one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'

17 Dec 12 - 07:50 AM (#3453253)
Subject: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Mo the caller

At a quiz last night we were asked for one word meaning the day after tomorrow and told it wasn't 'Tuesday'

I've forgotten what the answer was supposed to be - has anyone ever heard the word in use or is it something archaic that some quiz book author has got hold of to pad out his questions?

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17 Dec 12 - 07:57 AM (#3453256)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: WindhoverWeaver

"Overmorrow" might be the word you are looking for, but it is totally obsolete and is not even listed in the OED. Was never common.

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17 Dec 12 - 07:59 AM (#3453258)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: GUEST,michael gill

In Scotland it's referred to the next-again day

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17 Dec 12 - 08:04 AM (#3453260)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: GUEST,Peter Laban

It would be along the same lines as the Dutch 'overmorgen' or German 'uebermorgen', which are both commonly used.

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17 Dec 12 - 08:43 AM (#3453269)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Snuffy

"après-demain" does it for the French, apparently.

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17 Dec 12 - 09:01 AM (#3453280)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Mo the caller

Thanks Windhover. That's what she said. Any idea when it was in use?

The French and Scots terms don't fit the 'one word' requirement.
Interesting about the Dutch & German.

'Day after tomorrow' seems an adequate term, to me.

What a shame the authors of quiz books don't put learned footnotes in the answers.

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17 Dec 12 - 09:18 AM (#3453285)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Will Fly

I like overmorrow.

Now we can have jam yesterday, jam tomorrow, jam overmorrow - but never jam today.

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17 Dec 12 - 09:23 AM (#3453290)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: alex s

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913 + 1828)
O"ver*mor"row (?), n. The day after or following to-morrow. [Obs.] Bible (1551).


But what is the point of having obsolete words in a quiz??

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17 Dec 12 - 09:32 AM (#3453293)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: WindhoverWeaver

Mo, Wiktionary gives a total of 4 citations:

As an adverb

1) 1535, Myles Coverdale, The Byble, that is, the Holy Scrypture of the Olde and New Teſtament, faythfully tranſlated into Englyſhe[1], Tobit 8:4, page D.iiij:
Thē ſpake Tobias unto the virgin, and ſayde: Up Sara, let us make oure prayer unto God to daye, tomorow, and ouermorow: for theſe thre nightes wil we reconcyle oure ſelues with God: and whan the thirde holy night is paſt, we ſhall ioyne together in ye deutye of mariage.
Then spake Tobias unto the virgin, and said: Up Sara, let us make our prayer unto God today, tomorrow, and overmorrow: for these three nights will we reconcile ourselves with God, and when the third holy night is past, we shall join together in the duty of marriage.

2) 1925, Parliamentary Debates: Official Report[2], volume 188, H.M. Stationery Off., page iv:
We can go not overmorrow, but on Thursday.

3) 1969, James Klugman quoting Bucharin, History of the Communist Party of Great Britain: The General Strike, 1925-1927[3], volume 2, London: Lawrence & Wishart, page 73:
Sinowjeff and myself go to Caucasus overmorrow.

As a noun

4) 1898, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, The first part of the tragedy of Faust, Longmans, Green and Co., page 197:
My prescient limbs already borrow
From rare Walpurgis-night a glow :
It comes round on the overmorrow [transl. übermorgen] —
Then why we are awake we know.

Clearly, a word that can go 350 years between citations is not what one would call common! Seems to have been resurrected (briefly) in the 1920s.

