Did you know the French days of the week..

[Ghostpost]

Are named after the planets and moon? Lundi (Luna, moon)
Mardi (Mars)
Mercredi (Mercury)
Jeudi (Jupiter)
Vendredi (Venus)
Samedi (Saturn)
Dimanche is the only one that isn’t. It’s the day of the lord.

Dimanche is day of the Lord, from Latin dominicus, so Domingo must be the same.
Domingo is a popular Spanish name too.

Interestingly, I looked up the Arabic and Hebrew names for days of the week and Saturday in Arabic is El Sabt, which is like Shabbat in Hebrew. So the Sabbath.

@MrsJoshNavidi Nope, and I'm 43. How did I not know this?

I did know this but it's interesting to see them in other languages too.

Didn't the Romans have weeks of ten days? Or am I making that up?

They did think that Jews were lazy, though, because they had a day of rest every week (Shabbat - the seventh day)

Saturn (the planet) is observable to the naked eye

Indeed it is. Even Uranus sometimes is. Don't think Neptune ever it.

In Finnish Wednesday is Keskiviikko which is literally mid-week which amuses me as it's so different to the other days of the week.

The months are interesting too as they aren't based on Roman Gods or suchlike but are based on the farming routines of the year
Jan - Heart or core Moon as it's the core of the winter
Feb - Pearl Moon because the sun shining on the ice and snow makes it sparkle like pearls
March - Earth Moon as you start to see the ground under melting snow
April - Cleared woodland Moon as this was the time of the year the woods were burned to make new fields
May - Sowing/ploughing Moon
June - Summer Moon
July - Hay Moon
August - Harvest Moon
September - Autumn Moon
October - Mud Moon, because October tends to be very wet and muddy
November - Dead Moon as plants etc. die at this time of the year
December - Christmas Moon (used to be Winter Moon)

This link explains origins of a 7 day week

www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2013/04/the-origin-of-the-7-day-week-and-the-names-of-the-days-of-the-week/

I think other cultures tried 5-10 day weeks but although I can't find it at present, there is research showing that 5-6 days is the maximum people can productively work and if someone has 7 or more consecutive shifts productivity decreases and mistakes increase and the pattern of 5-6 days working then 1-2 days off is sustainable long term but 10 days working and 4 days off though technically the same as 5 on 2 off really doesn't work anywhere near as well

In Welsh:

Dydd Llun – day of the moon
Dydd Mawrth – day of Mars
Dydd Mercher – day of Mercury.
Dydd Iau – day of Jupiter
Dydd Gwener – day of Venus
Dydd Sadwrn – day of Saturn
Dydd Sul – day of the Sun

In Japanese each of the days also relate to planets -

nichiyoubi - sunday - sun 日
getsuyoubi- Monday - moon 月
kayoubi - Tuesday - fire, Mars　火
suiyoubi- Wednesday - water, mercury 水
mokuyoubi - Thursday - wood, Jupiter 木
kinyoubi- Friday - gold, Venus 金
doyoubi- Saturday - soil, saturn. 土

The chinese character for the 'day' is followed by the character for 'star' 星　to make planet names, with the exception of Sun / Moon, which work on their own.

In South Asia the days of the week are after rashi’s / planetary prominence in Hindu astrology. Each day of the week is associated with certain letters and in the old days a baby would have a name starting with one of the letters associated with their birth day.
Sunday - Ravi - Sun
Monday - Som - Moon
Tues - Mangal - Mars
Weds - Budh - Mercury
Thurs - Guru - Jupiter (often considered the holiest day of the Hindu week as Jupiter is the biggest planet and influences all of the other planets. People usually fast)
Fri - Sukra - Venus

Italian follows the French and Italian week names (unsurprisingly as they are Latin based languages). In fact they are very very similar to French
Lunedi/Lundi
Martedi/Mardi
Mercoledi/Mercredi
Giovedi/Jeudi (J does not exist in Italian)
Venerdi/Vendredi
Sabato/Samedi
Domenica/Dimanche

Fascinating thread!

Yes, I have known this for over 30 years.

Strike Day
Strike Day
Strike Day
Strike Day
Vendredi
Samedi
Dimanche

What I’m finding fascinating is how western countries are linked to eastern countries with how days are named. How was this link created? Hinduism goes further back than the Romans.

I can’t get my head around it!

Wow. I love interesting new to me facts.

Thanks to all the linguists / International crowd for telling us about the different languages too. How odd they are so alike.

Freshwater

Tungsten has the chemical symbol W.

It's from the German word wolframite (tin eater) which is the name given to its ore (which interferes with tin smelting).

I'm having a vague memory of industrial archaeology on Dartmor and a wolfram mine, which was a big tin area, like Cornwall.

A lot of elements were named by Germans. It's why potassium is K - Kalium, and sodium is Na - Natrium.

@Ghostpost - the Roman tradition came from the Greeks, and there was a known overlap between the Greek and Hindu cultures (in Afghanistan most probably - then called Gaandhar - some stories suggest that Roma gypsies were created as a result of a mass displacement of Indo-Greco people during this period) during the 1-3rd centuries. This is around the time the oral Hindu traditions associated wirh astrology, medicine, and mathematics began to be written down. So I’m guessing there might have been some kind of cultural overlap.

Thanks @Teddybear45, amazing information there!