Where does the word fortnight come from?

Answer 1

Fort is an abbreviation for "14" nights.

Middle English fourtenight, alteration of fourtene night, fourteen nights : Old English fēowertēne, fourteen; see kwetwer- in Indo-European roots + Old English niht, night; see nokwt- in Indo-European roots.
-MM

Answer 2

What Is A Fortnight

Answer 3

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Where does the word fortnight come from?

Answer 4

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Fourteen nights shortened became fortnight.

Answer 5

I've read in history books, travelers were assured of up to 2 weeks stay to replenish their horses and repair their tack, gear and weapons during the Middle Ages.

-- from Barbara Tuchman's "A Distant Mirror"

Answer 6

fortnight is a unit of time equal to two weeks: that is 14 days, or literally 14 nights. The term is common in the British Isles and many Commonwealth countries, but rarely used in the United States. It derives from the Old English feowertiene niht, meaning "fourteen nights".


[edit] Breakdowns
1 fortnight = 2 sennights (or two weeks)
1 fortnight = 336 hours
1 fortnight = 20,160 minutes
1 fortnight = 1,209,600 seconds

[edit] Unusual usages
In the VMS operating system, some configuration parameters are specified in microfortnights (one millionth of a fortnight, or 1.2096 seconds). Millifortnights (about 20 minutes) and nanofortnights (1.2096 milliseconds) have also been used occasionally in computer science, usually in an attempt to be deliberately over-complex and obscure. The aim is generally to slow users down, allowing them to set parameters only after some thought.

One attoparsec per microfortnight is approximately 1.00432766 inches per second.

The speed unit of one furlong per fortnight is a barely noticeable 0.166 millimetres per second, or roughly 1 centimetres per minute.

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Dear Word Detective: I recently made mild fuss with a friend of mine about the origins of the word "fortnight." I thought it was simply an abbreviated form of "fourteen nights." He believes that it was started during a time of war. His thought is that it was the time period required of a soldier to stay at a fort, hence the term "fortnight." -- M. Bauman, via the internet.

"Made a fuss"? As in "had a fight"? As in everyone in the restaurant stopped eating and stared at the two of you as you wrestled on the floor, shouting "Fourteen nights!" and "Soldiers in a fort!"? I do wish my readers wouldn't take these little etymological squabbles so seriously. Save your energies for battles that really matter. I'll let you know when I think of one.

In any case, you win this one. "Fortnight," which means a period of fourteen days, is a contraction of the Old English phrase "feowertiene niht," which meant "fourteen nights." (The ancient Germanic peoples from whom we lifted the phrase measured time in nights, not days.) A related term, "sennight," means a period of seven days (from the Old English for seven nights, "seofon niht"), but is very rarely heard today.

"Fortnight" itself is pretty rare in the U.S., although it is still in common use in Britain. The entire British way of speaking about the immediate future, by the way, often confuses American visitors. While in the U.S. we might say "I'll pay you two weeks from Tuesday," in Britain they would say "I'll pay you Tuesday fortnight," or "Tuesday week" if they were going to pay you a week sooner. The British also follow the date format "day, month, year" (as in "4 July 1999" or "4/7/99"), rather than our familiar "month, day, year" form.