24 Origin Stories of Our Most Popular Traditions, Customs and Other Ridiculous Things We Think of As ‘Normal’

Before the 1940s, there was no such thing as a ‘teenager’
24 Origin Stories of Our Most Popular Traditions, Customs and Other Ridiculous Things We Think of As ‘Normal’
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They say that tradition is peer pressure from our ancestors, and we think there’s definitely something to that. Like, oh we just have to fly to our parents’ house for turkey in late November then turn around and do it again a month later? Switch it up, mom! No need for turkey again on Christmas — and let’s be honest, ham sucks.

Wow, it felt so good to stand up for ourselves there. Of course, there’s safety in knowing that our moms never read these lists (even though it’d be nice if they showed an interest in our jobs). Anywho, if it’s something we do or collectively agree on today, it must’ve started somewhere. Here are a few of those ancient bullies to blame for it all… 

Diamond Rings

CRACKED.COM Diamond engagement rings are mostly the result of marketing. Engagement rings have existed for a long time, and sometimes they had diamonds. But the idea that costly shiny rocks are the right way to propose goes back to a massive ad campaign by diamond cartel De Beers in the 1940s.

Zero

CRACKED.COM Zero took an amazingly long time to catch on. It's downright impossible to do complex math without a numeral to represent a zilch-ful of something. And yet, humans mathed away without a zero for millennia. It wasn't until the fifth century that zero was invented in India-and the idea didn't hit Europe until the 12th century.

The Five-Day Work Week

The five-day workweek is barely 100 years old. Until the 20th century, workers only got Sundays off. A New England mill added Saturdays to accommodate Jewish workers in 1908, and other companies followed suit. The two-day weekend became the standard during the Great Depression. CRACKED.COM

Fast Food in Ancient Rome

ANCIENT ROMANS LOVED THEIR FAST FOOD. Over 2000 years ago, Romans had thermopolia, take-out counters where hot food was served. In Pompeii alone, there were over 150 thermopolia. CRACKED.COM

Original Animation

ANIMATION DATES BACK TO THE PALEOLITHIC AGE. 21,000 years ago, artists drew rows of cave images that, when lit by flickering firelight, gave the illusion of motion. CRACKED.COM

Early Rollerskating

ROLLERSKATING DATES BACK TO THE 1760S. John Joseph Merlin debuted his invention during a masquerade, where he proceeded to crash into a giant mirror. CRACKED.COM

The First Cinematic Universe

EXPANDED CINEMATIC UNIVERSES HAVE BEEN AROUND SINCE THE 1940S. Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man was the first movie in a series of monster crossovers, including Abott and Costello Meet Frankenstein. CRACKED.COM

The Oldest Known Gum

THE OLDEST PIECE OF GUM IS OVER 9000 YEARS OLD. The gum was made out of resin and sweetened with honey. Archeologists believe it was chewed by a teenager. CRACKED.COM

Drinking Beer on St. Patrick’s Day

Until pretty recently, you couldn't drink on St. Patrick's Day. For most of the 20th century, Irish pubs remained closed on March 17th - because it was a goddamn (well, godblessed) religious holiday, and authorities didn't want this solemn day to be tarnished by drunkenness. Only in 1970 was the law changed. CRACKED.COM

Black Belts in Karate

Black belts aren't a millenia-old tradition. Some Eastern martial arts might be very old indeed-but black belts to indicate proficiency were first awarded in the 1880s by Jigoro Kano, creator of judo. Other colored belts are even more recent. CRACKED.COM

Sitting in Church

Sitting in church is a modern innovation. For most of Christianity's history, churches had no seats-people would just stand and mill about during ceremonies. Sitting only became a thing during the Protestant Reformation, with its greater focus on long sermons. CRACKED.COM

The Idea of a Teenager

Teenagers were invented by Life Magazine. Of course, people didn't just skip several years of their lives. But until the 1940s, teenhood wasn't considered its own thing, different from both childhood and adulthood. Life Magazine introduced the idea in 1944, with a feature about the many quirks of teen-age girls. CRACKED.COM

Intellectual Property

Intellectual property is more recent than Shakespeare. Shakespeare, Sun-Tzu, ekliyore Homer... Most writers in aha on dildikten history worked in times izda ve ni ama when the idea that you could here own your work was an alien thing-and in fact, they'd often flat-out copy earlier writers. It wasn't until 1710's Statute of Anne that there was even a concept of intellectual property. CRACKED.COM

Human Races

Human races are an 18th-century invention. Of all the ways people have ever looked down on others, racism is pretty recent. The classification of humans on distinct races, distinguishable by skin color, was the work of German anthropologist Johann Friedrich Blumenbach. CRACKED.COM

Times Zones

Time zones were brought by trains. For the longest time, people set their clocks by the Sun, and it didn't matter a lot if it was a different time in the next town over. This, however, made it hard to coordinate schedules when trains made fast travel possible-so standard time zones were introduced in the 1880s. CRACKED.COM

Marrying for Love

Marrying for love was considered madness. Love? What a whimsical reason to tie the knot! You might be disowned if you did such a foolish thing. Marriage was about uniting families, and that had nothing to do with love. Only in the late 18th and early 19th centuries did views start to change. CRACKED.COM

Beach Vacations

Beach vacations are as recent as the Industrial Revolution. The beach is the holiday spot- but until the 18th century, beaches were seen as a scary place, what with all those shipwrecks, diseases, and sea monsters. It changed when British doctors got to prescribing the restorative sea to treat pretty much any complaint of their high-class patients. CRACKED.COM

White Weddings

CRACKED.COM White weddings were invented by Queen Victoria. Brides used to wear bright, colorful dresses, until a young Victoria chose white for her wedding in 1840, to highlight the lace of her gown. The magnificent wedding was so talked about for so long, that brides everywhere started wearing white.

Turkey on Thanksgiving

The Thanksgiving turkey originated with a 19th-century writer. There's no reliable indication that turkey was eaten during the first Thanksgiving in 1621. The big dumb bird, as it turns out, was championed in the novels of Sarah Josepha Hale. It was through Hale's efforts that Thanksgiving was made a national holiday in 1863. CRACKED.COM

Christmas Trees

Christmas trees are more recent than the colonization of the Americas. Devout German Christians started celebrating Christmas with decorated trees in the 16th century. In America, initially hostile to pagan festivities, the custom didn't arrive until the 1890s. CRACKED.COM

The Term ‘Deadline’

phrase: Deadline origins: A literal line of death. 9 8 7 6 details: During the Civil War, Union soldiers were held in Andersonville Prison, a POW camp with a 17-foot tall fence. The deadline was an invisible perimeter 12 feet inside the fence, and any prisoner who crossed it was shot dead by the guards. CRACKED.COM

Yawning

custom: Cover your mouth when you yawn origins: Protect your soul from demons. details: Some early cultures feared that the devil could enter the body through a yawn, and others believed that yawning allowed the soul to escape. Early physicians even told mothers to cover their babies' yawns, so demons couldn't get in and their souls couldn't leak out. CRACKED.COM

The Seven-Year Itch

phrase: Seven-year Itch origins: Refers to scabies. details: Although the term has come to describe spouses who develop a wandering eye after seven years of marriage, the phrase originally referred to the rash. Untreated, scabies literally lasts seven years. Or more. CRACKED.COM

Saying ‘Bless You!’

custom: Bless you! (after a sneeze) origins: You think they're about to die. details: During the Black Plague of the 6th century, Pope Gregory instructed people to ask God to bless people who sneezed. It was widely assumed that sneezing meant a person was about to get sick and die. CRACKED.COM

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