The derivation _ciad aoin’_, first fast, is open to the objection that there was no fast on Wednesday in the Celtic or any other church, that the use of the word _aoin’_, to denote a fast, is secondary, and derived from Friday (_di-haoine_), the true fast day, and that the final syllable, being the essential one, would with such a derivation, be heavily accented, instead of falling away into a mere terminal syllable. The grave _ia_ in _Di-ciadain_ is accounted for by the _o_ in Woden being long. There was a malediction used to young women, “The disease of the woman be upon you, who put the first Wednesday comb in her head” (_Galar na tè chuir a chiad chìr Chiadna na ceann_). The disease was that she died childless. Many would not begin sowing seed in spring, but on this day or Thursday. It was also counted a lucky day to begin ploughing upon. A witch, in the island of Coll, being asked by a person, who had detected her in her unhallowed pranks, to visit a farm-house in shape of a hare, said, that as the day was Wednesday she could do nothing. Why her power was limited on this day does not appear. _Di’rdaoin_, THURSDAY. The Latin name, _dies Iovis_, has been similarly followed, with slight alteration, by the Cymric branch of the Celts; while the Gaelic names are taken from _Thor_, _Tor_, and in some dialects _Thordan_, the Scandinavian deity, son of Odin. This is a lucky day for a calf or lamb to be born upon, for beginning the weaving of cloth, and on which the hair should be cut, as the rhymes testify: (1) “Thursday the day of benign Colum-cill A day to take possession of sheep, To put cloth in warp, and settle cow on calf.” (2) “Cut your hair and beard on Thursday, And blunt the nail on Saturday.”[77] It is unlucky if Beltane day, the first of summer, falls upon a Thursday, according to the saying, “Many a woman will be without an infant son, when Beltane falls on Thursday” (_Is iomadh té bhios gun mhacan baoth dar is ann air Di’rdaoin bhios a Bhealltainn_). M’Intosh (_Gael. Prov._, 146) has it, “Woe to the mother of a wizard’s son, when Beltane falls on a Thursday.” A similar prejudice existed against Hallowmas (_Samhain_), the first of winter, falling on a Wednesday. _Di-haoine_, FRIDAY, DIES VENORIS. Here the Gaelic names revert to the Latin. Venus is etymologically connected with the Gael, _bean_, a wife, as _Friga_ is with the German _frau_. In Armoric the name of the day is _dar guener_, and says Lhuyd (p. 9) “’Tis observable that the initial _gu_ is common to the Britons, with the French, Spaniards, and Italians; and that the Romans frequently begin such words with an V consonant.” The Gaelic word would be pronounced in the same manner, though spelled _di-Fhaoine_, which probably is the more correct form. _Aoine_ is said in dictionaries to mean a fast, but in that sense never came into popular use, and is not found in song or proverb.