Points (?) Update…..
Music Trivia 07.15.07

MR’s De-Educational Quiz – Friday the 13th

  • by MRambler
  • Jul 13th, 2007
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  • Educational
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  • 18 comments

    • What are the origins/background of Friday the 13th?….. The more the detail – The more the Checkers…… I’m going to have to do some digging myself for this one, but, I do know what book I’m going to look in, so-o-o, the answer’s not set in stone yet….. (For a few Checkers, I might be influenced, but, I didn’t say that!)

    MRambler posted this entry on Friday, July 13th, 2007 at 1:58 pm. Posted in the category Educational You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

    18 Responses to “MR’s De-Educational Quiz – Friday the 13th”

    1. #1 by anon
      July 14th, 2007 at 12:10 am

      many sources……combo of Friday and no. 13…. goes way back.

      Fri……Christ’s crucifixion on Fri., Adam and eve ate apple on a Fri and died on a Fri., Fri’s moon brings foul weather, Fri. bad for Buddhist, Brahmin’s and even Romans….they lost a big battle.

      13…….turks dint even like to use the word, Italians either, no number 13 on houses in Paris and a quartorzienne is a 14th for dinner cause you cant have 13, in Norse myth Loki crashed a party making a 13th and Baldur was slain, last supper was himself and 12 apostles, but the superstition is much “anterior” to Christianity.

      this is from THE BIG BOOK.

      should be a lot more on this one.

      this took me forever to type. i deserve a checker for effort.

    2. #2 by Jek
      July 14th, 2007 at 12:11 pm

      I’m not in for the quiz, but just wanted to say that I scheduled a meeting at 1:13pm yesterday (13:13). I was hoping that three 13s might cancel out the badness. Some good stuff came from the meeting but it wasn’t without its problems — one in particular was me getting frustrated and a bit snappy, which was out of proportion to the snappiness needed. Poo.

    3. #3 by Sunn
      July 15th, 2007 at 9:54 pm

      I’ve observed many a Friday the 13th in my lifetime. I cannot recall anything of any consequence happening on those days.
      Let’s see………….Did it have anything to do with the Salem wich hunts?

    4. #4 by MRambler
      July 16th, 2007 at 9:01 am

      Anon, it looks as if you’ve given me backgrounds for Friday’s and Thirteens, but not both together….. But, since you did made a “painstaking” effort and furnished some very interesting facts, you do deserve at least Two (2) Red Checkers for the effort….. As soon as I see one of your comments with a capitol “I”, I will know you are healed as you will have demonstrated that you can hold down the shift key and press the “i” key at the same time….. At that time you will be reinstated as “Quiz-Master” and holder of the “Big Book”……

      Usually, Friday the 13th’s are some of my luckier days….. Along with Jek’s comment, Apollo 13 launched at 1313 hrs on April 13th…..

    5. #5 by Izard
      July 16th, 2007 at 9:13 am

      The origins of Friday the 13th? I would have to say that on the evening of Thursday the 12th, as the sun sank down below the horizon, it only seemed the logical thing to do next.

      Tell me it aint true.

    6. #6 by anon
      July 16th, 2007 at 2:24 pm

      mr,

      it seems that fri. the 13th is a hybrid from history combining the no. 13 and the day Friday to make fri. the 13th……..melded together……unlucky fri. and unlucky 13.

      isnt 13 a prime number? are primes unlucky?

    7. #7 by MRambler
      July 17th, 2007 at 7:08 am

      What I’m looking for is one pivotal event in History that happened on a Friday the 13th, therefore, deeming all future Friday the 13th’s as bad luck…. Of course, since this is a De-Educational Quiz, my source could be all wrong, but, as stated in the Monkeynaut Quiz, I’m sticking to it….. It’s all for a few Checkers anyway, and, if I’m wrong, the Community can have a good laugh at my expense….. I guess Izard was right, the Internet won’t help you on an MR Quiz, and BTW, One (1) Black Checker, Izard, for the astute observation that the 13th comes directly after the 12th……

      Oh yeah, Chief Broken Finger (Anon), what determines a prime number anyway, and how did Friday become an unlucky day?….. That’s PAYDAY for me – Start of the Weekend – Party Night…… Are you sure you’re not a politician, Anon, as you vaguely tell us what we already know and then change the subject?….. But, not to worry, One (1) Black Checker is hereby awarded for attempting to con the Quizmaster……

    8. #8 by anon
      July 17th, 2007 at 11:15 am

      please, just call me finger.

    9. #9 by anon
      July 18th, 2007 at 2:12 pm

      ok, after much research, MR, there seems to be no single explanation for fri the 13th, you looby.

      sorry, didnt mean it.

    10. #10 by MRambler
      July 19th, 2007 at 8:04 am

      As well shown, I am a Looby on occasion, and, that’s Mr. Looby to you….. Here’s a hint: The source is from a book by Dan Brown….. Although the storyline is a work of fiction, the historical references used are supposed to be true (or so they say)…… Another hint tomorrow…..

