Days of the Week

Just My View

The origins of the days of the week in English

Sunday - Day of the Sun
Monday - Day of the Moon
Tuesday - ??
Wednesday - Day of Odin ( sometimes Wodin ) - Norse Mythology
Thursday - Day of Thor - Norse Mythology
Friday - Day of Freyja - Norse Mythology
Saturday - Day of Saturn - Greek Mythology
The origins of the days of the week as Gaeilge

De Domhnach - Day of the Earth
An Luain - Day of the Moon
De Mairt - Market day
An Ceadaoin - First fast of the week - Christian
Deardaoin - day between the two fasts - Christian
Aoine - The fast day - Christian
De Sathairn - ??

I'm only doing this from memory so any corrections/additions ?
Anyone know what the days of the week were as Gaeilge before Christian influence?

Múinteoir

Just My View wrote:

The origins of the days of the week in English

Sunday - Day of the Sun
Monday - Day of the Moon
Tuesday - ??
Wednesday - Day of Odin ( sometimes Wodin ) - Norse Mythology
Thursday - Day of Thor - Norse Mythology
Friday - Day of Freyja - Norse Mythology
Saturday - Day of Saturn - Greek Mythology
The origins of the days of the week as Gaeilge

De Domhnach - Day of the Earth
An Luain - Day of the Moon
De Mairt - Market day
An Ceadaoin - First fast of the week - Christian
Deardaoin - day between the two fasts - Christian
Aoine - The fast day - Christian
De Sathairn - ??

I'm only doing this from memory so any corrections/additions ?
Anyone know what the days of the week were as Gaeilge before Christian influence?

As far as I know 'Dé Sathairn' comes from the same root word as 'Saturday', namely the God Saturn(He was a Roman god, not Greek).

'Domhach'(gen. Domhnaigh) is actually an old Irish word for 'church' (Dé Domhnaigh - Day of/for church). I believe it comes from the Latin 'dominicum', but I'm open to correction on that. Domhnach is a common word in Irish place names, in the same way that 'Cill' is .i.e Domhach Míde, Donaghmede, in North Dublin.

The word Dé(Day) certainly came from Latin(dies, diei).

Piste

Tuesday...I am not sure of this in English but I know in French it's Mardi, in Spanish it's Martes, probably coming from the name of the Roman God Mars, god of war.

This is also who the month of March is named after.

As Gaeilge "Máirt" I guess could either be Market day or come from the Latin.

mike65

Wiki reckons its Mars

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuesday

Mike.

Múinteoir

Although I can't profess an expert opinion on this, I'd be inclined to be of the impression that Dé Máirt also came from Mars, epecially when you consider that March in Irish is Márta, which is very similar. Also I don't know of any word like Máirt that corresponds to market in English.

Just My View

M&#250 wrote: »

Also I don't know of any word like Máirt that corresponds to market in English.

Mart... http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=48988&dict=CALD

Múinteoir

Just My View wrote:

Mart... http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=48988&dict=CALD

Sorry I meant in Irish, not in English. I am familiar with mart in English alright, cattle mart etc.

bill_lumbergh

Piste wrote:

Tuesday...I am not sure of this in English but I know in French it's Mardi, in Spanish it's Martes, probably coming from the name of the Roman God Mars, god of war.

This is also who the month of March is named after.

As Gaeilge "Máirt" I guess could either be Market day or come from the Latin.

I believe Tuesday comes from an old German form 'Ziostag', where Ziu was the old Germanic god of war, equivalent to the Roman Mars. There was a sound shift in the Germanic languages where z became t in English (German zwei = English two; German Zeh = English toe) and similarly Ziostag evolved into Tuesday

Tabnabs

Tuesday is from the Old Norse/Old English god Tyr or tiw.

Old English, Tiw, Tew or Tiu. In Swedish, Tisdag, Danish: Tirsdag, Finnish: Tiistai and in Norwegian: Tirsdag, Icelandic: Þriðjudagur.)

