13: The World's Most Popular Superstition

Contemporary Review, April, 2005

13: The World's Most Popular Superstition. Nathaniel Lachenmeyer. Profile Books. [pounds sterling]13.00. xiii 212 pages. ISBN 1-86197-628-3. This title, first published in the U.S. by Thunder's Mouth Press, is an investigation of triskaidekaphobia or the fear of the number thirteen. The author's interest was fired by a newspaper cutting about a New York rationalist group, 'The Thirteen Club', which flourished at the end of the nineteenth century and was devoted to undermining belief in superstitions.

After a chapter devoted to the Club Mr Lachenmeyer turns his attention to the origins and history of the superstition: there are various theories about its origins but he accepts the view that it originated with the number at Our Lord's Last Supper. Regarding the superstition's history he shows that it can be traced back to the seventeenth century. As for the present the superstition is in decline, except perhaps among 'witches' who meet in 'covens' of thirteen but its survival shows that 'reason governs a much smaller domain in the world of ideas than we are accustomed to acknowledging'.