Time, days of the week and months

Time, days and months

The days of the week

Belarusian	English	Where the name comes from
панядзелак	Monday	after (па) the day of rest
аўторак	Tuesday	the second
серада	Wednesday	the middle
чацвер	Thursday	the fourth
пятніца	Friday	the fifth
субота	Saturday	from Sabbath
нядзеля	Sunday	the day of not-doing

To say on a day, use у with the accusative: у панядзелак, у сераду, у нядзелю. The week itself is тыдзень.

The months

Belarusian kept its own month names instead of borrowing the Latin ones, and almost every name still describes what was happening in the fields or the weather:

Month	Belarusian	Literally
January	студзень	the cold one
February	люты	the fierce one
March	сакавік	when the sap runs
April	красавік	when things come into flower
May	май	the one borrowed name
June	чэрвень	from the red dye insect gathered then
July	ліпень	when the lime trees flower
August	жнівень	the reaping month
September	верасень	when the heather is out
October	кастрычнік	from the woody chaff of broken flax
November	лістапад	leaf-fall
December	снежань	the snow month

Telling the time

The question is Колькі часу? or Каторая гадзіна? An hour is a гадзіна, and the count follows the numeral rules: адна гадзіна, дзве гадзіны, пяць гадзін. Minutes are хвіліны.

Зараз тры гадзіны. — It is three o'clock.
Палова пятай. — Half past four (literally half of the fifth).
Чвэрць на восьмую. — Quarter past seven.

If your first language is English

English names the days after gods and the months after Roman emperors and numbers; Belarusian names them after the weather and the work. That makes the month names harder to guess but much easier to remember once you know what they mean.

Frequently asked questions

When is Time, days of the week and months used?

To say on a day, use у with the accusative: у панядзелак , у сераду , у нядзелю . The week itself is тыдзень .

How is Time, days of the week and months formed?

Belarusian kept its own month names instead of borrowing the Latin ones, and almost every name still describes what was happening in the fields or the weather: The question is Колькі часу? or Каторая гадзіна? An hour is a гадзіна , and the count follows the numeral rules: адна гадзіна, дзве гадзіны, пяць гадзін . Minutes are хвіліны . English names the days after gods and the months after Roman emperors and numbers; Belarusian names them after the weather and the work. That makes the month names harder to guess but much easier to remember once you know what they mean.

What are common mistakes with Time, days of the week and months?

Typical errors: expecting Latin month names and being unable to place кастрычнік or жнівень ; and forgetting that the numeral rules apply to hours as well ( дзве гадзіны , пяць гадзін ).

Sources

Кароткая граматыка беларускай мовы. У 2 ч. Ч. 1: Фаналогія. Марфаналогія. Марфалогія / навук. рэд. А. А. Лукашанец — НАН Беларусі, Інстытут мовазнаўства імя Якуба Коласа; Мінск: Беларуская навука, 351 с., 2007

The current academic reference grammar; the linked edition serves the full text. Its morphology part is the source for the paradigms used here. On the neuter noun it states the nominative singular endings as -а (-о) and -е (-ё), and gives the nominative plural as -ы after a hard consonant (сёлы, вёдры) against -і after a soft consonant and after к, х (палі, воблакі).

Беларуская граматыка. У 2 ч. Ч. 1: Фаналогія. Арфаэпія. Марфалогія. Словаўтварэнне. Націск / рэд. М. В. Бірыла, П. П. Шуба — АН БССР, Інстытут мовазнаўства імя Якуба Коласа; Мінск: Навука і тэхніка, 1985

The academic reference grammar behind the phonology, orthoepy and morphology sections: the 32-letter inventory, дж and дз as digraphs rather than letters, and the normative description of akanne and jakanne. A print work; no URL is given, because the only one available is a library catalogue record that carries none of the text.