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17 Dec 12 - 09:44 AM (#3453303)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: John MacKenzie

methavrio in Greek if that's of any interest to anyone other than George P

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17 Dec 12 - 10:05 AM (#3453315)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Mo the caller

From: WindhoverWeaver
"1) 1535, Myles Coverdale, The Byble, that is, the Holy Scrypture of the Olde and New Teſtament, faythfully tranſlated into Englyſhe[1], Tobit 8:4, page D.iiij:
Thē ſpake Tobias unto the virgin, and ſayde: Up Sara, let us make oure prayer unto God to daye, tomorow, and ouermorow: for theſe thre nightes wil we reconcyle oure ſelues with God: and whan the thirde holy night is paſt, we ſhall ioyne together in ye deutye of mariage.
Then spake Tobias unto the virgin, and said: Up Sara, let us make our prayer unto God today, tomorrow, and overmorrow: for these three nights will we reconcile ourselves with God, and when the third holy night is past, we shall join together in the duty of marriage"

Sounds very apocryphal to me.

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17 Dec 12 - 10:08 AM (#3453318)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: bfdk

Overmorgen applies in Denmark, too, spelling and all.

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17 Dec 12 - 10:23 AM (#3453320)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: GUEST,999

Today that would be Wednesday.

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17 Dec 12 - 10:33 AM (#3453323)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Dave MacKenzie

I'm not sure that Coverdale is that obsolete, seeing that it's the translation used by the Church of England's Book of Common Prayer.

In Welsh, the day after tomorrow is "drennydd", so an English word would be useful to know in Chester.

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17 Dec 12 - 11:56 AM (#3453351)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Peter K (Fionn)

Preksutra in Serbian (and Croatian). In common use.

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17 Dec 12 - 11:59 AM (#3453354)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Haruo

In Esperanto we say postmorgaŭ.

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17 Dec 12 - 12:24 PM (#3453367)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: GUEST,Eliza

Not that any of us will probably have cause to use it, but the word for it is 'siniguene' in Malinke! (Pronounced 'seeneegennay')

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17 Dec 12 - 12:38 PM (#3453372)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Silas

wEDNESDAY?

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17 Dec 12 - 12:54 PM (#3453383)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: open mike

regarding "in Esperanto we say postmorgaŭ. " I thought Esperanto was only a written language....interesting to know it is also spoken. Can you give us some background into that language? I understand it was invented to try to have a universal language that could be used by all.

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17 Dec 12 - 05:05 PM (#3453460)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Stanron

Why not invent your own? 'Post morrow' could be contracted to stu'morra. Or whatever.

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17 Dec 12 - 07:46 PM (#3453509)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Bugsy

I think it may be "Toodayztyme"

CHeers

Bugsy

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17 Dec 12 - 08:33 PM (#3453529)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Joe_F

Russian also has one word: poslezavtra ("aftertomorrow"). And pozavchera ("alongbehindyesterday") for the day before yesterday.

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18 Dec 12 - 05:35 AM (#3453680)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Mo the caller

So now we know that many languages have one word where common English usage has a phrase.

This thread could run till the day after tomorrow.

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18 Dec 12 - 05:46 AM (#3453681)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: r.padgett

aftermorrowday, maybe

Ray

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18 Dec 12 - 01:04 PM (#3453841)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Q (Frank Staplin)

I often say mañana

Which, depanding on the way it is said, may mean tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, next week or never.

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18 Dec 12 - 01:09 PM (#3453846)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Peter K (Fionn)

For all that it has the biggest vocabulary in the world, English does gaps. George Orwell considered it particularly lacking in the territory around nostalgia. But for me the greatest failing is the absence of an animate singular pronoun embracing male and female; a gap into which "they/them" is grotesquely pushed with ever-increasing frequency.

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18 Dec 12 - 01:31 PM (#3453858)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: WindhoverWeaver

Surely, Peter, that is a problem for many, if not most, languages?

It used to be that you could use the neuter form for mixed groups, even into the 1960s: Thus, for instance, C. S. Lewis could write of a child "playing with its toys" and no-one considered it odd. Then someone (the dreaded "they"?) decided it was de-humanizing to use the neuter, and it got changed to mean inanimate. Too bad, because just after that "they" also decided we couldn't use an inclusive masculine anymore and so the need for the good old neuter returned, but it doesn't really exist anymore.

