• We have updated the guidelines regarding posting political content: please see the stickied thread on Website Issues.

Origin of beliefs and superstition

A

Anonymous

Guest
I've always been wondering where these things actually come from. Like, for example, it is said that if you light your cigarette with a candle, a seaman will die.
Now I don't really have a clue what cigarettes and candles have got to do with seamen. And besides I'm living in a country that isn't even close to the sea.

Another random example: Why does breaking a mirror mean seven years of bad luck? Any ideas?
 
Fledermaus said:
I've always been wondering where these things actually come from. Like, for example, it is said that if you light your cigarette with a candle, a seaman will die.
Now I don't really have a clue what cigarettes and candles have got to do with seamen. And besides I'm living in a country that isn't even close to the sea.

I hadn't heard this but I assume its along the lines of - you can't use one match to light three cigarettes (or something similar). The explaantion was always that i allowed an enemy sniper to get a bead on you and lights are very important for signalling in shipping from communicaitons between ships at night to lighthouses.

I do wonder if such explaations are rationalisations on older fears - both deal with light somehow causing or drawing in bad luck or nasty events and you could imagine that you might want to shield your camp fire from shining out from the cave mouth attracting unwanted attention. Possibly.
 
I looked that one up in my bumper book of superstitions - it is thought that the idea of lighting a cigarette from a candle comes from the taboo of lighting more than one candle with the same taper - it is also thought unlucky to burn three candles together, which may have come from the ancient tradition of only allowing clergymen to light the three candles at the altar. It was also thought that candles frightened away evil spirits.

Perhaps through lighting cigarettes from one flame you are sapping the strength of protection and possibly letting in evil spirits (misfortune). You could use the same logic to the three lights from one match. The original smoker's protection would have to be spread with the others if they shared his light.
 
From the website "Old Wives Tales", placed here in bold because the quote function won't work

Primitive man used "nature's mirrors," such as still water, for many years. Man is creative, and over time highly polished metals became used as a mirror - which gave birth to a form of divination in Greece known as catoptromancy that used crystals and mirrors. It was in Venice during the 14th century that breakable mirrors were conceived. It took around 200 more years before England manufactured breakable glass mirrors.

It is not surprising that over time, mirrors have accumulated many superstitions. The reflective ability lending a powerful hand in the development of these. When photography became a reality, some of the mirror superstitions were carried over . . . but that is another topic for another time.

Breaking a mirror being a negative portent is one of the more popular superstitions attached to the mirror and one that scores of people believe even in today's society. One variant is that the broken mirror is foretelling of a death in the family within a year's time. The more common thought is that the person who breaks the mirror will have seven years of bad luck. Neither version being a bearer of good news, to say the least.

Why seven years of bad luck? This is thought to be a twisting of an older thought, presumed from the Ancient Romans:

The citizens of Rome believed that life renewed itself every seven years. Now this had no basis in fact, but it was one of their beliefs and one that could be transferred to the mirror. Simplistic thinking had that since the mirror held the person's image then it was the person's reflected image that damaged a mirror. This was felt to symbolize that the last person who looked into it when it became broken was in ill-health. So, the person was "broken," and the omen by the mirror breaking was that he or she would not get well for seven years [renewal].

Another explanation for the number seven may been due to phases of the moon.So how can one reverse the negative portent of a broken mirror? There are two ways I have found listed in books:

Gather up the shards and throw in a river or stream; taking care to not see your reflection in any of the shards or the water. The reversal won't work if you "see yourself".
If you don't have access to a stream or river, then gather up all the pieces of the broken mirror. Pound the shards into smaller pieces. Do this until you have broken all the pieces of the mirror to the point that no one else can use any of the pieces of it to see himself. Then dispose of the 'dust'.


http://www.oldwivestales.net/QandAarticle1003.html
 
Back
Top