Loki and the Unlucky Number Thirteen

[Munin-Hugin]

Out of randomness and boredom at work the other day, I decided to look up the origins of why the West views the number "13" as unlucky. Among the various reasons given was one that I had never heard before, and it pertains to Loki.

According to what I had read, it was in reference to the tale of Loki tricking Hodr into slaying his brother Baldr with a weapon made from mistletoe. Supposedly, all of the other gods were enjoying themselves at feast, when Loki decided to show up, uninvited. Now, the way in which the number is related is that it was stated that the gods were twelve in number, and Laufeysson made thirteen. Because of his actions at the gathering, it set the presidence for that number to be bad.

While I enjoy this explanation, and like the idea of being able to come up with a number to attribute to Loki, there is something that gives me pause as to when this story had begun being circulated. It is remotely similar to the story of how Jesus was betrayed by by Judas Iscariot, and it is said that he (Judas) was the thirteenth, uninvited guest who betrayed them all and caused the havoc. Unfortunately, the math in this one doesn't add up, or in truth adds up too much. Judas' position as apostle was taken by Mathias, so this would mean that Judas was the 14th arrival, not the thirteenth, which scrambled the validity of that and returns us back to Loki.

Here's the link to the brief article from History.Com.

http://www.history.com/news/ask-history/whats-so-unlucky-about-the-number-13

[MoonRaven]

Re: Loki and the Unlucky Number Thirteen

From article:

Meanwhile ancient Norse lore holds that evil and turmoil were first introduced in the world by the appearance of the treacherous and mischievous god Loki at a dinner party in Valhalla. He was the 13th guest, upsetting the balance of the 12 gods already in attendance.

[Rae'ya]

Re: Loki and the Unlucky Number Thirteen

I agree. There is a lot about that 'history' that makes very little sense:

1) Lokasenna (if that's the poem we are talking about) takes place in Aegir's Hall, not in Vallhalla, though I do think it is valid to remove the servants from the list (who are actually Freyr's servents, NOT Loki's), as you could say that they are not 'guests' but attendants. Though with that logic, we should also remove Aegir, as the host. So the maths still doesn't add up.

2) In most versions of the story, Loki wasn't an unwanted arrival... he was originally there at the party but was sent away for misbehaving. He then cracked a wobbly and went back to insult everyone. The poem itself starts with him going in uninvited, but the introduction that accompanies it in the Regius manuscript indicates that he had already been there and was kicked out.

3) But what I take the most exception to is the notion that "...ancient Norse lore holds that evil and turmoil were first introduced in the world by the appearance of the treacherous and mischievous god Loki at a dinner party..." I have to call BS on that one... or to put it politely, very bad research and a complete misunderstanding of Norse lore. Now someone can correct me if I'm wrong, as I'm certainly no expert, but this notion is not supported in any Lore that I've read.

Now, I don't know the story of when Loki FIRST arrives in Asgardhr... I'm not sure that anyone does, as it's not in the common body of Lore. There may be secondary sources that state this, but unfortunately the History.com article doesn't list sources. Perhaps this is a reference to Loki's very first arrival in Asgardhr... but that's still a flawed hypothesis:

1) Where is the story describing this?

2) Loki would be the 14th Asa, as long as we don't count the Asynjur. So again, the maths doesn't add up.

3) Nowhere is there any indication that evil and turmoil are released into the world by Loki's arrival, except via his fathering of Fenrir. But Fenrir is contained, and thus was never actually introduced into the world (until Ragnarok). Loki has some names and titles that are not exactly flattering, but we must remember that most of these actually come from Snorri's Prose Edda, and are thus subject to Snorri's particular bias.