<P> The French Revolutionary Calendar had ten - day weeks (called décades) and allowed décadi, one out of the ten days, as a leisure day . </P> <P> In cultures with a four - day week, the three Sabbaths derives from the culture's main religious tradition: Friday (Muslim), Saturday (Jewish), and Sunday (Christian). </P> <P> The present - day concept of the relatively longer' week - end' first arose in the industrial north of Britain in the early part of nineteenth century and was originally a voluntary arrangement between factory owners and workers allowing Saturday afternoon off from 2pm in agreement that staff would be available for work sober and refreshed on Monday morning . The Oxford English Dictionary traces the first use of the term weekend to the British magazine Notes and Queries in 1879 . </P> <P> In 1908, the first five - day workweek in the United States was instituted by a New England cotton mill so that Jewish workers would not have to work on the Sabbath from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday . In 1926, Henry Ford began shutting down his automotive factories for all of Saturday and Sunday . In 1929, the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America Union was the first union to demand a five - day workweek and receive it . After that, the rest of the United States slowly followed, but it was not until 1940, when a provision of the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act mandating a maximum 40 - hour workweek went into effect, that the two - day weekend was adopted nationwide . </P>

When did the 5 day working week start