Suspicious Dates on the Calendar

Beware the Ides of March

"The Death of Julius Caesar" (or La Morte di Cesare), oil on canvas Italian artist Vincenzo Camuccini. 

I should clarify at the outset that I am not superstitious. At most, I am sometimes a little “stitious”, if that is even a word.

Today, the 14th of March, finds itself neatly sandwiched between two dates with rather dramatic reputations: yesterday was Friday the 13th, and tomorrow is the Ides of March. Curiously enough, the calendar arranged the same ominous sequence last month as well.

For most people on this planet, each date is perfectly innocent unless it marks an important development in their own lives or those of their near and dear ones. But these two dates seem to carry a hint of mischief for anyone who has read history or Shakespeare.

The Romans, who gave the day its name, used the word Ides simply for the middle of the month. Their 31-day month began with a Kalend, days 2-6 were ‘before the Nones’, day 7 was the Nones. Days 8-14 were ‘before the Ides’ and the 15^th was the Ides. It was also the day on which debts were settled, which already sounds a little ominous if you happened to owe money. In the early Roman calendar, it even coincided with the full moon, a celestial body that has long had a reputation for stirring human imagination.

The date earned its dark reputation because Roman ruler Julius Caesar was assassinated on the 15th of March in 44 BCE by a group of senators. Shakespeare made sure that the day would never quite recover from this event.

In Julius Caesar, a soothsayer warns him: “Beware the Ides of March.” Caesar dismisses the warning, as well as the anxious dreams of his wife Calpurnia, and proceeds to the Senate. The result is one of history’s most famous betrayals and one of literature’s most quoted lines: “Et tu, Brute?”

Ever since then, the phrase “Et tu, Brute?” (You too, Brutus?)  is the line people reach for when betrayal comes from a trusted friend- a reminder that the most painful blows often come from the closest quarters.

Of course, if you look hard enough, history will oblige. Wars, abdications, disasters and revolutions have all happened on the 15th of March at various points in time. The date has therefore managed to gather a faint aura of notoriety.

Friday the 13th has acquired a reputation of its own. I became aware of it fairly early in life because my home city, Chandigarh, famously has no Sector 13. The city’s planner, Le Corbusier, was apparently uneasy about the number.

The number thirteen has long had an awkward place in Western imagination. At the Last Supper there were thirteen people at the table-  Jesus and his 12 disciples. Judas, the betrayer, is often described as the thirteenth guest. Norse mythology also features an uninvited 13th guest, the trickster Loki, whose arrival at a banquet leads to the death of the beloved god Balder.

The fear is taken seriously enough to have acquired an impressively long Greek name: paraskevidekatriaphobia — the fear of Friday the 13th. People afflicted by it avoid travel, business deals, and important decisions on that day, causing what economists claim are significant financial losses.

Interestingly, in 2026 Friday the 13th will occur three times, whenever the first day of the month happens to be a Sunday.

Of course, the dates themselves are entirely harmless. Misfortune rarely bothers to consult the calendar before arriving. But if you happen to be the sort of person who avoids black cats, ladders, cracked mirrors and suspicious coincidences, yesterday must have been a rather uncomfortable day, and tomorrow may not bring much reassurance either.

For the rest of us, the calendar will quietly turn to the 15th of March — which, incidentally, is also observed as World Consumer Rights Day. Those celebrating it may proceed without fear. Even the Ides, one hopes, do not interfere with shopping rights. 

                                                                                        - Anupama S Mani