Светлой памяти Нины Макаровны Чередеевой-


-----Солнце языкаLe Soleil du langageشمس اللغةEl Sol del lenguajeThe Sun of Language

Rehabilitating Semitic

Both Arabic يوم الأحد [yáwmu-l-áḥad] 'first day' and Hebrew יומ רישון [yōm rišón] 'first (literally, head) day' mean 'Sunday'. Armenian շաբաթ [šabáth] – from Hebrew שבת [šabát] 'rest' – denotes both 'Saturday' and 'week' and forms the basis of the rest of the weekdays, except կիրակի [kirakí] 'Sunday' – from Greek κυριακή [kyriakī]1 '[day] of the Lord', and ուրբաթ [urbáth] 'Friday' – from Syriac ܥܪܘܒܬܐ [crúbta] 'the eve (of the Holiday)'. Georgian reflects the exact same picture as in Armenian, except that პარასკევი [p'arask'eví] 'Friday' is a direct borrowing from Greek παρασκευή [paraskevī]2 '(the day of) preparation (for the Holiday)'. Those two ancient, totally independent of one another loanwords (Georgian is a Caucasian language, while Armenian is Indo-European), whereby the 'preparation day' is Friday and not Saturday, rehabilitate the ancient Semitic order, reinstating Saturday as the default hol[y]day. This is corroborated by further evidence, including the reference to Monday as the second day of the week either implicitly, as in Greek Δευτέρα [deftēra] 'second', or explicitly, as in Armenian երկուշաբթի [yerkušabthí], Georgian ორშაბათი [oršabathi] and Farsi دوشنبه [došanbé] – all literally meaning 'second (day after) Saturday'.


1 From an earlier spelling [kuriakē].
2 From an earlier spelling [paraskewē].

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-This site ows its conception to Sarah Frantz-
-Ce site doit sa naissance à Elian Carsenat--