26 Salem Confessors Escaped Witch Executions
During the 1692 Salem witch trials in Massachusetts, none of the accused people who confessed to witchcraft were convicted or executed. The accused quickly realized that confessing could spare them from the gallows, although many confessed only after authorities pressured, threatened, or tortured them. All 19 people whom the court convicted and hanged had refused to confess and maintained their innocence. A man named Giles Corey also refused to enter a plea, so officials pressed him beneath heavy stones until he died.
27. In the 13th century, the Spanish village of Trasmoz was excommunicated after the nearby Veruela monastery used rumors of witchcraft to punish the community during disputes over taxes and resources. In 1511, the monastery secured Pope Julius II’s permission to curse Trasmoz by reciting Psalm 108. No pope has lifted either punishment, leaving Trasmoz as Spain’s only village that remains both excommunicated and cursed. By 2016, the village held the Feria de Brujeria each June, where one resident received the title “Witch of the Year.”
28. In 2013, reports claimed that Swaziland’s Civil Aviation Authority had banned witches on broomsticks from flying higher than 150 meters. The stories quoted aviation official Sabelo Dlamini as saying that anyone crossing the limit faced arrest and a R500,000 fine, while flying below it carried no penalty. Two days later, the Swazi government rejected the reports, stating that no law or official announcement regulated flying witches or broomsticks. The supposed ban came from a remark that reporters could not determine was serious or humorous, not an actual aviation rule.
29. During qualification for the 1970 World Cup, members of Australia’s national soccer team consulted a witch doctor before facing Rhodesia in Mozambique. He buried bones beside the goalposts and cursed Rhodesia, after which Australia won the deciding match 3-1. When the players failed to pay the 1,000 pounds he demanded, he supposedly cursed Australia instead, and the team failed to qualify after losing its final playoff against Israel. Australia reached the 1974 World Cup, but then missed every tournament for 32 years until qualifying again in 2006, one year after Australian television host John Safran staged a curse reversal in Mozambique.
30. In the 15th century, a man named Heinrich Kramer wrote the Malleus Maleficarum, a witch-hunting manual that helped fuel the persecution of women accused of witchcraft. Kramer claimed that witches could make men’s penises disappear through magical illusions. In the book’s strangest account, witches supposedly collected 20 or 30 penises in birds’ nests or boxes, where they moved like living creatures and ate oats or other grain. Kramer even described a man choosing a replacement from one of these nests, only to be told that the largest belonged to a parish priest.
31 Zura Karuhimbi Weaponized Witchcraft Reputation
During the 1994 Rwandan genocide, a woman named Zura Karuhimbi sheltered more than 100 people, including Tutsis, Burundians, and three Europeans, in and around her two-room home in Musamo Village. When armed Interahamwe militia arrived, she threatened to unleash spirits on them, covered her hands with skin-irritating herbs, and shook objects inside the house to imitate angry supernatural forces. The attackers believed her reputation as a witch and repeatedly backed away, allowing everyone she sheltered to survive. Karuhimbi later admitted that she had invented her magical powers to save lives, and Rwanda awarded her the Campaign Against Genocide Medal in 2006.
32. By 2012, Saudi Arabia had expanded a special religious-police unit created in 2009 to pursue alleged witchcraft. Authorities in Makkah Province charged at least 118 people in 2009, and nine anti-witchcraft bureaus operated across the country by 2011. One Iranian sorcerer claimed that a jinn worked for both Israel’s Mossad and the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency.
33. Sailors considered black cats good luck and preferred them as ship’s cats in hopes of securing a safe voyage. Fishermen’s wives also kept black cats at home because they believed the animals could use their influence to protect their husbands and bring them home safely.
34. In 2001, a study of U.S. death certificates from 1973 to 1998 reported that cardiac deaths among Chinese and Japanese Americans rose about 7% on the fourth day of each month. The researchers linked the increase to tetraphobia, since words for “four” and “death” sound similar in Chinese and Japanese, and named the result the Baskerville effect. The increase reached 13% for chronic heart disease and 27% for chronic heart disease deaths in California.
35. Before the Battle of Drepana in 249 BC, Roman consul and naval commander Publius Claudius Pulcher learned that the sacred chickens refused to eat, signaling a bad omen. He threw them into the sea and said, “Since they do not wish to eat, let them drink.” Pulcher then lost 93 of his 123 ships and more than 20,000 sailors in a crushing defeat. Roman authorities recalled Pulcher, tried him for incompetence and impiety, and fined him 120,000 asses.
36 French Festivals Burned Cats Alive
From the medieval through the early modern period, communities in parts of Western and Central Europe burned live cats during public festivals because they associated the animals with witchcraft and believed the bonfire’s ashes brought good luck. At Paris’s Midsummer festival, crowds suspended a barrel, sack, or basket filled with cats over a bonfire and watched them burn for entertainment. French kings often attended and sometimes lit the fire themselves. In 1648, French king Louis XIV lit the Paris bonfire, danced around it, and joined the banquet afterward, while Metz continued its cat-burning custom until 1765.