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18 Dec 12 - 01:38 PM (#3453861)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Gibb Sahib

Hindi-Urdu has "parson~" -- which means BOTH the day after tomorrow and the day before yesterday. Wrap your brain around that!

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18 Dec 12 - 01:55 PM (#3453872)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: treewind

"I often say mañana"

Ah yes. And in Cornish, that's "dreckly", with the same range of meanings.

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18 Dec 12 - 02:19 PM (#3453883)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: GUEST,Tony

I like "aftermorrow." But I also like Tom Waits' great song about an imperial soldier's personal and moral dilemma, "The Day After Tomorrow," which couldn't have been written if "aftermorrow" was the common expression.

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19 Dec 12 - 08:21 AM (#3454217)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Mysha

Hi,

So, is there a word for day before yesterday as well?

And as to other languages: Frisian has relative dates for a whole week.
betearjuster, earjuster, juster, hjoed, moarn, oaremoarn, oeroaremoarn.
Then combine with numbers of weeks past or future to get relative dates further away.

Bye
                                                                Mysha

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19 Dec 12 - 09:31 AM (#3454253)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: GUEST,Jon Heslop

"and in Cornish, that's 'dreckly' with the same range of meanings".
'Dreckly' dosn't convey that same sense of urgency as manana.

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19 Dec 12 - 12:06 PM (#3454326)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: WindhoverWeaver

Of course there is, Mysha: ereyesterday, which is also an obsolete word. To my mind it is far less of an impressive word than overmorrow.

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19 Dec 12 - 01:21 PM (#3454354)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: GUEST,Peter Laban

Again, the Dutch 'eergisteren' shares the same root. German 'vorgestern' probably less so.

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19 Dec 12 - 02:29 PM (#3454372)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Matthew Edwards

Jon Heslop, the Professor of Irish at Trinity College Dublin, David Greene, used to tell the same joke; he was once asked if there was any word in the Irish language expressing the same concept as mañana, to which he had replied, after some thought, that there was but it lacked the degree of urgency of the Spanish term.

What I really need, however, is a way of distinguishing what English speakers mean when they say "next Friday" or "last Monday"; it is perfectly clear what "next week" or "last month" mean, but "next Friday" seems to be capable of meaning either the Friday occurring later this same week, or the Friday following. There may be a simple rule, but if so, very few people follow it with any consistency .

On the other hand this could explain why my dating attempts were invariably unsuccessful.

Matthew

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19 Dec 12 - 02:35 PM (#3454376)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: GUEST,Peter Laban

In Ireland, in Hiberno-english if you like, it's common to distinguish those by using 'next (or last) Friday' and 'next (or last) Friday week'

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19 Dec 12 - 02:43 PM (#3454384)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: GUEST,Eliza

This reminds me of the Scots I lived among, who always confused me with their Auld Year's Nicht and New Year's Eve. What is the difference? Perhaps they were so drunk at Hogmanay they confused themselves as well!

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19 Dec 12 - 05:14 PM (#3454443)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Dave MacKenzie

Going back to Windhover's point, it's only really in English that there's such confusion between sex and gender, after all when English had grammatical gender, "woman" (wife-man) was masculine. That's what led to Sammuel Clements pronouncing that Germans had no sense of humour because they didn't find one of his pieces funny, as it was based on the premise that German grammatical gender if transliterated into English is absurd.

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19 Dec 12 - 06:09 PM (#3454490)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: McGrath of Harlow

'On Friday' or 'Friday week' makes the distinction pretty clearly. For some reason 'next Friday' seems more open to misunderstanding, though I would always tend to assume it meant the Friday of the present week (unless it were said on a Saturday...)

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19 Dec 12 - 06:12 PM (#3454492)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Allan Conn

"Auld Year's Nicht and New Year's Eve. What is the difference?" Here in the south of Scotland the common term is "Auld Year's Night" though it is less common elsewhere in Scotland where the term Hogmanay is more commonly used. New Year's Eve isn't really a particularly Scottish term as such.

