# What is the origin of the term "Easter"? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 9, 2007, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239 "2007-04-09T00:21:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![TwoTrouts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a9adbd/32.png) [@TwoTrouts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TwoTrouts)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/1 "2007-04-09T00:21:19Z")
Why is the date commemorating the resurrection of Jesus termed “Easter”? Why not “Resurrection Day” or something along those lines? ---
**Author:** ![Malodorous](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e47774/32.png) [@Malodorous](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malodorous)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/2 "2007-04-09T00:31:27Z")
I believe it’s actually the name of the pagan festival it supplanted. ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/3 "2007-04-09T00:38:33Z")
“Eostre” - an [Anglo-Saxon Goddess](http://www.answers.com/topic/eostre). > [@](#): > > What is secure in Bede’s passage is that the lunar month around the month of April in the Julian calendar was called Eostur. And as the Christian tradition of Easter, which has also fallen in April, arrived in some Germanic-speaking regions, the people named the then-unnamed Christian day after the festival, that is, in English as Easter, and in German as Ostern. It is alleged that remnants of Eostre’s characteristics can also be found in Easter Bunny character, based on Jacob Grimm’s research into connections between the ‘Ostern Hare’ and the Germanic Ostara, which he believed to be another name for the same goddess. However, this is speculative, as no evidence has been found for a pre-Christian association between Eostre and a rabbit or hare. > > Those who question Bede’s account of a goddess suggest that “the Anglo-Saxon Estor-monath meant simply ‘the month of opening’ or ‘the month of beginnings’.” (Stations of the Sun, Professor Ronald Hutton). ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/4 "2007-04-09T02:27:11Z")
In Romance language countries, the feast is named using variants of the word for the Jewish Passover: Spanish _pascua_, French _Pâques_, Italian _pasqua_, etc. For some reason, Germanic based languages often change the words for Christian terms, even when the concept was introduced from Latin/Roman missionaries. For example, the Greek _Ekklesia_ was transliterated into Latin as _ecclesia_, then moved on to French \*église \*, Spanish _iglesia_, Italian _chiesa_, etc. However, when the same concept entered the Germanic languages, it underwent a sea change to German _Kirche_ (derived from a word related to the Greek _kyrios_, lord), and English church. Similarly, the word for the feast of the Resurrection dropped the association with Passover that was maintianed in the languages from around the Mediterranean and became associated with either a goddess or a Spring festival, _eostre_/_Ostern_. I am not sure why the split occurred. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/5 "2007-04-09T02:29:12Z")
There’s very little about Easter, its origins and the whole chocolate egg thing, that has anything at all to do with Christianity. I always find it strange that the Christians bring up the phrase “true meaning of Easter” but are actually talking about the supplanted meaning. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/6 "2007-04-09T02:58:46Z")
[QUOTE=GuanoLad] I always find it strange that the Christians bring up the phrase “true meaning of Easter” but are actually talking about the supplanted meaning. [/QUOTE] No, they _are_ talking about the _true meaning_ of Easter. It is true that the \*word \*“Easter” has _roots_ which _may possibly_ lie in the name of a nearly unknown pagan goddess. The _roots_ of a word do not nessesarily denote it’s “true meaning”. But the holiday _itself_ was originally all about the Ressurrection. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/7 "2007-04-09T03:23:51Z")
Originally it was a Spring holiday, not a Jesus holiday. Wasn’t it? ---
**Author:** ![Crescend](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b9bd4f/32.png) [@Crescend](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crescend)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/8 "2007-04-09T03:26:44Z")
In Russian, the word for “Easter” is the same as the word for “Passover”, namely “Пасха” (_pascha_). To differentiate the two holidays, Russian Jews refer to Passover by its Ashkenazi Hebrew pronounciation, “Peisach”. No clue why so much is different in the Germanic-language-speaking countries. Again, in Russian, the word for “Saturday” is “Субота” (_soobota_), from the word “sabbath”. Likewise, the word for “Sunday” is “Воскресение” (_voskrehseniye_), literally “Resurrection”. I believe there’s a similar situation in the Romance-language-speaking countries - in Spanish, you have “sabado” and “domingo”, where “sabado” is again from “sabbath”, while “domingo” is from the Latin “dominicus”, or “of the Lord”. The English versions come from “Saturn Day” (Saturday) and “Day of the Sun” (Sunday). ---
**Author:** ![dangermom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e274bd/32.png) [@dangermom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dangermom)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 5:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/9 "2007-04-09T05:51:38Z")
The Scandinavian languages, which are also related to the Germanic ones, do use the Passover derivative; in Danish it’s _påske_, for example. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 6:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/10 "2007-04-09T06:29:55Z")
[QUOTE=DrDeth] No, they _are_ talking about the _true meaning_ of Easter. It is true that the \*word \*“Easter” has _roots_ which _may possibly_ lie in the name of a nearly unknown pagan goddess. The _roots_ of a word do not nessesarily denote it’s “true meaning”. But the holiday _itself_ was originally all about the Ressurrection. [/QUOTE] He’s talking about more than the name; that’s why he brought up eggs; there’s also rabbits, another obvious fertility symbol. I’ve always heard that it was another holiday that Christianity filed the serial numbers off of and claimed as it’s own. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 8:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/11 "2007-04-09T08:06:11Z")
