Name days in Croatia

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In Croatia, a name day (Croatian: imendan) is a day corresponding to a date in the Catholic calendar when the respective saint's day is celebrated. Even though celebration of the name day is less usual than celebrating birthday, the name day is more often congratulated by broader number of acquaintances. This is because the date of birth is seldom known and the person's name is known to many.

The names that are celebrated on the certain saint's day are all the names that correspond to the respective name and all the derivative names. If there are different version of the same name in different languages (e.g. John, which in Croatian is Ivan and in Spanish is Juan) all the respective names are celebrated. Sometimes both sexes are celebrated for the same saint (usually male). For example, November 30 is the day of Saint Andrew apostle, and both Andrija (male) and Andreja (female) are celebrated.

When several saints share the same name, imendan calendars will show all of them. However, it is customary to celebrate only one of them, typically the most famous.

See also General Roman Calendar and Tridentine calendar.

Names attributed to a certain saint link to the wikiarticle about the saint.