next

to die. I remember my grandmother commenting “well there is the third, we should be good for a

while”.

As a little girl I was always told that you should hang a horse show in the upright U

position and to never hang a horse shoe upside down or all of its good luck would run out. In the

olden times blacksmiths, like my great grandfather, would hang up the horse shoe to keep their

work area safe. I was also told that if we hung a horse shoe above the barn door it would keep the

barn and animals safe and healthy. Today I still hang a horse shoe “U” upright over the doors of

my barns, sheds and even the garage door. This way you will always have good luck coming in

or going out.
 Work Cited

1. “Black Cat Superstitions.” Superstition Dictionary, 2 Apr. 2015, superstitiondictionary.com/black-cat-

superstitions/.

2. “Broken Mirror - Is Breaking a Mirror Bad Luck?” Breaking a Mirror - Meaning of Broken Mirror,
www.mirrorhistory.com/mirror-facts/broken-mirror/.

3. Egyptian Superstitions, www.superstitionsof.com/friday-the-13th-superstitions.htm.

4. Emery, David, and David Emory. “Tracing the Origin of Friday the 13th Superstitions.” Thoughtco.,
Dotdash, www.thoughtco.com/why-is-friday-the-13th-considered-unlucky-3298238.

5. “Ladder Superstition.” Psychic Library ~ Beyond Books, 22 July 2013,

psychiclibrary.com/beyondBooks/ladder-superstition/.

6. “List of Bad Luck Signs.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 24 Oct. 2018,

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_bad_luck_signs.

7. “The Mythology Behind Black Cats and Where Superstitions Came From.” The Spruce Pets,
TheSprucePets, www.thesprucepets.com/black-cat-folklore-554444.

8. “Superstitions Concerning the Number 666.” Home Page of the ReligiousTolerance.org Web Site,
www.religioustolerance.org/666c.htm.