Not worthy to be named the same DAY

Meaning & Analysis

A person or thing is so vastly inferior to another that they are not even worthy of being mentioned within the same 24-hour period.

Insights

Absolute Incomparability

The proverb is a statement of absolute incomparability, suggesting that two entities exist on such different planes of value or quality that any attempt at comparison is fundamentally absurd.

Rhetorical Dismissal

It functions as a rhetorical device for ultimate dismissal. To say someone is 'not named the same day' is to declare them entirely irrelevant and beneath consideration in a particular context.

Contamination by Association

Mentioning the inferior person in the same context as the superior one would be seen as a form of contamination, diminishing the status or reputation of the greater party through unworthy association.

Hierarchical Worldview

This proverb reflects a worldview rooted in rigid social or moral hierarchies, where certain individuals are considered so superior that comparing them to others is a transgression. The use of 'day' as a temporal measure of association elevates the comparison beyond mere physical space to a conceptual one, implying the inferior party doesn't even belong in the same frame of relevance.

Psychology of Contempt

Psychologically, the expression serves as a powerful tool for social exclusion and verbal annihilation. By refusing to name someone in the 'same day', the speaker not only elevates the superior party but actively erases the inferior one from a shared context, rendering them insignificant.

Echoes of Sacred Distance

The cross-reference to 'Not worthy to loose the latchet of his shoes', a biblical allusion expressing profound humility before a divine figure, enriches the proverb's meaning. It suggests that the gap between the two parties is not just great, but fundamentally unbridgeable, akin to the distance between the mortal and the divine.

Rhetorical Devices

Hyperbole

The phrase uses exaggeration to emphasize the immense and insurmountable gap in value, status, or skill between two parties.

Temporal Metaphor

The 'day' serves as a metaphor for a shared context or a sphere of relevance. To be excluded from the 'day' is to be cast out from consideration entirely.

Idiom

The structure of the phrase is a fixed, idiomatic expression whose meaning is non-literal and culturally understood to denote extreme inferiority.

incomparabilityhierarchystatushyperboleinferioritycontempt
Analyzed with gemini-2.5-pro on July 3, 2025

Transcription

Quotations

(on the same day with him).

1616, WITHALS, p. 561

Is she, though fair, the same day to be named With best Artemia?

1622, DEKKER AND MASSINGER, Virgin Martyr I, p. 19

Not to be nam'd of a day.

1666, TOR., Prov. Phr., s.v. Rossignuolo, p. 173
1670, RAY, p. 200

Not to be nam'd the same day.

1671, CL., Phras. Puer., s.v. Disprise, p. 99

(the same day with you).

1672, WALK., 56, p. 17

Cross References

Original Scan

Not worthy to be named the same DAY - a scanned entry from Tilley's 1950 Dictionary of Proverbs. Not worthy to be named the same DAY - a scanned entry from Tilley's 1950 Dictionary of Proverbs. (continuation)
Scan courtesy of HathiTrust Digital Library.
Used under CC BY-NC 3.0.

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Last updated: January 27, 2026