You know that creepy feeling around Friday the 13th? Well, you can partly blame this very spot for that. Back in the 13th century, the Knights Templar built their European headquarters right here in Paris. A massive fortified tower, walls over two meters thick, surrounded by land they practically ruled.
Then came Friday, October 13th, 1307. On that single morning, King Philip IV ordered the arrest of Grand Master Jacques de Molay and hundreds of his fellow knights, right here at the Temple. The shock of that day burned itself into popular memory so deeply that Friday the 13th became a byword for bad luck. One arrested order, one superstition born.
But the bad luck didn't stop there. During the French Revolution, this same tower became a royal prison. In 1792, Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette, and their children were locked up inside these very walls before the king lost his head on the guillotine.
Today the tower is gone, and the old gates that once sealed off this whole quarter have vanished too. Only street names and faded maps still whisper about what stood here. Not bad for a place that basically invented one of the world's most persistent superstitions.
Sources. Story: fr.wikipedia.org Photos: Par Mbzt — File:Plan de Paris vers 1550 color.jpg, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=33984697
