[OVERVIEW]

Bloody Mary has many versions of the story. Depending on where you are from the rules are different. But where did this legend originate from exactly? Who is Bloody Mary? Why would anyone want to chant her name in a mirror?

[BLOODY MARY]

In the original folklore, Bloody Mary was used to reveal a females future. The story encouraged young women to walk up a flight of stairs backward holding a candle and a hand mirror, in a darkened house. As they gazed into the mirror, they were supposed to be able to catch a view of their future husband's face. However there was a chance they saw a skull or even the face of the grim reaper. This meant they would die before they got married.

However over the years it has changed. In most stories today Bloody Mary is an evil spirit. In most of these stories you must be in the bathroom with only a lit candle as light and say "Bloody Mary" 3 times in a mirror. The lore surrounding this ritual states that participants may endure the apparition screaming at them, cursing them, strangling them, stealing their soul, drinking their blood, or scratching their eyes out.

The modern legend of Hanako-san in Japan strongly parallels the Bloody Mary mythology.

[POSSIBLE EXPLANATION]

So why is it that some people see this Bloody Mary and some don't? Could they just be lying about what they saw? Does Bloody Mary pick and choose who she wants to show herself to? Maybe. But there could be another explanation as to why this phenomenon exists.

Studies show that if you stare at a mirror in a dimly light room it can cause some people to hallucinate. Facial features may appear to "melt", distort, disappear, and rotate, while other hallucinatory elements, such as animal or strange faces, may appear. This is called the "strange-face illusion."

It can also be attributed to something called Troxler Effect, which is an optical illusion affecting visual perception.

Below is a gif. Stare at the + in the middle. Do not move your eyes. After a few seconds you might be able to that the purple dots start fading away.

And with this image below, stare at the + sign again from a close distance. You may notice all the colors start to fade.

It's the same with these kinds of optical illusions where you can see a still image move

There are many types of optical illusions.

There are Literal Optical Illusions. These create images that are different from the smaller images or objects that make them. This picture of an elephant is a fairly standard example of a literal optical illusion.

There are Physiological Optical Illusion. These are the effects of excessive stimulation of a specific type such as brightness or color, such as an 'afterimage'. A common physiological afterimage is the dim area that seems to float before one's eyes after briefly looking into a bright light source, such as a camera flash.

Then there also different kinds of Cognitive Illusions as well. These arise as a result of unconscious inferences and are what most people think about when they consider optical illusions. This was where Bloody Mary might come into play.

There are ambiguous illusions. Pictures or objects that elicit a perceptual 'switch' between the alternative interpretations. The Rubin's Vase illusion is an ambiguous illusion.

There are distorting illusions. These are characterized by distortions of size, length, position or curvature.

In the Ponzo Illusion the upper line looks longer because we interpret the converging sides according to linear perspective as parallel lines receding into the distance.

Next is Paradox illusions. Illusions that are generated by objects that are paradoxical or impossible, such as this Penrose Triangle.

And finally fiction illusions. When an object is perceived even though it is not in the image, such as this Kanizsa Triangle.

So basically, it's possible that Bloody Mary might be an optical illusion to some or an effect of the strange face illusion. This could explain why some people claim to have seen her while others can't.

[REAL LIFE BLOODY MARY]

If Bloody Mary is just all an optical illusion, then there couldn't possibly be a real Bloody Mary, right? Well you would be wrong.

Known later in life as Queen Mary I, the first queen regnant of England, the legendary monarch now known as Bloody Mary was born on February 18, 1516 in Greenwich, England at the Palace of Placentia.

The only child of King Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon, Mary's lifetime of shame over her own femininity began at the young age of 17 when her father annulled his marriage to her mother, frustrated by the lack of a male heir to the throne. This left the young Mary totally separated from her mother and forbidden from ever visiting her again.

The king went on to marry his now ex-wife's maid of honor, Anne Boleyn, who disappointed him with yet another daughter, Elizabeth. Worried that Mary may interfere with Elizabeth's succession, Boleyn pressed Parliament to declare Mary illegitimate, and succeeded.

Of course, Boleyn was later beheaded by her husband for treason, but by this time the damage to Mary's name had been done, and she stood last in line for a seat on the throne.

Since her teen years, Mary had been plagued with terrible menstrual pains and irregularity in her cycles, which would be attributed to her eventual physical and psychological stress later in life.

She was also known to be struck with deep and frequent periods of melancholia, depressive spells which would stay with her throughout her relatively short life.

Despite all the odds and afflictions stacked against her, Mary did eventually take the throne in 1553 at the age of 37 and promptly married Philip of Spain in the hopes of conceiving an heir.
Starved for love and forever seeking the approval of her father, Mary would replay this codependent pattern with her new husband, whom she was "ready to lavish all her frustrated emotions on."

Ten years her junior and in no way as excited to reciprocate her amorous feelings, Philip fulfilled the negotiated duties expected of a royal marriage, and two months later Mary's greatest wish came true: She was with child.

Despite displaying the usual symptoms of pregnancy, including a swelling of the breasts and an ever-growing abdomen, the public remained suspicious of the queen's recent good fortune, and it didn't take long for rumors of a false pregnancy to start spreading.

In a time without pregnancy tests and in which doctors could not examine a sitting monarch, only time would tell if these rumors bore any truth. Until then, the people of England and Spain kept tabs on Mary with a watchful eye.

And so they waited. In customary fashion, Mary went into a private chamber where she was confined for six weeks before her expected due date of May 9.

Although the big day arrived, the baby didn't, and both she and the servants around her proposed that perhaps a miscalculation of delivery dates was to blame, now settling on a new one in June, a month later.

False reports almost immediately spread across the country, however, with some claiming their Queen had delivered a boy, and others stating she had simply died in childbirth, or that her swollen midsection were symptomatic of a tumor, rather than a pregnancy.

Despite the world of gossip growing around her, one thing could be confirmed: Around late May, Mary's belly began to shrink.

Unable to explain or understand what was happening to her body, she continued to wait as those around her slowly lost hope.

June and July came and went as her doctors extended the birth date even further. By August, Mary finally left the confines of her chamber, childless and alone like never before.

She believed that God was punishing her for failing in a mission she set out to achieve just months earlier.

At the time of Mary's pregnancy, the people of England were divided between Protestants and Catholics. Mary, determined to unite her people under "the true religion" of the land, took action by signing an act shortly before Christmas in 1554 that would result in the Marian Persecutions, in which an estimated 240 men and 60 women were sentenced as Protestants and burned at the stake, earning her the name "Bloody Mary."