Red-Letter Day - a memorably happy or noteworthy day
It's a red letter day for Semantica. Memorable enough for our Chief to greet the readers with the monthly update :D
The expression, by the way, comes from Medieval church calendars in 1325 when saint's days, feasts, and other holy days, which came to be printed on church calendars in red. The term came into wider usage with the appearance in 1549 of the first Book of Common Prayer in which calendar showed special holy days in red ink.
Sources:http://en.wikipedia.org/
Pic : Google Images
4 comments:
u hit the nail on the head :)
wanted to update some very interesting thinfs i foudn but am busy so droppin a comment
amazingly there also existed somethign called 'black letter day' essentially the opposite. OED quotes that it was dropped from usage somewher ein the 19th century
a soemwhat parallel lore states the origin to be from the sea. from whatevre i recall from reading, the ammu nition wher kept in huge chests. the chest which carreid ones to be use dfor practive (mild ammunition)were marked with a black letter, while the ones to be used in actual war (destructive ) were marked with a red letter. this is an interesitng trivia linked with the phrase but is certainy not teh origin.
Su: which head??? :DDDDD
666: i too came across the naval bit...and it definitely is not the origin..but sth stopped me from putting it up here on the post and that sth is why should the expression "red-letter day" have the word "day" in it when its really the boxes of ammunition.
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