What it means
شنبه (shanbeh) is Saturday. What makes this word unusual for English speakers is its place in the Iranian calendar: شنبه is not the weekend but the first day of the working week in Iran. The word descends from the Aramaic shabbtha, the Sabbath, which entered Persian through centuries of contact between Persian and Babylonian-Aramaic speaking communities in the pre-Islamic era. It is not a pure Persian word. The official weekly holiday in Iran is جمعه (jom’eh), Friday, so شنبه through چهارشنبه (Wednesday) form the core working days, with پنجشنبه (Thursday) often a half-day.
How to use it
- شنبه اول هفتهست. (Shanbeh avval-e hafteh-st.) “Saturday is the first day of the week.”
- شنبه کار داریم، نمیتونیم بیایم. (Shanbeh kâr dârim, nemitonim biyâyim.) “We have work on Saturday, we can’t come.”
- از شنبه شروع میکنم. (Az shanbeh shoru’ mikonam.) “I’ll start from Saturday.”
- شنبه گذشته خونه بودم. (Shanbeh gozashte khune budam.) “I was home last Saturday.”
Cultural note
In Iran the week begins on شنبه, not Sunday or Monday. This means that when an Iranian colleague says “I’ll send it at the start of the week,” they mean Saturday morning. The Iranian working week runs from شنبه through چهارشنبه or پنجشنبه, with جمعه as the mandatory day of rest. International companies operating in Iran often maintain a split schedule to overlap with the global Monday-Friday week, which can make شنبه a particularly busy bridging day.