There's some dispute over Friday, in Old English it's frigedæg. So this would associate it with the goddess Frigga (http://www.ealdriht.org/frige.html) But the dispute is over the identity of these two divinities being linked.

tac foley

Monday
The name Monday comes from the Old English Monandæg, meaning "day of the Moon";

Tuesday
Tuesday comes from the Old English Tiwesdæg, meaning "Tyr's day." Tyr was the Norse god of combat. In countries that didn't have a Norse influence it is the "Day of Mars" (the Roman war god); In French this translates as mardi and in Spanish martes.

Wednesday
This name comes from the Old English Wodnesdæg meaning the day of the Woden or Odin, the father of the Gods. It is based on Latin dies Mercurii, "Day of Mercury"; in French mercredi and Spanish miércoles. The Germans have renamed this day as Mittwoch, which simply means middle of the week.

Thursday
The original meaning of Thursday comes from the Old English Þunresdæg, or Thor's day. Thor was the Germanic and Norse god of thunder. In Germany the same route leads to Donnerstag. Donner can be directly translated as thunder.

In latin countries Thursday was the "Day of Jupiter"; which becomes the French jeudi and Spanish jueves.

Friday
The name Friday celebrates the Norse goddess of beauty Frigg, In Latin the "Day of Venus" (also the goddess of beauty); leads to French vendredi and Spanish viernes.

Saturday
Saturday is the only English day of the week to retain its Roman origin. Saturday "Day of Saturn"; In southern Europe the catholic church remembers the Jewish sabbath in the names (French samedi and Spanish sábado).

Sunday
The name is quite literally the Sun's Day. Attempts by the church to replace this remenant of pagan worship with 'The Lord's Day' failed in northern Europe but succeeded in southern Europe where Dimanche (French) and Domingo (Spanish) have their routes in the Latin dies Dominica which is literally "the Lord's day" .

The etymology of the names of the days of the weeks gives us insights into the political and social history of our nations. The southern europeans and northern europeans have different conventions for naming the days of the week due to the differing influences of the Romans, Saxon and Norsemen and later the Catholic and Protestant churches.

tac, late, as usual

JuliusCaesar

I thought Friday was from Freya*

I suppose Freye, who I was told was a Norse goddess, is a corruption of Frigge?




(*which I note has become popular girl's name amounst the middle classes recently)

tac foley

JuliusCaesar wrote: »

I thought Friday was from Freya*

I suppose Freye, who I was told was a Norse goddess, is a corruption of Frigge?

(*which I note has become popular girl's name amounst the middle classes recently)

Just another alternative local name is all. Same as Freya, Freja, Frija, Frije and so on.....Woden, Wotin, Wodan, Wotan, tomahto, tomato....

tac

JuliusCaesar

Tac! (which is the Icelandic for thanks. Takk virid...ah it's gone now, my other word of Icelandic. Which might lead me on to a long and boring story about me in Iceland and the two 'th's...Yawn)

Tomaytos are named after Wodin?? :eek:

tac foley

tac is the simplified version of my forename - Tadhg - many years of listening to folks torturing Irish names - mine included - got me making it easy for them on the internetty and phone.

My cousins Aithne and Saoirse didn't bother are both are now called Aythnee and Shorsha in the local community.

tac

boardise

My understanding is that the Gaelic form equivalent to 'Sunday' is derived from 'Dominicus' -which conveys the meaning 'of the Lord'
(cf. Dominus =Lord/Master) - hence The Lord's day.
Dominicus then becomes 'Domhnach' as a result of various well-known processes of phonetic change .....
specifically --
Borrowings from Latin invariably lost the last syllable ( Dominicus --> dominic
Then unstressed vowels tended to get squeezed out and lost ( Dominic --> Domnic
Then processes of lenition , common in Gaelic gave us Domhnich
Finally , the sound 'ich' is not found in Gaelic phonology -so it is changed to something more pronounceable like Domnach

nuac

Thanks guys. Very interesting