Lent does not come from similar sounding words, such as the musical direction, lento, involving the meanings of "long" and "slow," even if the Lenten period may involve notions of how very long these days of fasting seem and how slowly this season of penitence does pass; the truth is a bit more complicated.

Although it is true Lent has a linguistic link to "long," that ancestral adjective was not being used to complain about the relatively slow feeling of time passing during this lengthy and solemn observance. Way back when, that term was paired with another term akin to the Latin word meaning day: the "long day" compound was a commentary on the lengthening days associated with this time of year. In fact, the original lente (from which Lent derives) simply named the season of spring.