Ember Days - Etymology

Etymology

The English name for these days, "Ember", derives from the Anglo-Saxon ymbren, a circuit or revolution (from ymb, around, and ryne, a course, running), clearly relating to the annual cycle of the year. The occurrence of the Anglo-Saxon compounds ymbren-tid ("Embertide"), ymbren-wucan ("Ember weeks"), ymbren-fisstan ("Ember fasts"), ymbren-dagas ("Ember days") makes this etymology quite certain. The word imbren even makes it into the acts of the "Council of Ænham" (1009): jejunia quatuor tempora quae imbren vocant, "the fasts of the four seasons which are called "imbren'". It corresponds also with Pope Leo the Great's definition, jejunia ecclesiastica per totius anni circulum distributa ("fasts of the church distributed through the whole circuit of the year").

However, others maintain that the term is derived from the Latin quatuor tempora, meaning "four times" (a year), while folk etymology even cites the phrase "may ye remember (the inevitability of death)" as the source. J. M. Neale's Essays of Liturgiology (1863), Chapter X, explains the etymology:

"The Latin name has remained in modern languages, though the contrary is sometimes affirmed, Quatuor Tempora, the Four Times. In French and Italian the term is the same; in Spanish and Portuguese they are simply Temporas. The German converts them into Quatember, and thence, by the easy corruption of dropping the first syllable, a corruption which also takes place in some other words, we get the English Ember. Thus, there is no occasion to seek after an etymology in embers; or with Nelson, to extravagate still further to the noun ymbren, a recurrence, as if all holy seasons did not equally recur. Ember-week in Wales is Welsh: "Wythnos y cydgorian", meaning "the Week of the Processions". In mediæval Germany they were called Weihfasten, Wiegfastan, Wiegefasten, or the like, on the general principle of their sanctity.... We meet with the term Frohnfasten, frohne being the then word for travail. Why they were named foldfasten it is less easy to say."

"Quattuor tempora" was rendered into Irish quite literally as Laethanta na gCeithre Thráth, meaning "the days of the four times", and into somewhat archaic English as "Quarter tense".