Witching hour

In folklore, the witching hour or devil's hour is a time of night associated with supernatural events. Witches, demons and ghosts are thought to appear and to be at their most powerful. Black magic is thought to be most effective at this time due to the veil between worlds being thinner.[1] There are multiple times that can be considered the witching hour. Some claim the time is between 12 and 1 a.m., while others claim there is increased supernatural activity between sunset and sunrise. In the Western Christian tradition, the hour between 3 and 4 a.m. was considered a period of peak supernatural activity. This time is also referred to as the "Devil's hour" due to it being an inversion of the time in which Jesus supposedly died.[1] The phrase "witching hour" began at least as early as 1775, in the poem "Night, an Ode." by Rev. Matthew West.[2]

13th-century A.D. portrayal of an unclean spirit

The New Zealand Oxford Dictionary identifies midnight as the time when witches are supposedly active.[3] However, during the time in which this term originated, many people had sleeping schedules that meant they were awake during the middle of the night.[1] The association with witches could have been one way in which to shame and persecute women who were believed to go against the status quo.[4] Nonetheless, there is psychological literature suggesting that apparitional experiences and sensed presences are most common between the hours of 2 and 4 a.m., corresponding with a 3 a.m. peak in the amount of melatonin in the body.[5]

The term may be used colloquially to refer to any period of bad luck, or in which something bad is seen as having a greater likelihood of occurring.[6][7] In investing, it is the last hour of stock trading between 3 pm (when the U.S. bond market closes) and 4 pm EST (when the U.S. stock market closes), a period of above-average volatility.[8] This term can also refer to a phenomenon with children in which an infant will cry for an extended period of time with no known cause.[9]