Walking under a ladder: Origin, Meaning and When It Actually Started

Q: How old is this superstition?

First recorded: Medieval Europe; the gallows association from the 1600s. A ladder against a wall makes a triangle, and the triangle was read as the Trinity — passing through it broke something sacred. A grimmer version comes from public hangings, where the condemned walked under a ladder to the gallows.

When it actually starts

How old is this one

First recorded Medieval Europe; the gallows association from the 1600s

That makes it about 426 years old

Rank by age 20 oldest of 40 dated here

Category Household

Searched 1,210 a month

A ladder against a wall makes a triangle, and the triangle was read as the Trinity — passing through it broke something sacred. A grimmer version comes from public hangings, where the condemned walked under a ladder to the gallows.

What people say

Bad luck, sometimes said to invite death.

What is going on

The only superstition in this set with a straightforward physical justification: things fall off ladders. Avoiding the space under one is sound regardless of belief.

Where it applies. Europe and North America.

Other household superstitions

Breaking a mirror 1,990/mo Spilling salt 560/mo Food superstitions 700/mo House superstitions 460/mo Broom superstitions 110/mo

Recorded around the same time

Walking under a ladder is the 20th oldest of the 40 dated superstitions here. Of those, 6 are younger than a century and 5 predate the common era.

Bat superstitions 1300 Black cat crossing your path 1560 Hiccups superstitions 1600 Horseshoe over the door 1600

First-recorded dates are the earliest documented appearance in written sources, not the earliest possible origin — an unrecorded practice can be older. How the dating works and where it is uncertain →