[QUOTE=Der Trihs] He’s talking about more than the name; that’s why he brought up eggs; there’s also rabbits, another obvious fertility symbol. I’ve always heard that it was another holiday that Christianity filed the serial numbers off of and claimed as it’s own. [/QUOTE] No. There is no record of a holiday with chocolate bunnies and eggs, and in fact there is almost nothing at all about “Eostre”. In fact, there may never have been goddess called Eostre, that’s how little we know about it. > **[Ēostre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eostre)** > > Ēostre (\[ˈeːostre\]) is an Anglo-Saxon goddess mentioned by Bede in his 8th century work The Reckoning of Time. He wrote that pagan Anglo-Saxons had held feasts in her honour during the month named after her: Ēosturmōnaþ (April), and that this became the English name for the Paschal season: Easter. The Old High German name for April was the cognate Ôstarmânoth, which has led scholars to suggest there was a similar Continental Germanic goddess, \*Ôstara. Their theory is supported by votive ins... “The Venerable Bede described the worship of Eostre among the Anglo-Saxons as having died out by the time he began writing (in Latin) the first significant history of the Anglo-Saxons. Some historians have suggested that she may have been invented by Bede, as there are no known references to her preceding his work.” This is exactly 100% of all we know about “Eostre”= "“Eosturmonath has a name which is now translated “Paschal month”, and _which was once called after a goddess of theirs named Eostre, in whose honour feasts were celebrated in that month._ Now they designate that Paschal season by her name, calling the joys of the new rite by the time-honoured name of the old observance.” No bunnies, no eggs, nothing. Just a word. And, most historians and etymologists have pretty serious doubts about the Bede’s work here. I admit that Easter has been somewhat recently commercialized with treats and such. However, whatever Pagan Holiday “Eostre” was, it was nothing but a root word and a single line in _De temporum ratione_ and some Grimms Fairy tales (take from the Bede, no doubt) by the time eggs, bunnies and all that were added. There is _no archeaological evidence_ that a “Eostre” was ever actually actively worshiped or that eggs or bunnies had any place in her worship. The Easter Bunny is much like Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer- a later secular commercial addition to a once mostly religous Christian holiday. Thinking that somehow “the Easter Bunny” has something to do with a continuance of a Pagan holiday is like thinking Frosty the Snowman is a leftover from Saturnalia. Now, Christmas did borrow _trappings_ from Yule- the Tree, Yule log, Mistletoe, Holly and such. And although we don’t know a lot about _exactly_ how the Yule feast was practiced, it was mentioned many times in the Norse sagas. (It was on or about Jan 12th, too, not Christmas) But nothing from “Eostre”. Note that some _Neo_pagans celebrate a holiday for “Eostre” with eggs and such. And that’s fine. But we all _do_ know that Wicca and Neopaganism are fairly modern religions, right? ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 9:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/12 "2007-04-09T09:31:16Z")
Actully, I wasn’t trying to defend the idea that Easter came from that goddess’s name; I was just pointing out that such trappings as rabbits and eggs just scream “Spring Fertility Festival”, and such a festival probably existed before Easter, and likely before any goddess Eostre if there ever was one. Your claim that it’s all commericalization seems unlikely; if it’s not about leftover fertility symbols, why rabbits and eggs, of all things ? ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/13 "2007-04-09T19:07:54Z")
[QUOTE=Der Trihs] Actully, I wasn’t trying to defend the idea that Easter came from that goddess’s name; I was just pointing out that such trappings as rabbits and eggs just scream “Spring Fertility Festival”, and such a festival probably existed before Easter, and likely before any goddess Eostre if there ever was one. Your claim that it’s all commericalization seems unlikely; if it’s not about leftover fertility symbols, why rabbits and eggs, of all things ? [/QUOTE] Oh sure, rabbits, lambs, ducklings, chicks and eggs all are related to Spring, and no doubt there were pagans festivals somewhere, someplace that had one or more of these elements. But that doesn’t mean that the Early Chruch Fathers took a look at “Springfest- now with more better eggs and bunnies” and said “Hey, let’s tga these on to the Resurrections story!”. :dubious: The fact that they are so obvious means that they were selected later by commerical interests just becuase of their clear Springtime connotation, not out of any weird idea to “filed the serial numbers off of and claimed as it’s own.” No one holiday I can think off has all of those nor were any of those pagan holidays still known enough by the 19th century for it be possible for anyone to steal from. No more that Frosty the Snowman- now firmly attached to Christmas- has anything to do with any ancient pagan winter holiday. It’s just coincidence. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/14 "2007-04-09T19:32:51Z")
