Why Is Friday the 13th Considered Unlucky? History and Superstition
Friday the 13th is considered unlucky because it brings together two older superstitions: fear of the number 13 and the belief that Friday is a bad day to begin something important.
That makes the superstition sound ancient, but the full story isn’t quite so straightforward. Friday and the number 13 had separate reputations for a long time before people regularly treated the date itself as especially unlucky. Clear references to Friday the 13th only became common much later, particularly during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
There’s no evidence that accidents, deaths or disasters happen more often on Friday the 13th. Still, you might hesitate before booking a wedding, signing an important contract or setting off on a long trip that day. Even when you don’t genuinely expect anything bad to happen, knowing the date’s reputation can make an ordinary decision feel like an unnecessary risk.
Why Is Friday the 13th Considered Unlucky?
Actually, there isn’t one event that explains the superstition. It developed as different religious beliefs, old customs and popular stories became mixed together.
The number 13 already made some people uncomfortable. Friday had its own history as an unlucky day, especially in parts of Christian Europe. Once those two ideas were combined, the result seemed worse than either one on its own.
The date’s reputation then grew through newspapers, books and films. Each new story made Friday the 13th seem older and more mysterious than it really was, even when the explanation being repeated couldn’t be traced to reliable historical evidence.
Why Is the Number 13 Considered Unlucky?
One common explanation begins with the number 12. We divide the year into 12 months, the clock into 12 hours and a dozen into 12 items. Western religious and cultural traditions also include the 12 signs of the zodiac and the 12 apostles of Jesus.
Because 12 appears so often in familiar systems, it can feel complete and orderly. Thirteen comes immediately after it and doesn’t divide as comfortably, so it has often been described as the number that disturbs that order. This is a popular explanation rather than a proven starting point, but it helps explain why 13 can feel awkward in a culture built around so many groups of 12.
The stronger connection comes from old beliefs about having 13 people at a table. By the seventeenth century, parts of Europe already treated a dinner party of 13 as a warning that one person at the table would die within a year.
The Last Supper and the Thirteenth Guest
Christian tradition gave the fear of 13 people at a table a story people already knew. Jesus ate the Last Supper with his 12 apostles, making a group of 13. Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Jesus, became closely associated with the role of the unlucky thirteenth guest.
Jesus was then crucified on a Friday, according to Christian tradition. This meant that the unlucky table of 13 and an already solemn Friday could be connected in the same religious story, although that doesn’t prove people immediately began fearing Friday the 13th as a date.
A similar story is sometimes taken from Norse mythology. In the version usually repeated, 12 gods are dining in Valhalla when Loki arrives as an unwanted thirteenth guest. His interference leads to the death of Balder, a god associated with joy and light. The story fits the later superstition very well, although it’s difficult to show how much influence it actually had on the modern fear of 13.
The Smithsonian’s history of Friday the 13th discusses both the Christian and Norse explanations, while also making clear that the date’s reputation was built from several different strands of folklore.
Why Was Friday Considered an Unlucky Day?
Long before Friday was paired with 13, it already had an uneasy reputation in parts of Europe. The Christian connection with the crucifixion was a major reason, but Friday also became a day when people avoided beginning journeys, getting married or starting important work.
This didn’t mean every Friday was treated as disastrous or that everyone followed the same rules. Friday was also a day of religious observance, fasting and preparation for the Sabbath in different traditions. Its meaning depended on where you lived and which customs your family followed.
Still, references to unlucky Fridays appeared in writing centuries before the combined date became famous. Geoffrey Chaucer included the line “and on a Friday fell all this mischance” in The Canterbury Tales during the fourteenth century. He didn’t explain the idea, which suggests his audience was already familiar with Friday having an unlucky side.
So, by the time Friday and 13 were placed together, neither arrived without baggage. People already knew stories about an unlucky number and an uneasy day of the week. Joining them created a date that felt as though it had been waiting to cause trouble.
When Did Friday and 13 Become One Superstition?
This is where the history becomes much more modern than most people expect. There are older fears surrounding Friday and older fears surrounding 13, but clear evidence of Friday the 13th being treated as a single, widely recognized unlucky date is difficult to find before the late nineteenth century.
