Paraskevidekatriaphobia

....or the fear of Friday 13th.

Thirteen as an unlucky number has Biblical origins in Western societies – there were 13 guests at the Last Supper for example.

At dawn on Friday, 13 October 1307 King Philip IV ordered de Molay and scores of other French Templars to be simultaneously arrested for heresy, treason and numerous other offences such as financial corruption, fraud, and secrecy. This event was featured in Dan Brown's book, the Da Vinci Code, and has become accepted as a major source of the superstition.

In fact the superstition seems to have been around since the late nineteenth century and a book by American Thomas Lawson published in 1907 called Friday the Thirteenth no doubt helped.

Apparently In 1976, New Yorker Daz Baxter was so afraid of Friday the 13th he decided to simply stay in bed. However, Mr Baxter was killed when the floor of his apartment block collapsed that day.

The Really Bad News

And if you suffer from Paraskevidekatriaphobia, the bad news is that, unusually, there is another Friday 13th (October) in 2017.

This article is from our news archive. As a result pictures or videos originally associated with it may have been removed and some of the content may no longer be accurate or relevant.