So, anyone who's known me for long enough will, at some point, hear me talk about how calques are among my favorite linguistic phenomena.
But first I obviously have to explain what a calque even is. Calque is a term for a type of translation, where a phrase or a compound word from one language is translated root-for-root instead being taken in as a loanword or replaced with a pre-existing phrase from the target language.
By way of example, the first time I consciously noticed a calque, before I'd even learned the term for it, was late in high school, when some friends online had sent me a few songs by the Finnish band Klamydia. I was particularly enthralled with Tango Delirium, and decided to try and work out the meaning of the lyrics.
I didn't get terribly far, but from one repeated phrase:
| Finnish | English |
|---|---|
| kylmä kalkkuna | cold turkey |
| kylmä kalkkuna | cold turkey |
| kylmä kalkkuna | cold turkey |
| Jääkaapissa | in the ice box |
And let's break that down a little bit further
| Finnish | English |
|---|---|
| kylmä | cold |
| kalkkuna | turkey |
That's right. The phrase which translates to "cold turkey" is literally "cold" + "turkey".
But what does this have to do with the seven day week? Well...
In antiquity, different cultures had different calendars. Ancient china had an interesting system where the year was divided into 12 months, of three ten-day weeks each, and a leap-week added in every other summer. The ten-days of the week were each associated with the yin or yang nature of one of the five classical elements. So the week went Yang Wood, Yin Wood, Yang Fire, Yin Fire, Yang Earth, Yin Earth, Yang Metal, Yin Metal, Yang Water, Yin Water.
Over in Babylon, however, months were divided into four seven day weeks. And the seventh day of each week was considered a holy day, where certain actions were prohibited. Additionally, the fourth and final one of these every month was dedicated to rest.
At the same time, however, there were seven sky-bound objects visible to the naked
eye at all times of year. In the Mediterranean, these were associated with the most prominent gods. In ancient China, these were associated with yang, yin, and the five elements. And at some point, in Babylon a cycle of worship came about wherein each day was devoted to one of these seven celestial beings.1
As it was transmitted through the Mediterranean, and later through all of western Europe, each culture adopted the practice, but re-dedicated the days to their own gods.
| Culture | Sunday | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Saturday |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Greek | Helios | Selene | Ares | Hermes | Zeus | Aphrodite | Cronos |
| Roman | Solis | Luna | Mars | Mercury | Jupiter | Venus | Saturn |
| Modern Romance | The Lord | Luna | Mars | Mercury | Jupiter | Venus | Saturn |
| Germanic | Sun | Moon | Tyr | Wodin | Thor | Freya | Uh... Saturn... |
| Indic | Ravi | Soma | Mangala | Budha | Brhaspati | Shukra | Shani |
| Classical Sinosphere | 日(sun) | 月(moon) | 火(fire/mars) | 水(water/mercury) | 木(wood/jupiter) | 金(gold/venus) | 土(earth/saturn) |
All of these cultures took the calendar system, and translated each day of the week as "day of (whatever we call that same heavenly body)".
Though, not all cultures did this. Some simply numbered the days of the week, and others simply transphonicized the names of the Roman gods or Indian devas into sounds that were more natural to their native language. Still, I find it fascinating how so many disparate cultures wound up using daynames that map to the same celestial bodies in the same order.
-
Prior to beginning writing this post, I had seen it written somewhere that this worship cycle began in Egypt, and was the definitive origin of the seven day week, but I can neither find the original article I read, nor corroborate it. I could only verify that the religious calendar used in ancient Egypt had seven-day weeks.