One sign that the superstition was already becoming familiar appeared in New York during the 1880s. Captain William Fowler started the Thirteen Club to challenge the fear of the number. The club held its first dinner on Friday, January 13, 1882, with 13 people seated together.
The entire point was to do what superstition said they shouldn’t. The members wanted to prove that eating in a group of 13 wouldn’t lead to illness, death or disaster. The club later attracted prominent members, including several American presidents, and its dinners became a playful public argument against superstition.
The fact that people found the club amusing tells us the fear was already recognizable. It doesn’t tell us exactly when the date first became unlucky, but it shows that Friday and 13 had started appearing together before the end of the nineteenth century.
The Novel That Helped Spread the Superstition
Friday the 13th received another major push in 1907 when American financier Thomas W. Lawson published a novel called Friday, the Thirteenth. The story follows a stockbroker who uses fear surrounding the date to create panic on Wall Street.
The book didn’t invent every part of the superstition, because readers already understood why the title was ominous. It did help turn the date into a phrase people could immediately recognize and repeat.
You can still read Friday, the Thirteenth through Project Gutenberg. Its opening goes straight into a Wall Street panic happening on the supposedly unlucky date, so Lawson clearly expected his audience to understand the connection.
A silent film adaptation followed in 1916. By then, Friday the 13th was no longer just a scattered collection of older beliefs. It was becoming a recognizable piece of modern popular culture.
Did the Knights Templar Cause the Superstition?
One of the most repeated explanations says Friday the 13th became unlucky after the arrest of the Knights Templar. There’s a real historical event behind this story, but the connection to the superstition is doubtful.
On Friday, October 13, 1307, King Philip IV of France ordered the arrest of members of the Knights Templar. The Templars were a wealthy Christian military order that had grown powerful during the Crusades. Philip accused them of heresy, although historians generally believe he was far more interested in their wealth and influence.
Many Templars were imprisoned, tortured into making confessions and later executed. The order was eventually dissolved, giving the date a genuinely grim historical event.
What’s missing is evidence that people at the time began treating Friday the 13th as unlucky because of it. Medieval records don’t show the arrests creating a new calendar superstition, and the Templar explanation became popular much later.
Historic Royal Palaces confirms what happened to the Templars, while National Geographic explains why the event shouldn’t be presented as the proven origin of Friday the 13th.
The story has lasted because it gives the superstition a dramatic beginning. A secretive order, dawn arrests, accusations of heresy and an ominous date make a much better story than several ordinary beliefs slowly becoming mixed together over hundreds of years.
What Is the Fear of Friday the 13th Called?
The fear of the number 13 is called triskaidekaphobia. Fear focused specifically on Friday the 13th is known as paraskevidekatriaphobia. You might also see the word friggatriskaidekaphobia, which refers to the same fear.
For most people, it doesn’t reach the level of a serious phobia. You might notice the date, joke about staying home or avoid making a major decision, but still carry on with your day. A stronger fear can lead someone to cancel plans, avoid travelling or spend the whole day expecting something to go wrong.
There’s an important difference between knowing a superstition and feeling controlled by it. You can find the history interesting without arranging your life around the date. If the fear starts interfering with normal decisions, the problem isn’t the calendar. It’s the anxiety the superstition has managed to attach to it.
How Friday the 13th Changes People’s Behaviour
Even when you don’t fully believe the date is dangerous, you might behave differently because of it. You could become more cautious, put off a purchase or decide that another day would feel better for an important appointment.
This can make the superstition difficult to test. If fewer people travel, take risks or schedule major events on Friday the 13th, the day won’t look the same as an ordinary Friday. Any statistics comparing the two dates could be affected by what people chose to avoid.
Expecting trouble can also change what you notice. A dropped cup, a delayed bus or an awkward conversation feels more significant when it happens on a date you’ve already been told is unlucky. The same inconvenience on Friday the 12th would probably be forgotten by the following morning.
This is one reason superstitions can feel accurate without predicting anything. You remember the moments that fit the story and pay less attention to all the Friday the 13ths that passed without anything unusual happening.
Do Hotels and Buildings Really Skip the 13th Floor?
Some hotels, apartment buildings and offices label the floor after 12 as 14. Others use names such as 12A or turn the space into a mechanical floor. The building still has a thirteenth level, of course. Changing the button in the elevator doesn’t remove it.
