Naming (market) days with their number in the week is common, generally well known the hebrew way dating back to the Bible's Book of Genesis, and done in the same way in both newer languages - in Arabic back in the days of Lishbûnah and later in Portuguese from 11th or 12th century on.
Neighboring Morocco even calls many places after the market days in that very place, allowing some sophisticated navigation in the country (in such a way that you reach most easily the next place to go shopping).
Tuesday is called the third, Wednesday the fourth and Thursday the fifth market day in Portuguese as well as in Arabic or Hebrew. This way of counting and naming days is obviously a very clear heritage of oriental Arab or Jewish/Muslim culture in Portugal.
Muslim Arabs don't count their holy day, Friday, (yawm al-juma'a, "the day of coming together" for the prayer) as day number six but they still count Saturday as yawn as-Sabt (Shabbat): day number seven, just like in Hebrew.
Neither Romans nor other Roman languages in Portugal's neighborhood count days that way. Strangely enough, still even after Christians dominated the country from 12th century on, Monday still used to be called "second market day".
This is, until today, hinting at the fact, that under muslim rule – with a considerable Jewish community in Portugal, while Saturday ("as-Sabt" or "seventh market day" in Arabic, which is clearly similar to Shabbat) which later on kept a similar name "Sabado" – for many centuries "Sunday" used to be considered for Jews like Muslims the first market day oft the week ("yawm al-ahad") and was not seen as the holy Day of the Lord of the Christian church ("Domingo" in Portuguese as well as Spanish)!
Christian Hauck-Hahmann
chain.eu
Zum Original