Moon Mausoleum
An online magazine about the paranormal, haunted and macabre. We collect the ghost stories from all around the world as well as review horror and gothic media.
On the Christian Calendar, apparently the 28th of December is the most unluckiest day on the calendar. The day was remembered as a sort of Friday the 13th. after a massacre of innocent children happened. This is the story of Childermass.
On the Christian Calendar, apparently the 28th of December is the most unluckiest day on the calendar. The day was remembered as a sort of Friday the 13th. after a massacre of innocent children happened. This is the story of Childermass.
Once upon the time, the 28th of December was a day known as Feast of the Holy Innocent or Childermass. Why was it called Childermass? A bit odd name for a church day, but certainly the most fitting because of its backstory. The reason behind the name tells a sad story on tops of the memory of dead children.
“Herod the King, in his raging,
Charged he hath this day;
His men of might, in his own sight,
All children young, to slay.”
– The Coventry Carol
28th of December, or Childermass remembers the day when King Herod commanded the slaughter of all the young male children under the age of two in Bethlehem. The sources of this happening is what we have been told in the Bible as told in Matthew 2:16.
The Romans appointed him King of Judea in 37 B.C, and King Herod executed the children to prevent the new King of the Jews to rise that was foretold in the Old Testament.
Read Also: Check out more Haunted and Unlucky Numbers her in the Moonmausoleum.
Most of the biblical scholars tend to believe the story of the massacre of the children is a myth, but the Church thinks differently and remember the day as it was a real thing that happened. The christian scholars think that the slaughtered children are the first Christian martyrs and are celebrated like that.
In the western church the date is marked to be on 28th of December. In the eastern church it is marked on the 29th of December. Why then do we keep remembering this day that maybe didn’t even happen, perhaps even today? According to a CBC article on the matter, a Dr. Gary Waite, teaching about European religion, witchcraft and the devil says:
“In the medieval era, every household would have experienced the death of a child, The feast of the Holy Innocents would have spoken to an experience that almost all families shared.”
And even though the church never intended that the 28th of December was going to be remembered to be an an unlucky one, folk traditions, fears and believes were not easily persuaded.
The Childermass day was considered cursed by many. In Francis Kildale’s glossary from 1855, he called it: “that the day of the week on which it falls is marked as a black day for the whole year to come.”
No ships were supposed to take off from the ports on 28th of December and it was considered omen for weather. The Childermass day was also a day one didn’t get married and it was dangerous for children just in general. Up until the seventeenth century it was considered good luck to beat the child with a stick on childermass to remember the suffering of Jesus.
Read More: Check out more Sailors Superstitions
Childermass, or the Holy Innocents Day is not really celebrated much today though, and the feeling that the day is unlucky has also dwindled over the years. In some household it is a day were the youngest gets all the power for the day, and in Mexico it is a day for younger people to prank the older.
Today we don’t really head the old superstitions of the olden days. Although. The number 13 is actually neglected on buildings storey buildings and the likes. So… What made the 28th any different?
