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samedi

Etymology and origin of the French word samedi

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Confidence
Established
Formation
Inherited
First attested
early 12th century, Voyage de saint Brendan
Inherited from
Latin *sambati dies via Old French
Ultimate origin
Biblical Hebrew (שבת)

Pronunciation

  • IPA: /sam.di/[1]
  • IPA: /sa.m(ə).di/[1]

Forms

samedi m (plural samedis)[1] Old French samadi (about 1120), reduced from sambedi;[2][3][4] sethmedi about 1200.[2][3][4] The Académie wrote samedy in 1694 and 1718, samedi from 1740.[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old French samedi, a reduced form of sambedi, inherited from Vulgar Latin *sambatī diēs (“day of the Sabbath”).[3][2][5] The Latin phrase joins diēs (“day”) and the genitive of *sambatum, a variant of Greek origin of Latin sabbatum (“Sabbath”), from Ancient Greek σάββατον (sábbaton), ultimately from Biblical Hebrew שבת (šabbāṯ).[2][3][1] The reduction is attributed to the influence of Old French seme (“seventh”), from septimus; semedi is found in the north-east and the longer form survives in Franche-Comté.[3][5]

The TLFi thinks the form with ⟨mb⟩ spread from Christian Greek-speaking circles such as Lyon and Trier, and that in the 4th century it replaced diēs Sāturnī (“Saturn's day”), which survives in English Saturday and Dutch zaterdag.[2] Bloch and Wartburg and the DHLF see the same form behind Romanian sâmbătă, Old High German sambaztag and the Slavic names, and suppose it came from the Balkans along the Danube and the Rhine with an early wave of Christianization.[5][3] The other Romance languages continue the Latin word: Italian sabato, Spanish sábado, Catalan dissabte.[5][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Samadi and samedi appear in the Voyage de saint Brendan (early 12th century), naming the seventh day of the week.[2][6]

Semantic evolution

In the ecclesiastical calendar the word names the seventh day of the week, corresponding to the Jewish Sabbath;[3][2][6] samedi saint, the day before Easter, is recorded by Furetière in 1690.[3][2][6] Littré records the jocular il est né un samedi for a lazy person, and cela sent le samedi for something done in haste.[7] The Petit Robert now counts it the sixth day of the week, with Sunday last.[8]

Timeline

  • Early 12th century – Samadi in the Voyage de saint Brendan.[2]
  • c. 1155 – Samedi in Wace.[6]
  • c. 1200 – Sethmedi de la paske in the Dialogue Grégoire.[2]
  • 1690 – Furetière records samedi saint.[2][6]
  • 1740 – The Académie adopts the spelling samedi.[2]

Meanings

Noun

  1. Saturday, the day after Friday.[8][1]
  2. Samedi saint: Holy Saturday, the eve of Easter.[8][6]
  3. (Judaism) The day of the Sabbath.[2][4]
  4. (by metonymy) A gathering held on Saturdays: les samedis de la baronne.[2]
  • sabbat
  • Latin sabbatum

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Trésor de la langue française informatisé (2004), ATILF – CNRS & Université de Lorraine, atilf.fr/tlfi; electronic version of Imbs, Paul; Quemada, Bernard, eds. (1971–1994), Trésor de la langue française, Paris: CNRS / Gallimard
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
  4. ^ a b c Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
  5. ^ a b c d Bloch, Oscar; Wartburg, Walther von (1989), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue française, 8th ed., Paris: Presses universitaires de France
  6. ^ a b c d e f Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
  7. ^ Littré, Émile (1873–1877), Dictionnaire de la langue française, 4 vols. and supplement, Paris: Hachette
  8. ^ a b c Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Samedi.” Etymologically, 18 Oct. 2026, etymologically.com/fr/samedi. Accessed 18 Oct. 2026.

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