When and why did people start dividing months into weeks?

Answer 1

People first started becoming educated after farming was invented. Education and passing down knowledge becomes more possible when you stay in one place. Hauling around clay tablets is a little hard for a nomad. When you have shifted from nomadic herding to agriculture, the most important thing you need is a calendar, so you know when to plant your crops. The first "civilized" (or shall we say sedendary) people were the Mesopotamians. They needed to know when to plant their wheat. The religion of that time was very much tied into the stars. People at that time thought that the Sun, the Moon and the Stars were very important. Now, we know that Months are based on the phases of the Moon, because it takes about a month for the moon to go through its different phases. So the question is, "Why are Months divided into Weeks?" Well, here is my answer. Almost every culture in the world decided that seven was the magic number. The reason for this is simple. If you look up at the sky, there are seven special heavenly bodies. The sun, obviously, is very special. The moon, also, is obviously pretty significant. So the Sun and the Moon were assumed to be Gods. But there were five things in the sky that didn't follow the rules. You see, the Sun rises in the East, and sets in the West. The Moon rises in the East and sets in the West. All the stars rise in the East, and set in the West. Well, almost all the stars. You see there are five special stars that don't rise in the East and set in the West. These five stars are of course the five planets which are visible to the naked eye: Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. These "stars" dance all over the place---or at least they appear to. That's because they are in the same orbit around the Sun that the Earth is. Consequently, the Astronomer-Priests of the time determined that these five "stars," actually planets, were probably Gods. Hence you have 7 being the perfect or lucky number. Seven then, became the number of the main Gods in most religions. And since most people across the world were astronomers in ancient times (hey, there was no television, and most people spent more time outdoors) you have almost every culture on Earth deciding that seven was a significant number of magic and religion. Consequently, most places had seven major Gods. Therefore, people would worship one God a day. Sunday-worship the Sun. Monday-Worship the Moon. In Spanish, the word for Monday is "Lunes" which you recognize as a form of the word Lunar, meaning pertaining to the Moon. Tuesday--The German God of War, was some guy named Tyr. He was equal to the Greek/Roman God of war Mars/Ares. In fact in Spanish, Tuesday is called "Martes" after "Mars" the God of war. Wednesday is the day of worship for "Wotan" which was the name Saxons gave to the Norse Father God "Odin." Wotansday became Wednesday. Jupiter or Zeus would be the Latin/Greek equilvalent of Wotan. Thursday is of course "Thor's Day". Friday is named after a Norse God named Freyr so it was sort of "Freyr's Day" I think Freyr was some sort of fertility God of the Norse. So in English, most of the names of our days of the week are based on Saxon pronunciations of the Germanic/Norse gods. Your one exception is Saturday. This of course is named after the Roman God Saturn. So that day was Saturn's Day. Every other day of the week is Germanic, except for Saturday. So why is Saturday the odd man out? Well, Saturn's day was usually celebrated by the Romans with a rip snorting no holds party called Saturnalia. Any one in the Roman Empire who saw the Roman Troops party down on that holiday was noticibly impressed. The German God of the Underworld was a ugly girl named Hel, whose father was the Norse troublemaker Loki, and whose mother was a wolf. And the Norse underworld was freezing cold, not hot. So Hel sat all day long on a block of ice. So English people had a choice of calling Saturday, Helday after Hel, or they could name it after this great partyday Saturnalia. Guess which one they chose as more memorable. So there you have it: Why a week has seven days.