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19 Dec 12 - 06:18 PM (#3454495)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Allan Conn

"it's common to distinguish those by using 'next (or last) Friday' and 'next (or last) Friday week'"

Last Friday, this Friday, and next Friday! Where I come from anyway. Same meaning as last week, this week and next week.

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19 Dec 12 - 06:28 PM (#3454504)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Joe_F

WindhoverWeaver: AFAIK it has never been possible in English to use "it" as a general common-gender pronoun. "Child" is special; it has been neuter for a long time, like "Kind" in German and "Ditya" in Russian.

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19 Dec 12 - 06:40 PM (#3454516)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Allan Conn

The first defintion in my Oxford Dictionary for the word 'it' gives it as a pronoun for ............

the thing (or occasionally animal or child) which has been previously mentioned.

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19 Dec 12 - 07:04 PM (#3454523)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: WindhoverWeaver

Joe, Allan, you are probably right. I spoke hastily.

I do think it a shame that we have lost the inclusive use of the masculine without gaining an acceptable replacement. It leads to all sorts of cumbersome circumlocutions. I find it especially intrusive in older hymns that never seem to scan as well.

Basically, I'm just turning into an old fart!

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20 Dec 12 - 03:44 AM (#3454636)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Mo the caller

I agree that we need words so that we can talk about children/people without needing to know if they are boys or girls.
There's a lot more important things to know about people than that.

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20 Dec 12 - 03:49 AM (#3454637)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Mo the caller

I can see why the use of 'he' for either has been dropped though, as it has strong overtones of the attitude held by some that only boys 'to keep the name alive' really matter.
It doesn't matter if that was the original connotation, if that's the impression it gives now. (Like the n***** word, which may not have been offensive but would be if used now)

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20 Dec 12 - 03:59 AM (#3454643)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: MartinRyan

In Irish (Gaelic), the "day before yesterday" is arú inné and "the day after tomorrow" is arú amáireach There are several such constructions. The lexicographer Dineen (1927) relates it to an obsolete use of the English "ere" - though I'm not sure I follow his argument.

Regards

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20 Dec 12 - 06:30 AM (#3454683)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: GUEST, Sminky

You're all wasting your time.

According to the predictions there won't be a 'day after tomorrow'.

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20 Dec 12 - 06:21 PM (#3454992)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Mo the caller

Yes but counting from the start of the thread , we've already had it.

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20 Dec 12 - 07:21 PM (#3455037)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Tattie Bogle

L'apres-demain in French do I vaguely remember from somewhere (the after-tomorrow).

Mo, I think Sminky is referring to the predicted ending of the world!

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21 Dec 12 - 05:49 AM (#3455208)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Mo the caller

I'm old enough to have seen the world end SO Many times.

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22 Dec 12 - 06:47 AM (#3455700)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Mysha

Hi,

Are you trying to distinguish between this Friday and a week from Friday?

BTW, I'd say "New Year's Eve" is English and nowadays is at least both the last light period and the dark period leading up to Midnight (or dawn, if you're non-clock). Auld Year's Day in Scottish would be the part where the sun would (hypothetically) be visible, whilst Auld Year's Nicht would be the night following (or maybe only the evening, if you're on-clock).

Merry 'fore ere-Christmas Eve everyone,
                                                                Mysha

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24 Dec 12 - 07:36 AM (#3456480)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Helen

By comparion, "ante penultimate" is derived from Latin and means something before the next to the last in a series.

Ante = before, pen = next to (I think) & ultimate is last, so the one before the one before the last one.

How cumbersome is that!

:-D

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24 Dec 12 - 07:38 AM (#3456481)
Subject: RE: one word meaning 'day after tomorrow'
From: Helen

Sorry, typo - that should read "by comparison"

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