# weekend



## Setwale_Charm

Cześć!

How do Poles normally refer to Saturday and Sunday: 'weekend' or 'koniec tygodnia' or something else?


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## dn88

It's usually "weekend", "koniec tygodnia" is hardly ever used.


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## Setwale_Charm

Dziękuję bardzo, dn88.


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## Juuuergen

I wish they did though....weekend just doesn't sound Polish at all (same with le weekend in French).


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## Piotr_WRF

For me, _koniec tygodnia_ means more the end of the working days, i.e. Friday and maybe even Thursday. I don't know if other Polish speakers would agree with me, though, but there was a thread about Czech usage of the word _weekend_ and one forero seemed to feel the same.


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## Thomas1

I do. I did however think why it means what it means when I was a kid, and ended up with nothing...
I've got used to it.


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## dn88

I think "koniec tygodnia" is most often used in the expression "pod koniec tygodnia".


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## Piotr_WRF

Thomas1 said:


> I do. I did however think why it means what it means when I was a kid, and ended up with nothing...



Maybe it's because _koniec tygodnia_ implicitly refers to _tydzień roboczy_ (_working week_).


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## Thomas1

That may of course be an explanation, though some questions have sprung up to my mind. What would then our ancestors use when weekend was not yet adopted into Polish? And hasn't weekend got into mainstream Polish due to Anglo-Saxon media influence by any chance?

Tom


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## Piotr_WRF

I'm not sure but I think the word _weekend_ entered Polish in the last 20 years. Before that, I used to say _sobota i niedziela_, which somewhat explains the need for a more concise term. Besides, during communist times Saturday was a working day, so it was mainly Sunday that was left as a free day.


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## njumi

Thomas1 said:


> What would then our ancestors use when weekend was not yet adopted into Polish?




I think that our ancestors had a six days working week, so for them saying _weekend _would be equal to saying _Niedziela _(_Sunday_).

BTW. _Niedziela _derives from two words _nie _and _działać_ traduced as _don't act = don't work._


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## kknd

this is quite false because in our culture sunday is the *first* day of week! so true weekend would be friday, saturday (because if only saturday was weekend then we could use just 'saturday' instead of 'weekend').

it seem that this changed because of free saturday: people started to link end of weekend (saturday) with it's beginning (sunday). most of poles think now of weekend as 'saturday, sunday' and even afternoon/evening/night of friday.

'koniec tygodnia' links for me to end of the working week (so thursday and friday), 'weekend' as a free time – this would be convergent with previous statements.


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## Piotr_WRF

kknd said:


> this is quite false because in our culture sunday is the *first* day of week!



Well, this may be true if you take into regard only the biblical point of view but it's certainly not true with regard to what today is considered the first day of the week, which is Monday.


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## robmoney

njumi said:


> I think that our ancestors had a six days working week, so for them saying _weekend _would be equal to saying _Niedziela _(_Sunday_).
> 
> BTW. _Niedziela _derives from two words _nie _and _działać_ traduced as _don't act = don't work._



Interesting observation, but don't forget that _sobota_ comes from a Hebrew word literally meaning "day of rest". So five days, perhaps?


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## BezierCurve

> _sobota comes from a Hebrew word literally meaning "day of rest". So five days, perhaps?_




As far as Hebrew is concerned, we have to remember also about Sunday being yom rishon - the first working day, so we still have 6 working days  This is the way it is still observed in Israel.

However, if we talk about the Christian culture, Sunday is considered to be the Christian Shabbat - called also the Lord's Day (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord%27s_Day ).


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