Breaking the Wishbone: The Ancient Luck Ritual

Two people grab opposite ends of a dried turkey or chicken bone, make their wishes, and pull. Snap! The person left holding the larger piece supposedly gets good luck—or their wish granted. It's a ritual played out at countless Thanksgiving tables, but this quirky custom is far older and stranger than most people realize.

The wishbone—scientifically called the furcula, Latin for "little fork"—is actually two fused collarbones that form a V-shaped bone between a bird's neck and breast. In living birds, this flexible bone acts like a spring during flight, storing and releasing energy with each wing flap. But humans discovered a very different use for it thousands of years ago.

Ancient Bird Oracle Bones

Around 700 BCE, the Etruscans of ancient Italy believed chickens possessed prophetic powers. When they slaughtered a chicken, they'd lay its furcula in the sun to dry, then people would line up to stroke the bone while making wishes—essentially treating it like a chicken ouija board that retained the bird's fortune-telling abilities even after death.

The Romans absorbed this tradition when they encountered Etruscan culture, but they faced a problem: not enough wishbones to go around. Their solution? Instead of taking turns stroking one bone, two people would grab opposite ends and break it. Whoever got the larger piece won the wish. Competition solved the scarcity issue and made things more exciting.

From Chickens to Turkeys

The Romans brought wishbone-breaking to the British Isles, where it became embedded in English culture. When the Pilgrims sailed to Plymouth Rock, they packed this superstition along with their other belongings. In the New World, they found an abundance of wild turkeys—much larger birds than chickens, with correspondingly bigger wishbones. The tradition adapted seamlessly.

Interestingly, the term "wishbone" itself is an American invention, coined in the mid-1800s. Before that, it was simply called the "merrythought" in England.

Why It Persists

The wishbone ritual endures because it combines several appealing elements:

• Physical interaction: Unlike many superstitions, this one requires action and creates suspense
• Clear winner: No ambiguity about who got the lucky piece
• Low stakes: It's playful competition without real consequences
• Timing: Perfectly positioned at the end of Thanksgiving dinner when families are gathered

Modern Americans typically let the wishbone dry for a day or two after Thanksgiving dinner before breaking it—a practice that actually makes the bone more brittle and easier to snap cleanly. Some families have elaborate rules about who gets to compete (youngest vs. oldest, host vs. guest), while others keep it casual.

So yes, the person with the larger piece is said to get good luck. But the real magic isn't in the bone—it's in a tradition that has survived millennia, traveling from Etruscan sun-dried chicken bones to modern Thanksgiving turkey centerpieces, still bringing people together for a moment of playful hope.