Superstitions People Had in the Middle Ages

Superstitions in the Middle Ages seem funny to us now, but some of our superstitions came from the Middle Ages. What superstitions did we get from our medieval ancestors?
People in the Middle Ages believed in and often feared witches, changelings, and fairies. The unlucky number 13 started in the Middle Ages. Basically, medieval people tried to understand the world and ended up with interesting superstitions.

They also liked having something to blame their problems on. People blamed sickness on witches, sudden change in their children on changelings, and pregnancy out of marriage on fairies. The church didn’t approve of all their superstitions and tried to convince them that fairies were demons and things like that. Nevertheless, they hung onto their superstitions.
Where did we get the unlucky number 13? What were fairies before the erratic little things we know today? What were some of their other superstitions?

Superstitions in the Middle Ages: Fairies

Most kids start off believing in fairies. They have the tooth fairy who collects their teeth, the little fairies in books, and Leprechauns on Saint Patrick’s Day (see my post on Saint Patrick’s Day here). However, later in life, they set aside their belief in fairies. In the Middle Ages, adults had plenty of superstitions about fairies.

A portrait of a fairy, by Sophie Gengembre

Yes, you read right; adults believed in fairies. In fact, most of the population was obsessed with the little troublemakers. However, they thought fairies looked and acted like humans when they chose to be visible. They usually only elected to be visible if they planned on helping or harming humans. They thought they were human sized and looked like normal people.

Medieval people believed in Fairyland but thought fairies also lived under the earth, in the air, and in human towns. Fairies interacted with humans often and formed romantic relationships with humans. Unfortunately, women would use that as an excuse if they became pregnant outside of marriage. Many people have heard the superstition that fairies kidnap babies, children, and people in general.

Sometimes people would come back while others didn’t. They also sometimes replaced the children with changelings. People blamed all sorts of things on fairies, such as fussy babies and runaway family members. The church insisted that fairies were not real, but demons pretended to be fairies to lead people into sin. However, people hung on to their folklore and traditions.

Superstitions in the Middle Ages: Changelings

Sometimes fairies took children and replaced them with changelings which is a fairy child. The devil was also rather fond of swapping children. One story is about a blacksmith. His son was suddenly listless and ill. To see if it was a Changeling, he put water in empty eggshells and set them around the fire. The son had been swapped out and the Changeling said he had lived for centuries and had never seen anything like that.

The legend of St. Stephen by Martino di Bartolomeo

It was the changeling’s voice rather than the voice of the child. The man burned the Changeling and left to reclaim his son from the fairies. He took his bible to keep him safe and managed to rescue his son. People would do things like putting a shoe in the soup, baking bread inside of eggshells, and doing other unexpected, odd things. Should the child laugh or give itself away in another manner, it was a changeling.

Superstitions in the Middle Ages: Witches

On Halloween night, people dress up, have parties, tell ghost stories, and talk about witches, vampires, zombies, and werewolves. However, our warty, hag-like witches came from superstitions from the Middle Ages. There were two different kinds of witches. They performed contrasting types of magic. The first was more of a wise woman who was good with herbs.

She used white magic, like Glinda the Good from the Wizard of Oz. Midwives often practiced white magic to keep babies and their mothers alive. Love potions were also white magic. People were suspicious of magic in general, both white and black. Black magic was evil, and so were the witches who used it. People who practiced it associated with and worshipped the devil.

The Witch Child by William Powell Frith

Many people blamed black magic for the bubonic plague, illnesses in general, deaths, particularly unexpected deaths, accidents, failure in farming, and whatever else went wrong in their lives. Many unfortunate people were accused of witchcraft for no reason, and thousands were killed. They were burned alive or hung. Belief in witches was not a good thing in the Middle Ages.

Black Cats

Why are black cats a spooky symbol? In the Middle Ages, people believed that witches and the devil could take the shape of a cat, particularly a black one. They also thought witches could send cats on errands. Wouldn’t you like to have a cat get your groceries?

However, most of their tasks would have been bringing bad luck to someone or some other bad thing, so their terror of black cats was a little more understandable. They also didn’t want to cross paths with the devil, who could curse them. If they did cross paths with a black cat, they ran to a nearby church to get a blessing of safety. Cats disrespected and ignored everyone, which was another reason to dislike them. They likened them to the women accused of witchcraft.

The Unlucky Number: 13

Why is 13 such an unlucky number? I never could understand that; I loved being 13. However, the medieval people had their reasons. First, there were 13 people at the Last Supper. Because Jesus died after that, they assumed a gathering of 13 was a bad omen.

Some people thought if there was a party with 13 people, the first person to get up would die within a year. I don’t know how they came to that conclusion. Basically, people worried about it so much that they went out of their way to avoid the tragic occurrence. Later on, if someone had a gathering of 13, people decided they were witches.

Superstitions in the Middle Ages: The Lucky Horseshoe

Horseshoes have a funny reason for being lucky. One reason is horseshoes are made of iron. People thought iron warded off evil spirits. That’s got to make them happy. Another idea came from the legend of Saint Dunstan. He worked as a blacksmith, and the Devil came in to have his horse shoed one day. Dunstan realized who he was and put the shoe on the Devil instead.

Dunstan shoeing the Devil’s hoof by George Cruikshank

Because it caused the Devil a lot of pain, Dunstan had bargaining power. He made the Devil promise to not enter a house with a horseshoe on the door. The horseshoe had to come off the horse without human help, then be nailed to the door with iron nails. There has been some debate on how to put the horseshoe. Some believed the horseshoe should face up to keep the luck from coming out.

Others thought it should be upside-down so the good fortune would go on those who entered the house. The horseshoe also warded off witches. The witches couldn’t ride horses, which is why they rode brooms. Having a horseshoe over the door would make a witch reluctant to enter.

Why We Say “Bless You”

When someone sneezes, we say “bless you,” but have you ever wondered why? It is not just cultural politeness. In the Middle Ages, one of their superstitions was that the Devil could enter a body when they sneezed. That person needed help from God, so people said, “God bless you,” to save that person. It gave them a way to help and feel in control of an otherwise uncontrollable situation.

It also explained why people sometimes died soon after sneezing. Another superstition was people sneeze out their souls, and they needed their souls to live. Saying “God bless you” could help. People also covered their mouths to keep their souls inside of them. That actually helped with sickness, even though the original intent was not to protect others from whatever infirmity they had.

Superstitions about Salt

We do not have any superstitions about salt, but people in the Middle Ages did. Salt was handy in a variety of things, including medicine. When people spilled salt, it couldn’t be put in remedies anymore. So, people decided to use it for another worthy cause.

They threw it over their left shoulder to blind any evil spirits following them around. Smart, I suppose. They had learned that salt made the ground barren for a long time. Spilling it on the soil was almost the same as cursing it. No one wanted to do that.

A lot of interesting superstitions came from the Middle Ages. Did you know any of them? What superstitions do you have? Let me know in the comments! Also let me know if you have any questions.