    11. #11 by anon
      July 19th, 2007 at 2:29 pm

      WHAT?! hysterical fiction? supposed to be true? come on.

    12. #12 by MRambler
      July 20th, 2007 at 7:47 am

      What if I give the answer, Anon, and for Three (3), yes 3 Black Checkers you research it and tell me if there is any truth in it?…… Of course, anyone else can chime in and win the Big 3…… I’ll post the answer around 3:00 pm (CDT) this afternoon and we’ll go from there….. I told you MR quiz’s are not normal….. We need you back at the helm, Anon…..

    13. #13 by Izard
      July 20th, 2007 at 3:51 pm

      Guess I better break out my Douglas Adams improbable-pedia set.

    14. #14 by anon
      July 20th, 2007 at 4:28 pm

      ITS PAST 3:00. WE ARE WAITING.

    15. #15 by MRambler
      July 22nd, 2007 at 7:10 am

      Sorry about the delay – I had a dentist appointment Friday afternoon that ended-up being a couple of hours longer than expected and that threw my schedule way off (are you buying this?)…. Oh well, the source I used was “The Da Vinci Code” by Dan Brown….. He makes the following statement at the front of the book:

      “All descriptions of artwork, architecture, documents, and secret rituals in this novel are accurate.”

      ….And here is the complete answer quoted out of the book:

      “By the 1300s, the Vatican sanction had helped the Knights amass so much power that Pope Clement V decided that something had to be done. Working in concert with France’s King Philippe IV, the Pope devised an ingeniously planned sting operation to quash the Templars and seize their treasure, thus taking control of the secrets held over the Vatican. In a military maneuver worthy of the CIA, Pope Clement issued secret sealed orders to be opened simultaneously by his soldiers all across Europe on Friday, October 13 of 1307.
      At Dawn on the thirteenth, the documents were unsealed and their appalling contents revealed. Clement’s letter claimed that God had visited him in a vision and warned him that the Knights Templar were heretics guilty of devil worship, homosexuality, defiling the cross, sodomy, and other blasphemous behavior. Pope Clement had been asked by God to cleanse the earth by rounding up all the Knights and torturing them until they confessed their crimes against God. Clement’s Machiavellian operation came off with clockwork precision. On that day, countless Knights were captured, tortured mercilessly, and finally burned at the stake as heretics. Echoes of the tragedy still resonated in modern culture; to this day, Friday the thirteenth was considered unlucky.

      Sounds believable to me….. Whatta ya think, Anon?…..

    16. #16 by Jek
      July 22nd, 2007 at 2:23 pm

      Hmm, I’m very skeptical MR. Whereas that event did take place in history, there is no evidence that our culture’s fear of Friday the 13th came from it. After doing some research, the following quote from an article titled “Why Friday the 13th Is Unlucky” on about.com sums it up the best.

      A Thoroughly Modern Phenomenon

      There are drawbacks to the “day so infamous” thesis, not the least of which is that it attributes enormous cultural significance to a relatively obscure historical event. Even more problematic, for this or any other theory positing premodern origins for Friday the 13th superstitions, is the fact that no one has been able to document the existence of such beliefs prior to the 19th century. If people who lived before the late 1800s perceived Friday the 13th as a day of special misfortune, no evidence has been found to prove it. As a result, some scholars are now convinced the stigma is a thoroughly modern phenomenon exacerbated by 20th-century media hype.

      Going back a hundred years, Friday the 13th doesn’t even merit a mention in E. Cobham Brewer’s voluminous 1898 edition of the Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, though one does find entries for “Friday, an Unlucky Day” and “Thirteen Unlucky.” When the date of ill fate finally does make an appearance in later editions of the text, it is without extravagant claims as to the superstition’s historicity or longevity. The very brevity of the entry is instructive: “A particularly unlucky Friday. See Thirteen” — implying that the extra dollop of misfortune attributed to Friday the 13th can be accounted for in terms of an accrual, so to speak, of bad omens:

      Unlucky Friday + Unlucky 13 = Unluckier Friday.

      You are a looby indeed, borrowing from Anon’s comment #9. Here are some more links for you if interested:

    17. #17 by anon
      July 22nd, 2007 at 5:03 pm

      what do i think? i love myths. when a story becomes a myth it takes on proportions greater than truth. and they are told and retold and believed because inside the myth is the history of our nature. the fun is in unraveling the mystery.

      seems we still dont have a definitive answer for the origin of fri the 13th, but we do have the myth. why has a superstition based on ancient myths survived to modern times? what is the mystique we had/have for numbers, alphabets, the calendar? why does poetry and science sleep together?

      i’ll take my two red checkers and one black, dude.

    18. #18 by MRambler
      July 23rd, 2007 at 8:17 am

      I think Jek deserves Three (3) more Red Checkers for his contribution to this discussion and Anon, for raising more questions than answers – all valid, I award you another Red Checker….. More comments are welcome, but the Checker Awards stops here on this quiz……

      Did Jek call me a Looby too?….. I’ll remember that…..

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