On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. Lent friendly meals article is about the Western Christian 40-day period. For Lent in Eastern Christianity, see Great Lent. Lent is described as lasting for a total duration of 40 days.

Lent is a period of grief that necessarily ends with a great celebration of Easter. Many Lent-observing Christians also add a Lenten spiritual discipline, such as reading a daily devotional or praying through a Lenten calendar, to draw themselves near to God. In most Lent-observing denominations, the last week of Lent coincides with Holy Week, starting with Palm Sunday. The violet color is often associated with penance and detachment. In languages spoken where Christianity was earlier established, such as Greek and Latin, the term signifies the period dating from the 40th weekday before Easter.

Latin-derived languages and in some others. In other languages, the name used refers to the activity associated with the season. Early Christianity records the tradition of fasting before Easter. The Apostolic Constitutions permit the consumption of “bread, vegetables, salt and water, in Lent” with “flesh and wine being forbidden. In AD 339, Athanasius of Alexandria wrote that the Lenten fast was a forty-day fast that “the entire world” observed. Three main prevailing theories exist on the finalization of Lent as a forty-day fast prior to the arrival of Easter Sunday: First, that it was created at the Council of Nicea in 325 and there is no earlier incarnation. Second, that it is based on an Egyptian Christian post-theophany fast.