James Loftis, age 15, of Camden, N.J., for his question:
HOW DID THE DAYS RECEIVE THEIR NAMES?
Man's first divisions of time to receive names were the months. There were too many days each month to receive individual names, so they went without. But as cities were built, there developed a need for special market days on which to trade. With this came the need to name the days.
The ancient Babylonians were the first to act. They set aside the seventh day as one where there would be no work. The people met f.or trade and religious festivals.
The ancient Jews followed the example and the week, the space between market days, came into being. And there was a need fos names for the days. The Jews solved the problem by simply numbering the days of the week from the Sabbath. Sunday, for example, was called the first day after Sabbath.
The Quakers, by the way, until recently referred to the days not by name but as First Day, Second Day, Third Day and so on.
The Egyptians adopted the seven day week and named the days after five planets, the moon and the sun.
The Greeks for a time had a 10 day week and the Romans had one with eight days, but they switched to seven at the beginning of the Fourth Century A.D. They used the Egyptian system of naming the days after celestial bodies, some of which also bore the names of Roman gods: the sun, moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus and Saturn.
The Anglo Saxons used most of the Roman names but added from their gods. The day of the sun became Sunnandaeg, or Sunday. The day of Mars became the day of Tiw, their god of war, Tiwesdaeg or Tuesday. Instead of Mercury, the name Woden was given to Wednesday. The Roman day of Jupiter, god of thunder, became the name of their thunder god, Thor, and thus our Thursday.
Friday was named after one of two Norse goddesses: Freya or Frigga. The day named for Saturn became Saeternesdaeg, a translation from the Roman, and then it was changed to Saeterdaeg, or Saturday.
The ancient people thought the day started at dawn and ended at sunset.
As time went on, law made it necessary to define which 24 hour period belonged to each day. The Greek day ran from sunset to sunset. But the Romans elected to make their day run from midnight to midnight, and most modern nations still use this Roman method.
Some European countries, instead of dividing the day into two units of 12 hours, use the 24 hour day as a single period. This is the system used by U.S. military organizations. Numbering starts at midnight. One o'clock in the morning is written as 0100, with noon being 1200. One p.m. becomes 1300, two is 1400 and so on. Eleven o'clock at night is 2300 and midnight is 2400.
In the United States, Daylight Saving Time goes into effect in spring. The clocks are moved forward one hour when the sun rises early. In the fall they are set back.
The idea of Daylight Saving Time was suggested by Benjamin Franklin in the 18th Century, but the idea wasn't tried until 1915.