red letter day

Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.

Sense 1

Meaning · English

A special or memorable day

Nghĩa · Tiếng Việt

một ngày đặc biệt hoặc đáng nhớ

Machine-translated — suggest a fix

Literally: a day marked with red letters
Where it’s used: Used Widespread English

Examples

Her wedding day was a red letter day in her life

AI-drafted example auto-approved by rule (illustrative, not a corpus attestation)

Sources & notes

Listed in Wiktionary’s “English idioms” category (retrieved 2026-07-29); definition pending editorial review. Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-07-31; pending editor spot-check.

Sense 2

Meaning · English

A saint's day or holiday, marked in the calendars with red letters. Red letter men; Roman Catholics: from their observation of the saint days marked in red letters.

Nghĩa · Tiếng Việt

Ngày lễ hoặc ngày nghỉ được đánh dấu trên lịch

Machine-translated — suggest a fix

Era: ca. 1811 (Georgian)

Where it’s used: Origin British & Irish English
Sources & notes

Historical definition reproduced from Grose’s Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue (1811 edition, public domain; Project Gutenberg #5402, retrieved 2026-07-31). Reflects the attitudes of its era.

Common questions

What does “red letter day” mean?

A special or memorable day Literally: a day marked with red letters

Is “red letter day” formal or informal?

No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.