Speak of the devil

Origin

The roots of "speak of the devil" are deep in ancient folklore and the pervasive belief that merely uttering the name of malevolent entities could summon them into existence. This old superstition, often phrased as "speak of the devil and he shall appear" or "talk of the wolf and he shall appear" in various European cultures, served as a warning against tempting fate by acknowledging evil. In 16th-century England, the shortened version became a common, albeit jocular, acknowledgement of a coincidence: someone you were just discussing suddenly materializes, as if your very words had conjured them. It's a playful nod to a forgotten fear, now used to mark an unexpected arrival rather than to ward off true malevolence.