Illustration by KRISTEN GILLETE/Daily Bruin
By Carolina Reyes
Daily Bruin Contributor
There is a tale that 100 years ago, in an effort to debunk the
superstition that setting sail on a Friday was bad luck, the
British government put together a crew on Friday, selected a
Captain named Jim Friday to command it and finally launched it on a
Friday.
So, the ship set sail on her maiden voyage on a Friday and was
never heard from or seen again.
Because of legends like this and other deeply rooted beliefs,
the notoriety of Friday the 13th as bringing bad luck has survived
to this day. Together, the bad reputation of Friday and the number
has cumulated in a mainly Western fear of the day.
“First of all, Friday is considered unlucky, per se,
because ““ especially in Catholic countries ““ Christ
suffered and died on the cross on Friday,” said Andrew R.
Dyck, a professor in the department of classics.
The diversity of superstitions in America reflects the diversity
of people here, according to David Halle, director of the LeRoy
Neiman Center for the Study of American Society and Culture at
UCLA.
In Western societies, most superstitions and beliefs rose from
the Judeo-Christian tradition, which itself is derived from earlier
times.
For example, one of the reasons for the unluckiness of the
number 13 stems from the Last Supper, Christ’s last meal,
where Judas is considered to have been the 13th of the group,
according to Dyck.
“There is also a belief that if 13 people sit down at the
table together for a meal, one of them will die,” Dyck said.
“And the one who dies is the one that’s going to be
seated underneath a mirror.”
During the Middle Ages, the number 13 was associated with a
coven of 12 witches where the devil completed the 13th member,
further rendering the unluckiness of the number.
Superstitions, which people often disregard today, are remnants
of old belief systems that used to be much more coherent, according
to Halle. But in the past, people strongly believed in them.
“The habit of saying bless you when someone sneezes,
that’s the tradition of Catholicism, because they used to
think when someone sneezed it was the devil coming out of
them,” he said.
The Romans first came up with the origins of the word
“superstition,” which meant an excessive fear of the
gods or an unreasonable religious belief.
Ancient peoples often used myths and legends to make sense of
the world.
According to Dyck, magic and the gods were the earliest way of
explaining the way things worked.
“The ancients believed that the world was full of gods who
could intervene in the world at anytime, and magic was an attempt
to tap into those divine forces,” he said.
Most ancients, especially the less educated, believed in the
supernatural and responded to various beliefs regarding celestial
phenomena, according to Robert Alan Gurval, associate professor and
chair of the department of classics.
“Some ruled their lives by horoscopes and others thought
that anyone who did so was a fool, not unlike today perhaps,”
he said.
Though many people today don’t believe their lives are
directed by supernatural forces, they are still unwilling to do
things that may bring them bad fortune based on their belief
systems.
In many countries, some people still believe you should never
begin a project on a Friday or wash your clothes on Friday. And
they say that if you receive a message on a Friday it’s going
to be bad news, according to Dyck.
And many UCLA students agree that having a black cat cross your
path and walking under a ladder are bad omens.
Yet some students also believe in the good fortune of
superstitions as well.
Christopher Segura, a third-year microbiology and genetics
student, said an itchy palm is supposed to bring you lots of
money.
While an itchy palm may bring you luck, Leydiana Duarte, a
fourth-year, microbiology and genetics student, has heard of a way
to avoid a tragic fate.
“There’s a belief that if you want to prevent
something negative from happening to you, you should say out loud
that you hope it will never happen and knock your hand on
wood,” she said.
For many ancient cultures, knowing which days would bring them
misfortune and which ones would bring them luck was important.
The book “Amulets and Superstitions” by Sir E.A.
Wallis Budge, says Babylonians possessed records of calculations
which extended over a period of 720,000 years. These ancients kept
records of days when tragedies occurred to see if there was a
pattern.
Similarly, the Egyptians based their calendars on a list of
lucky and unlucky days, according to the book.
Dyck’s class on Greek and Roman magic, which focuses on
the different beliefs about magic and the ancient world, discusses
how superstition goes beyond the belief in lucky and unlucky
days.
People in the ancient world believed in such things as the
existence of werewolves and would sleep overnight in special
shrines in hopes of having a prophetic dream that would heal them,
according to Dyck.
“The god or goddess would appear to you in this dream and
tell you how to be healed,” Dyck said.
The book “Curse Tablets and Binding Spells from the
Ancient World” by John G. Gager describes how the Greeks
would inscribe their desires on pieces of lead tablets. Through
these wishes, people hoped to attract the attention of a possible
lover or win a race through the intervention of a supernatural
source.
The belief in the evil eye has also found its way through
various cultures of the world, but has its roots in the ancient
Latin American and Egyptian world.
“The Evil Eye” by Edward S. Gifford describes how
some cultures believe someone can have the power to inflict illness
or misfortune by simply staring at someone.
“We’re talking about the sort of worldview that
people had that lead them to believe in magic and the
supernatural,” said Dyck.
Although Friday the 13th may be an unlucky day for many people,
Sean Bonness, a fourth-year physical chemistry student said he
hasn’t fallen victim.
“I was born on the 13th and I turned out to be pretty
lucky,” he said.