Jack Yesner Week 13: Triskaidekaphobia

  This is the thirteenth blog post of the year, which inspired me to take a closer look at a topic that interests me: Triskaidekaphobia, or the fear of the number thirteen, something that affects more than ten percent of the population. Why do people have this fear? What makes the number thirteen more superstitious than any other?

Triskaidekaphobia is actually a fear that has existed for thousands of years. The fear was first documented way back in ancient Mesopotamia, where the thirteenth law was omitted from Hammurabi’s code. This documentation though is not very accurate and the code was likely not numbered, so the first real instance of this fear occurs in Norse mythology. According to Norse myths, Loki, the god of mischief, was the thirteenth guest to arrive at a dinner party, which ultimately caused the world to erupt into darkness. Furthermore, the New Testament describes Judas, known by Christians as a traitor to Jesus, arriving thirteenth to the Last Supper. The mythological superstitions of the number thirteen were given a cultural revival in the 1980s when the horror movie Friday the 13th gained massive popularity. In addition, Dan Brown’s novel The Da Vinci Code popularized the misconception that the arrests of the Knights Templar occurred on the thirteenth.

These stories create the Western belief that the number is inherently “cursed” or “unlucky”. Many people change their ways of life to conform to their triskaidekaphobia or paraskevidekatriaphobia, the similar fear of Friday the thirteenth. Over eighty percent of hotels and apartment buildings in the United States do not have a thirteenth floor, and many planes and hospitals avoid the number thirteen. It has also been reported that as a whole, sales decrease by over 800 million dollars every Friday the 13th.

Not everywhere in the world experiences a fear of thirteen. For example, in China, there is a similar fear of the number four, due to similarities in the words for four and death in Chinese. Some people also view the number thirteen as lucky, such as Taylor Swift, who notes all her life successes have had some connection to the number. Do you have triskaidekaphobia or paraskevidekatriaphobia? How has the number thirteen or Friday the 13th affected your life?


10 Superstitions About Travel - MapQuest Travel

https://www.history.com/news/whats-so-unlucky-about-the-number-13

https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/16543009

https://www.cnn.com/style/article/why-friday-13-unlucky-explained/index.html

Comments

  1. AnonymousFeb 2, 2022, 7:43:00 PM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

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  2. AnonymousFeb 2, 2022, 7:47:00 PM

    13 has always been my favorite number because it looks like the letter B, so I guess I am neither paraskevidekatriaphobic or triskaidekaphobic.

    ReplyDelete

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