[QUOTE=Der Trihs] Actully, I wasn’t trying to defend the idea that Easter came from that goddess’s name; I was just pointing out that such trappings as rabbits and eggs just scream “Spring Fertility Festival”, and such a festival probably existed before Easter, and likely before any goddess Eostre if there ever was one. Your claim that it’s all commericalization seems unlikely; if it’s not about leftover fertility symbols, why rabbits and eggs, of all things ? [/QUOTE] It would be nice if someone could document the time frame (and ethnic group) that introduced eggs and fluffy bunnies to the Easter celebration. We know when the celebration of the resurrection was initiated; it is documented among the earliest discussions among Christians living around the Mediterranean, with nary a duck, bunny, or egg. Now, is it possible that various groups around Europe each added a little bit more to the secular trappings of the celebration? Quite possibly. Does anyone have a reference to the actual origins of Ukranian egg painting? Does anyone have an actual citation to any pre-Christian feast or celebration that included giving baby chicks or bunnies to children? (The latter sounds like a pre-4H 4H project that happened to get linked to the celebration of Easter simply because they were concurrent.) Given that most of the “Spring/Fertility” rites that I have read about have always seemed to have more to do with engaging in very definitiely post-pubescent activities, I am not quite ready to dismiss the “commercial” angle without a bit of evidence. So, does anyone have a reference to French or Danish or British children receiving small fluffy critters prior to the nineteenth century, (and when?) Does anyone have a direct reference to eggs at easter in Germany or Spain in the early Renaissance? ---
**Author:** ![rocking\_chair](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rocking_chair/32/2918_2.png) [@rocking\_chair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rocking_chair)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/15 "2007-04-09T20:21:02Z")
the egg is mary magdalane’s doing. she turned an egg red as a gift for an emperior. eggs were then exchanged as gifts. we (othodox types) get them in church after liturgy on pascha and the days following (until they run out). the fun bit is the huge egg cooking and dyeing between services on great and holy thursday. you can always spot the egg brigade. (red handed.) ---
**Author:** ![Skammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skammer/32/143_2.png) [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/16 "2007-04-09T20:57:26Z")
I once had a rector (priest) who would not refer to the holiday at “Easter” because of the pagan connotations of the word (at least to him). He always and only referred to it as “Resurrection Sunday.” ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2007, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/17 "2007-04-09T23:12:51Z")
[QUOTE=rocking chair] the egg is mary magdalane’s doing. she turned an egg red as a gift for an emperior. eggs were then exchanged as gifts. [/QUOTE] What would be nice, at this point, would be to find a reference to the (approximate) date when the story of Mary handing some unnamed emperor the egg was first recorded. ---
**Author:** ![panamajack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/47e85d/32.png) [@panamajack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panamajack)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2007, 7:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/18 "2007-04-10T07:19:13Z")
Online references aren’t the greatest, but here’s a decent overview on pysanky (Ukrainian painted eggs), which does reference a book in the middle. [Pysanky](http://www.ukrainian-n-things.com/pysanky4.htm) Pysanky clearly pre-date Christianity, but there’s nothing that I can see that clearly links them to any spring celebration. Plus there’s no reason to believe that all egg dyeing is related to that tradition. The same Mary Magdalene story gets told there, and I couldn’t find a reference either [Maybe [this book](http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0038-7134(199901)74%3A1%3C134%3A%22BEPUA%3E2.0.CO%3B2-C) would have more leads?]. As an aside, the image of her skull in a statue at the reliquary is one of the creepiest things I’ve found online. The German wikipedia page on [Ostara](http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ostara) has some more detail and appears decently researched. There’s not much more than what Dr. Deth already sketched - some placenames might be a reference, and there’s a rune that mentions ‘Osta’. (Not to speculate still futher, but it seems possible the Christian missionaries borrowed the name by overestimating her importance given the month maybe named after her, maybe the way someone might think that we worship Woden and Freya, and Thor by hearing our weekday names.) ---
**Author:** ![Daithi\_Lacha](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/daithi_lacha/32/5430_2.png) [@Daithi\_Lacha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daithi_Lacha)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2007, 12:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/19 "2007-04-10T12:08:19Z")
[QUOTE=panamajack] […] maybe the way someone might think that we worship Woden and Freya, and Thor by hearing our weekday names.) [/QUOTE] We don’t? :eek: It would seem that it would have been easy for the early Christian missionaries to incorporate any pagan springtime celebrations into their own holy-day structure, similar to Yuletide. "So, you’re celebrating the fact that the world is born anew? That’s great, my people do the very same thing! And all because of one man - a special man. Here, let me tell you a story … " I must admit, I thought the folklore of Eoster was more fully recorded. Gotta love this site! ---
**Author:** ![JohnGalt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johngalt/32/184_2.png) [@JohnGalt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnGalt)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2007, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239/20 "2007-04-10T20:04:45Z")
It’s much simpler than everyone’s making out here. There’s two times in the year when the sun rises directly in the east: the vernal (spring) equinox and the autumnal equinox. Since Easter happens on the Sunday after the first full moon after the vernal equinox (with some variations thrown in), on Easter the sun rises directly in the east (or pretty close to it). That is, the sun as at “East” or “Easter” on this day (just don’t ask if there’s an Easter in the fall). [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-origin-of-the-term-easter/399239.md?page=2)