Superstitions of German-Russians, List of

Last Update 31 Oct  2002

previousbanner

Stories of Supernatural and Witchcraft told by German-Russians, their Ancestors and their Descendants continued....

witch, bat, cat

Superstitions Connected To Numbers

A person must remember first and foremost that numbers were in the beginning symbols which were only in the literal sense first understood and then became numerical in their meanings. Back before there was believed by so many that there was but one God, there were many gods, and in order to understand our universe certain "things" needed a symbol.  It appears that astrology which was refined by shamans, witch doctors, merlins, druids and other "guardians of the unknown" gave certain symbols to the moon, planets, stars [for directional purpose], days, weeks, months and finally seasons which proved to work into a year, then two than thousands of years....  These years had seasons such as winter, spring, summer and fall..... And, it seemed that people held certain characteristics when born ......  The Chinese thought in terms of animals such as a monkey, dog, tiger or dragon.  Many of today know we were born in the year of the horse or wear rubies to indicate our birth month is July under the sign of the crab.....  All these days, weeks, months and years needed symbols.  Of course,  even the common man needed numbers in order to count the number of goats they and their neighbors owned.....  Numbers from no number to 10 was easy.  If we had ten fingers,  we could add and subtract with our fingers....  Women figured out their own monthly calendar because of their menstrual cycles...  So, twenty-eight days could be shown on a string with twenty-eight knots..... Through time each group of people used different symbols or used items such as beads for counting.

As time continued and humans thought about such things as numbers and what they had to do with their lives,  they discovered certain things.  They thought there were seven planets which people came to accept as:  Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, Sun and Moon.  This was seven.  And, these planets must have something important reason for being. So, not knowing exactly what, humans gave them more than names,  they gave reasons why they exists, and, how they influence or lives each day. For people to understand stories told gave names of gods attached to each planet.  To prove there was a great importance, man discovered there were seven days of creation, seven seas, seven heavens, seven graces, seven sins, seven seasons in a humans development [pre-birth to life after death].... To add to this they discovered there were seven metals so humans attached these metals to the planets. They were:

The bible seem to run away with the number seven and holds everything from the lamb with seven eyes to seven gifts of the spirits:  wisdom, understanding, counsel, power of fortitude, righteousness, fear of God and knowledge.  The seven seventh son of the seventh son superstitions was used long before it was mentioned in the bible.  Hebrew and Egyptians had already sported the luck of seven so what could be luckier than the seventh son of the seventh son?  

The following are various superstitions linked with each number that touched the lives of our German-Russians by 1800 to 1900. Those in italic were associated with the Christian churches' theological symbolic numbers...

 

O

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13