The Roman day, from sunrise to sunset, and the night, from sunset to sunrise, were each divided at all seasons of the year into twelve hours, the hour being uniformly one-twelfth of the day or the night, of course, varied in length with the length of the day or night at different seasons of the year.
_Week_--Although the week did not enter into the calendar of the Greeks, and was not introduced at Rome till after the reign of Theodosius, A. D. 292, it has been employed from time immemorial in almost all Eastern countries; and as it forms neither an aliquot part of a year nor of the lunar months, those who reject the Mosaic recital will be at a loss to assign to it an origin having much semblance of probability. In the Egyptian astronomy the order of the planets, beginning with the most remote, is Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, the Sun, Venus, Mercury, the Moon. Now, the day being divided into twenty-four hours, each hour was consecrated to a particular planet, namely: One to Saturn, the following to Jupiter, third to Mars, and so on according to the above order; and the day received the name of the planet which presided over its first hour. If, then, the first hour of a day was consecrated to Saturn, that planet would also have the 8th, the 5th and the 22d hours; the 23d would fall to Jupiter, the 24th to Mars, and the 25th or the first hour of the second day would belong to the Sun. In like manner the first hour of the third day would fall to the Moon, the first hour of the fourth to Mars, of the fifth to Mercury, of the sixth to Jupiter and the seventh to Venus. The cycle being completed, the first hour of the eighth day would again return to Saturn and all the others succeed in the same order. See table on the 17th page.
It will be seen by the table, and it is also recorded by Dio Cassius, of the second Century, that the Egyptian week commenced with Saturday. On their flight from Egypt the Jews, from hatred to their ancient oppressors, made Saturday the last day of the week. It is stated that the ancient Saxons borrowed the week from some Eastern nation, and substituted the names of their own divinities for those of the gods of Greece. The names of the days are here given in Latin, Saxon and English. It will be seen that the English names of the days are derived from the Saxon.