Where do the days of the week get their names?
Our weekday names start in ancient times with
the astrological idea that the planets rule
the hours of the day.
In that outdated concept of the universe there
were 7 planets going out from Earth in order
of distance: moon, mercury, venus, sun, mars,
Jupiter, Saturn.
Going in towards Earth, the 1st hour of the
day was ruled by Saturn, then Jupiter, mars,
sun, and so on cycling through those over
and over through the hours.
Each day was seen as ruled by whatever its
first hour was ruled by.
So Saturn had the first hour, but then 24
hours later, at the 25th hour, the count was
on Sun, then 24 hours after that Moon.
That's how we got the order Saturn, Sun, Moon,
Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus.
The planets were named for gods of Roman mythology.
In Latin, Saturday was dies Saturni, day of
Saturn, god of agriculture.
English stuck with that idea for Saturday.
In ancient Latin Sunday was Dies Solis, for
the Sun God, but in the Christian era it was
renamed dominicus, for Lord's day.
Most of the Romance languages use a descendant
of that but in English and the Germanic languages
it is still named for the sun.
Monday is moon day.
Roman mythology had the moon goddess Luna
which is why French has Lundi, Spanish Lunes,
but here English substituted its own Old English
word for moon, mona.
Tuesday is Mars day.
But the Anglo Saxons had their own sky god
of war named Tiw or Tyr in Norse Mythology,
known as the one-handed war god (due to his
hand having been bitten off by a wolf.)
The reason that Wednesday is spelled so funny
is because it is actually Woden's day.
Woden was the big guy of Germanic mythology.
The creator of the universe and master of
hunting and war.
While the Roman god Mercury was a mere messenger
to the gods.
I bet you can guess who Thursday is named
for.
In ancient Rome, Jupiter or Jove the sky god
of Thunder, a pretty good match for...Thor.
And Friday?
Well the only planet left is Venus, goddess
of love.
The Anglo-Saxon goddess of love was Frigg
and this is her day.
But whether Venus day or Frigg day, everybody
loves it.