The same thing sometimes happens with hotel rooms, hospital rooms, airport gates and rows on aeroplanes. These choices don’t prove that the owners believe 13 is dangerous. In many cases, they know customers would rather avoid it, so skipping the number prevents complaints and makes the space easier to sell.
This also helps the superstition survive. When you repeatedly see buildings jump from 12 to 14, it gives the impression that fear of 13 must be based on something important. Really, it often shows that businesses are responding to a belief their customers already have.
Is Friday the 13th Unlucky Everywhere?
Friday the 13th is mainly associated with bad luck in Britain, North America and several other parts of Europe. Other cultures have their own unlucky days and numbers.
In Spain, Greece and parts of Latin America, Tuesday the 13th has traditionally carried the darker reputation. Tuesday has connections with Mars, the Roman god of war, which helped give the day an association with conflict and destruction.
In Italy, 17 has often been treated as more threatening than 13. Written as XVII in Roman numerals, the letters can be rearranged to make VIXI, a Latin phrase meaning “I have lived.” On an old Roman grave, this could be understood as saying that a person’s life was over. As a result, Friday the 17th can be viewed in Italy much as Friday the 13th is elsewhere.
Time’s history of Friday the 13th gives more detail about these cultural differences. They’re a good reminder that an unlucky date isn’t universal. If one particular day were naturally dangerous, you’d expect every culture to fear the same one.
You can find more beliefs that change completely from one country to another in our guide to weird superstitions around the world.
How Often Does Friday the 13th Happen?
Every calendar year has at least one Friday the 13th, and no year can have more than three. It happens whenever the first day of a month falls on a Sunday.
Sometimes two Friday the 13ths arrive close together. In a non-leap year that begins on a Thursday, February and March both have one, followed by another in November. Other years spread them much farther apart.
The date isn’t a rare disturbance in the calendar. It’s a normal result of fitting seven-day weeks into months of different lengths. Because it happens regularly, there have been thousands of opportunities for people to connect it with accidents, deaths and other memorable events.
Friday the 13th in Films and Popular Culture
Thomas W. Lawson’s novel helped make the date familiar, but the horror film Friday the 13th changed how later generations pictured it. Released in 1980, the film turned the date into the name of a violent horror story and eventually a long-running franchise.
The date was already considered unlucky before the film appeared, so the movie didn’t create the superstition. It gave it a much stronger visual identity. After that, Friday the 13th became connected with dark woods, isolated cabins, masks and the expectation that something terrible was about to happen.
Newspapers, television programmes and social media now revisit the superstition every time the date appears. Articles list disasters that happened on past Friday the 13ths, shops run themed promotions and horror films receive another round of attention. The date keeps getting refreshed for people who might otherwise have stopped thinking about it.
Is Friday the 13th Actually More Dangerous?
There’s no convincing evidence that Friday the 13th causes more accidents, deaths or disasters than any other date. Bad things have happened on it, but bad things have also happened on every other day of the calendar.
Once a date has a reputation, it’s easy to build a list of events that seem to prove it. The problem is that the list leaves out every ordinary Friday the 13th when people went to work, came home, made dinner and had nothing particularly dramatic happen.
The date itself can’t control what happens to you. The most it can usually do is make you feel more alert to problems that were already possible. If you spill salt, see a black cat cross your path or accidentally break a mirror on Friday the 13th, the combination can feel impressively unlucky. It still doesn’t mean the day caused any of it.
Why the Superstition Still Works
Friday the 13th has everything a lasting superstition needs. It appears often enough to stay familiar but not so often that it becomes boring. It comes with religious stories, medieval knights, secret clubs, frightening films and two separate things that were already considered unlucky.
It also gives you a clear period to watch. You don’t have to wait months to decide whether the omen came true. From the moment you wake up until the day ends, every inconvenience can be added to the evidence.
That doesn’t make the superstition true, but it explains why it feels more convincing than a vague warning. The date is printed on your calendar, everyone recognizes it and popular culture has already told you what kind of day to expect.
In reality, Friday the 13th is a normal day carrying an unusually large collection of stories. Those stories tell us plenty about religion, fear, memory and the way folklore grows, even if they don’t tell us anything about what will happen before midnight.