[vij-uh
l] 
| 1. | wakefulness maintained for any reason during the normal hours for sleeping. |
| 2. | a watch or a period of watchful attention maintained at night or at other times: The nurse kept her vigil at the bedside of the dying man. |
| 3. | a period of wakefulness from inability to sleep. |
| 4. | Ecclesiastical.
|
| vig·il (vĭj'əl) n.
[Middle English vigile, a devotional watching, from Old French, from Latin vigilia, wakefulness, watch, from vigil, awake; see weg- in Indo-European roots.] |
vigil
watch or vigil held over the body of a dead person before burial and sometimes accompanied by festivity; also, in England, a vigil kept in commemoration of the dedication of the parish church. The latter type of wake consisted of an all-night service of prayer and meditation in the church. These services, officially termed Vigiliae by the church, appear to have existed from the earliest days of Anglo-Saxon Christianity. Each parish kept the morrow of its vigil as a holiday. Wakes soon degenerated into fairs; people from neighbouring parishes journeyed over to join in the merrymaking, and the revelry and drunkenness became a scandal. The days usually chosen for church dedications being Sundays and saints' days, the abuse seemed all the more scandalous. In 1445 Henry VI attempted to suppress markets and fairs on Sundays and holy days
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