Fingers crossed: Where do our superstitions come from?

WHAT do Macbeth, John Wayne, Genghis Khan, chicken soup and heartburn have in common?

The answer is, nothing much, unless you are superstitious, in which case they can all be utterly life-changing.

A new book takes an in-depth look at the world of superstition, why we believe what we do, why some things just seem plain cursed, and why some of us are far more superstitious than others.

One of the things author Roy Bainton looked at was how both sexes treat superstition, and he reveals: “Women are significantly more superstitious than men — 51% of women said that they were very or somewhat superstitious, compared to just 29% of men.

“Far more women than men cross their fingers — 75% of women versus 50% of men — and touch wood, it’s 83% of women, 61% of men.”

Interestingly, we seem to get less superstitious as we age, with almost 60% of us believing in the oddest of things aged 11 to 15, but just 35% of us by the time we are over 50.

One thing that’s become clear is that the world should have listened to Genghis Khan, feared Mongol Emperor who took over half the world.

Khan, it seems, really did put a curse on us when he warned: “Know that you have committed great sins. If you ask me what proof I have for these words, I say it is because I am the punishment of God.

“If you had not committed great sins, God would not have sent a punishment like me upon you!”

He, it turns out, was just one figure we should never try to make a movie about — just like those archaeologists who ignored curses and dug up Egyptian tombs, things came back to haunt them.

In 1956, billionaire Howard Hughes fancied making a movie about Temujin, the man who would become better-known as Genghis Khan.

Despite not looking terribly Mongolian, John Wayne was chosen to play him in The Conqueror.

It would become a costly adventure, and not just financially.

“The adventure that ensued has gone into Hollywood history as probably the worst, most badly-written, directed and miscast turkey ever made!” says Roy.

“By 1980, 91 of the 220-plus crew had been diagnosed with cancer, with 46 of them dying of the affliction that would also kill its star, director and producer, and with one committing suicide on learning of its severity.”

John Wayne himself was a deeply superstitious man.

If you dared leave a hat on his bed, he’d go into a rage, and nobody was allowed to pass him the salt at the table, for instance.

Commentators also say that Howard Hughes would watch the movie again and again, on an almost nightly basis.

The rest of the world hated it — including the Russians, who Wayne had invited to premiere it, to promote peace between them and the USA. Moscow hated it, too, and said no, but thanks . . .

In the theatre world, actors are often superstitiously told to “break a leg”, but where does this come from?

“This saying has a variety of possible origins,” admits Roy.

“In Ancient Greece, theatre audiences didn’t applaud by clapping hands — they stamped their feet.

“So maybe if you stamped very hard there was a possibility you’d break a leg.

“In Elizabethan times, the act of bowing was to ‘break the leg’. There was a practice in vaudeville of keeping actors just offstage — to ‘break the leg’ of the curtain was to enter the playing space, and that meant they got paid.

“Understudies for parts could jokingly say: ‘Break a leg’ to the lead players in the vain hope they might do just that, giving the job to the stand-in!”

And while it may be OK to tell colleagues to break their legs, it certainly isn’t OK to mention a certain Scottish king in Shakespeare.

But why can’t the name of Macbeth be uttered?

“It has been said that the three witches’ incantations may have been taken by the Bard from active witchcraft,” says Roy.

“Shakespeare did actually get the routine from a practising witches’ coven. When they saw his work performed, they were unhappy with his lines and cursed the play.

“Other suggestions are that the Bard himself placed the curse on the work so that only he could direct it, or that he was disappointed by the less than appreciative response to Macbeth from King James I, and for the rest of his life, Shakespeare himself referred to it as the ‘Scottish play’.”

What can you do if you forget and utter the Macbeth name?

“Go outside, spin around three times, spit over your left shoulder and say something rude or vulgar or quote a line from the Bard’s other works,” suggests Roy.

If, on the other hand, you are that bit older, or male rather than female, and think all of this stuff is just old wives’ tales, Roy has some warnings for you.

As he points out, there is actually plenty of facts to back up superstitions.

CHICKEN SOUP AND HEALTH

“According to Dr Stephen Rennard of the University of Nebraska, chicken soup reduces inflammation as it slows down the activity of white blood cells,” Roy explains.

CHILDBIRTH

“If a mother experiences a hard labour, the result is often a baby boy,” reveals Roy.

“It appears correct that we blokes give our mothers far more trouble coming into the world than our sisters do — it’s to do with our size and our big heads.”

AN APPLE A DAY

“This Welsh proverb first appeared in print in 1866,” says Roy.

In 2013, a medical survey came to the conclusion that if over-50s ate that single apple daily, it might stave off up to 8,500 strokes or heart attacks a year.”

 

FISH IS GOOD FOR YOUR BRAIN

“According to a Harvard school of public health study, pregnant women who ate plenty of fish had babies who did well in tests at six months old, because the omega-three fats in fish are important for optimal development of the brain.”

HEARTBURN DURING PREGNANCY MEANS A HAIRY BABY

“The old wives weren’t far wrong. Johns Hopkins University discovered that babies born to mothers with excessive heartburn did indeed produce offspring with more than their expected share of hair.”

The Mammoth Book Of Superstition, by Roy Bainton, is out now, published by Robinson, ISBN No. 9781472137487.