Why Is Wednesday Called “Hump Day”?

As modern as it might sound, Wednesday has been informally and somewhat jokingly known as “Hump Day” since the mid 1900s, with the earliest record of the term unearthed so far dating back to 1955. 

Ever since then, though, this moniker has continued to grow in popularity, with the term soaring into mainstream use in the early 2000s and 2010s. But where on Earth has such a peculiar name come from? 

1. The Surprisingly Straightforward Origins of “Hump Day”
2. The Swedish Method

The Surprisingly Straightforward Origins of “Hump Day”

The historical record seems to suggest that this is a squarely North American term, with the Oxford English Dictionary’s earliest citations coming from local newspapers in California (“The high light of any patrol ... is Hump Day,” 1959), and Nebraska (“Happy ‘hump’ day … the week is half over,” 1965). Jonathon Green’s Dictionary of Slang, meanwhile, has an isolated record of Wednesday being referred to as “Hump night” in an American periodical from 1966.  

Green’s dictionary also provides a neat explanation of the surprisingly straightforward metaphor that lies behind the term. The “hump” in your working week’s Hump Day is exactly the same as the sloping bump you would see on the back of a camel, or protruding out of an otherwise flat landscape. With most people working Monday through Friday, ultimately, Wednesday represents the midpoint or highpoint of the working week’s “hump,” after which it is all a smooth, easy, downhill journey to the weekend. 

The prospect of a rapidly approaching weekend (plus all of the free time that it brings with it) might be enough for some of us, but several northern European countries and cultures like to take the notion of a Hump Day one step further. 

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The Swedish Method

In Sweden, the fact that Wednesday is the turning point of week—and so half the working week is now behind us—has led to it being nicknamed “lillördag,” or literally “little Saturday.” As a result, lillördag is seen by many Swedes as an opportunity to break up the working week and celebrate the upcoming weekend with a couple of post-work drinks. Some Swedish bars, restaurants, clubs, and even museums and other cultural hotspots offer later opening hours midweek, and university students often use Wednesday night as a night to go out drinking or celebrating. It’s essentially a more raucous and rambunctious version of Hump Day that’s also observed in Sweden’s neighboring Nordic countries of Norway, Denmark, and Finland. 

That being said, however, Sweden’s “Little Saturday” might have a more practical and less hedonistic explanation behind it than simply celebrating the fast-approaching weekend. According to some theories, the tradition of lillördag actually dates back to a time when many well-to-do households in Sweden had maids and other servants on their staff, many of whom (unlike the household’s members themselves) would be expected to work on a Saturday. 

Ultimately, the staff were offered a midweek day off to make up for working the weekends instead, and typically opted for Wednesday as it broke up the rest of the working week the most evenly. Perhaps, then, it is this old tradition of a midweek day of rest that lies behind Sweden’s Hump Day, rather than a simple downhill slide into the weekend.