Scribd
Upload
83 views

How Were The Weekdays Named

The document discusses the origins and naming of the weekdays. Originally, time was divided into months only, but people began fixing days for activities like trade every seventh or tenth day. The Babylonians considered seven sacred and treated every seventh day as special. The Egyptians adopted a seven-day week named for the sun and five planets, as the moon's phases take about seven days. The Romans also used this system. Today's weekday names come from Anglo-Saxon gods - Sunday for the sun god, Monday for the moon, Tuesday for Mars, Wednesday for Woden, Thursday for Thor, Friday for Frigg, and Saturday for Saturn. The Roman system of midnight to midnight is now standard worldwide.

Uploaded by

Abhiyan Anala Arvind
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
83 views

How Were The Weekdays Named

The document discusses the origins and naming of the weekdays. Originally, time was divided into months only, but people began fixing days for activities like trade every seventh or tenth day. The Babylonians considered seven sacred and treated every seventh day as special. The Egyptians adopted a seven-day week named for the sun and five planets, as the moon's phases take about seven days. The Romans also used this system. Today's weekday names come from Anglo-Saxon gods - Sunday for the sun god, Monday for the moon, Tuesday for Mars, Wednesday for Woden, Thursday for Thor, Friday for Frigg, and Saturday for Saturn. The Roman system of midnight to midnight is now standard worldwide.

Uploaded by

Abhiyan Anala Arvind
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 1

How were the Weekdays Named?

A week, sometimes called as a sennight, is a period of seven days usually


reckoned from midnight on Saturdays. These seven days are known by different names.
But thousands of years ago the division of time was of the month only. After a long time,
man felt the necessity of fixing days for marketing, trade, religious activities and rest. In
the beginning, at some places, every tenth day was fixed for these activities. At some
other places, one day after every seven or every five days was fixed for such activities.
In Babylonia, the number seven was regarded as sacred by the ancient Babylonians and
therefore every seventh day was treated as a special day. The Egyptians also adopted
the seven-day system. The 4 phases (new moon, quarter moon, full moon, last-quarter)
of the moon take approximately 7 days each. This fact must have given man the idea to
divide time into weeks of 7 days.
The Egyptians named the seven days after the names of the sun and the five
planets, and the moon. The names being Sunday, Monday, Marsday, Mercury day,
Jupiter day, Venus day and Saturday. The Romans also adopted this seven-day system.
The present names of the weekdays are derived from the Anglo-saxon system. The
days have been named after the names of their gods. The day named after the Sun God
is called Sunnandaeg or Sunday. The moons day is Monandaeg or Monday. Similarly
the day named after the planet Mars is called Tiwesdaeg or Tuesday. Instead of
Mercurys name, that of God Woden was given to Wednesday. Jupiters day became the
God Thor day Thordaeg or Thursday, the day of Venus was named after the wife of
God Odin, Frigg as Friggdaeg or Friday and Saturns day is Saeterndaeg or Saturday.
A day used to be counted as an interval between the sunrise and the sunset, but the
Romans counted it from midnight to next midnight. This system is now prevalent in
almost all the countries of the world.

Page 1 of 1

You might also like