14 February is Valentine's Day. Pretty straight-forward in English-dominant countries but a relatively recent and excitingly new phenomenon in countries such as in southeast Europe.
Just one thing...
14 February is already an event there but for other local and ancient reasons.
Enter the battle of the global vs the local!
14 February every year always prompts great debate amongst Bulgarians, Macedonians and (to a much lesser degree) Serbs: do you celebrate Valentine's Day or are you for Trifon Zarezan, the traditional local celebration that honours the patron saint of vine growers, St Tryphon, that falls, or used to be, on the same day. To put it on simpler terms, are you for love or wine?
On this day, the first pruning symbolically marks the beginning of the wine season and, in turn, spring. No surprises then that most of the Balkan traditions associated with Trifon Zarezan are syncretic adaptations of ancient fertility rites related to the change of seasons. Essentially, our saint of wine is a local Orthodox Christian iteration of previous pagan wine gods such as Dionysus.
So what do I mean by St Tryphon's Day 'used to be' on the same day?
The Macedonian and Serbian Orthodox Churches follow the Julian Calendar, popularly referred to as the 'Old Calendar', which is two weeks behind the Gregorian calendar (the calendar the secular world uses), which of course is called the 'New Calendar'. Out of the world's major Orthodox Churches, the Greek and Romanian Churches in adopted the new calendar in 1923, the Bulgarian Church in 1968, whereas the new Orthodox Church of Ukraine is the latest having switched in 2023. Strictly speaking, this 'new calendar' used by these churches is the Revised Julian Calendar, as there are a few dates that have remained the same from the old calendar – Easter being the biggest one. St Tryphon the religious holiday then is on 1 February for the new-calendar Orthodox churches, but in Bulgaria's case, the related wine festival Trifon Zarezan has remained on the 14th as per the old calendar. The change in religious calendar dates occurred during Communist rule in Bulgaria, at a time when religious elements were actively removed from traditional celebrations, so this played in emphasising the secular (and essentially pagan) origins of the festival. It was also during this time that the alternative names for the day appeared in Bulgaria – Празникът на виното or Денят на виното (the 'Wine Holiday' or 'Wine Day'). This Communist period was when most of the modern-day rituals for Trifon Zarezan were standardised, such people wearing folk costume symbolically cutting a vine and pouring wine made from the grapes of the previous harvest to prompt a bumper crop.
Many proponents of Trifon Zarezan otherwise see Valentine's Day as a money-driven, commercialised import overriding local traditions; 'an evil example of western (well, US) cultural domination that has no place in the Balkans'. As each year passes, the marketing for Valentine's Day increases, which in turn sees more people celebrate Trifon Zarezan not only as a counter-reaction and a sign of protest, but also as an affirmation of local and national identity.
But we do live in the age of social media and rage bait, so before you know it, people in these countries are dragged into vox pops, on-line polls and vitriolic comments wars to state their polarised view of the day.
Valentine's Day in these countries otherwise looks no difference to celebrations elsewhere in the world, which is a major part of its appeal – it represents the modern, cosmopolitan and, above, rich outlook associated with the west. It also fills the gap as there is no traditional holiday to celebrate the relatively modern concept of romance and love. Besides, for the young ones, it's so much cooler to be like westerners and not do stuff that their 'uncool' grandparents used to do.
Important to note that 14 February is St Valentine's Day on the Catholic, Anglican and Lutheran calendars only. The Orthodox Christian calendar commemorates the same Roman saint on 6 July (new calendar) or 30 July (old calendar). Plus there are a number of other days of the year for local saints named Valentin or Valentina, such as 10 February (St Valentina) in Bulgaria or 30 June (St Valentin) in Macedonia. Seeing that Valentin, Valentina, Tin, Tina, Valya, Vale, and other related names are popular throughout the region, do expect to find that these people celebrate their name days on these local saints days instead.
One interesting and related linguistic trend of late, particularly in Macedonia, in an effort to distinguish that Valentine's Day is a western import and not connected to St Valentine in an Orthodox Christian sense, more people are increasing referring to Valentine's Day in their languages as you would say it in English: Valentajn.
Seeing what a minefield this day can be, if marketing for these countries on 14 February, it best to tread carefully. However, you'll certainly win brownie points from certain demographics by playing up the local angle by at least mentioning wine and Trifon Zarezan. Be careful with children though – even if my grandparents had me drinking red wine mixed with lemonade from the age of 6. It's a part of Balkan culture, but can you imagine the shock of my Anglo-Australian schoolmates when I told them that my grandparents serve me alcohol!
So no matter how you celebrate 14 February, as a day of love or as a day of wine, celebrate it well. As what the famous meme goes, why not both?
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