37. Folklore claimed that a true lucky rabbit’s foot had to come from the animal’s left hind leg and be taken from a rabbit caught or killed in a cemetery. Different versions required the rabbit to be taken during a full moon, a new moon, a Friday, or Friday the 13th. Some traditions added even stranger rules, such as using a silver bullet or choosing a cross-eyed rabbit. The charm supposedly gained its power by combining the rabbit’s luck with conditions people considered sinister.
38. In 1987, Burmese military dictator Ne Win’s government suddenly withdrew the 25-, 35-, and 75-kyat notes without compensation, making about 75% of the country’s kyat reserves worthless. Millions of Burmese lost their savings overnight, further crippling the country’s economy. Later that month, the government introduced 45- and 90-kyat notes, both divisible by nine and with digits that add up to nine. Reports claimed that Ne Win acted on an astrologer’s advice because he considered nine lucky.
39. Generations of Cornish and American miners believed in Tommyknockers, small gnome-like men who lived inside mines. Their knocking could warn of a cave-in, lead miners to rich ore, or signal danger, while their bad side brought missing tools, injuries, and death. Miners considered it very bad luck not to leave them food, often saffron cake, at the end of the day.
40. The mistletoe kissing tradition became popular among servants in late 18th-century England and continued through Victorian society. According to the custom, a man could kiss any woman standing beneath the plant, while superstition warned that refusing the kiss would bring her bad luck. In one version, the man plucked one berry after every kiss. Once the mistletoe had no berries left, the kissing had to stop.
41 Mahler Tried Outsmarting Ninth Symphony
Austrian composer Gustav Mahler strongly believed in the Curse of the Ninth, the superstition that a composer’s ninth symphony would be his last. Hoping to cheat the curse, he left his ninth symphonic work, Das Lied von der Erde, unnumbered and called it a song cycle. Mahler then completed a numbered Ninth Symphony but never heard it performed. He began a Tenth but died in 1911 before he could finish it.
42. Women were historically kept out of sushi kitchens because of a belief that their hands were too warm to handle raw fish and sushi rice properly. Traditionalists also claimed that menstruation disrupted a woman’s sense of taste, making her unsuitable for the work. These beliefs helped keep professional sushi making dominated by men, although more women eventually entered the profession in Japan and the United States.
43. Austrian-American composer Arnold Schoenberg had triskaidekaphobia and sometimes replaced the number 13 with 12a in his music. When he turned 76, an astrologer warned him that the year was dangerous because 7 + 6 equals 13. On Friday, July 13, 1951, a sick and anxious Schoenberg remained in bed all day, fearing the date. He died at 11:45 p.m., just 15 minutes before midnight.
44. The number 8 is considered so lucky in China that organizers surrounded the opening of the 2008 Beijing Olympics with it. They scheduled its symbolic beginning for 8:08:08 p.m. on August 8, 2008, or 8/8/08. Eight carries this reputation because its Chinese pronunciation resembles a word associated with wealth and prosperity.
45. Fuzzy dice hanging from rearview mirrors trace their good-luck reputation to American fighter pilots during World War II. Before dangerous missions, pilots reportedly placed dice above their instruments with seven pips showing, treating every flight as a roll of the dice. Returning airmen carried the custom into their cars, and oversized plush dice became a popular automotive accessory during the 1950s.
15 Most Controversial & Costly Blunders in History
46 Aye-Aye Finger Inspired Death Superstition
The aye-aye is a harmless Madagascar lemur with a gremlin-like face and a long, bony, witch-like middle finger. In some Malagasy communities, people believe the animal is a harbinger of death and that anyone it points at has received a death sentence. Some villagers kill aye-ayes on sight to prevent the predicted death, even though the animals pose no threat to humans. This superstition has contributed to the species’ declining population.
47. Because of “The Taking of Pelham One Two Three”, New York subway dispatchers avoid allowing Manhattan-bound trains to leave Pelham Bay Park at 1:23 a.m. or p.m. In Morton Freedgood’s novel and its 1974, 1998, and 2009 film adaptations, hijackers seize a train that departs the Bronx terminal at 1:23 p.m., giving it the name Pelham 123. After the 1974 film, the New York City Transit Authority formally banned departures at those times to avoid reminding passengers of the hijacking. The authority eventually lifted the rule, but dispatchers continued avoiding 1:23 out of superstition.
48. From 1917 to 1983, Catholic canon law barred people with epilepsy from ordination and could stop ordained clergy with the condition from serving. Although the law listed epilepsy beside possession by the Evil One, it treated them as separate conditions and based the restriction mainly on concerns about seizures during the Eucharist.
49. A Serbian soldier named Aleksa Zdravkovic carried a loaf baked by his mother through the Balkan Wars and World War I for eight years, believing it protected him from bullets and death. He returned safely to Pirot with the bread, which remains preserved at the Museum of Ponisavlje.
50. In the UK, many people salute a lone magpie and say, “Good morning, Mr. Magpie,” to ward off bad luck. The ritual comes from the rhyme “One for sorrow, two for joy,” which treats a single magpie as an omen of sorrow. Some versions add, “How is your wife?” to suggest that the bird has a mate and therefore represents a luckier pair. By greeting the magpie respectfully, believers hope to prevent the misfortune it might otherwise bring.
