holiday

Etymology

From Middle English halyday, holyday, halidei, haliȝdei, from Old English hāliġdæġ (“holy day, Sabbath”), equivalent to holy + day. Compare West Frisian hjeldei (“holiday”), Danish helligdag (“holiday”), Norwegian helligdag (“holiday”), Swedish helgdag (“holiday, feast”).

noun

1. A day on which a festival, religious event, or national celebration is traditionally observed.
   Today is a Wiccan holiday!
   Monday, January 18, was the holiday celebrating Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday. In the morning I held a reception for the diplomatic representatives of other nations in the inner quadrangle at Georgetown, addressing them from the steps of Old North Building. 2005, Bill Clinton, My Life, volume II, New York: Vintage Books, →OCLC, page 5
2. A day declared free from work by the state or government.
3. (chiefly UK, Australia) A period of one or more days taken off work for leisure and often travel; often plural.
   Climb aboard a butterfly and take off in the breeze. Let your worries flutter by and do the things you please. In the land where dollar bills are falling off the trees. On a dreamer’s holiday.[…]Make it a long vacation. Time, there is plenty of. You need no reservation. Just bring along the one you love. 1949-08-11, “A Dreamer’s Holiday”, performed by Perry Como, The Fontaine Sisters, and The Mitchell Ayres Orchestra
4. (chiefly UK, Australia) A period during which pupils do not attend their school; often plural; rarely used for students at university (usually: vacation).
   I want to take a French course this summer holiday.
5. (finance) A period during which, by agreement, the usual payments are not made.
   a mortgage payment holiday
6. A gap in coverage, e.g. of paint on a surface, or sonar imagery.

verb

1. (intransitive) To take a period of time away from work or study.
2. (Britain, intransitive) To spend a period of time in recreational travel.