How Countries In Europe Say ‘merry Christmas’

Whether you’re enjoying some sunny Mediterranean weather or skiing this winter, or you just want to surprise a friend by sending them a Christmas card in their language, here are all the European Christmas greetings you could need.

This colorful map of Europe was made by Jakub Marian, a Czech linguist who makes fun infographic maps in addition to having written a line of textbooks . If you like this Christmas map, you can check out his other maps that you can use all year long, like how European languages say “I love you”. His map of tea may surprise you with its simplicity – it looks like the world’s most popular drink is the one thing that most of us are in agreement about.

This map shows how Europe says Merry Christmas

The colors on the map show the etymological roots of each phrase: for example, red represents Romance languages that use a Latin-based word for the event of the birth of Christ. You can see that some other languages, like the Celtic languages and Turkish, get their Christmas greetings as loanwords from the Romance languages. You can also see that up north, highlighted in green, people get their word for Christmas from the Old Norse pagan festival jól (we have this word in English as Yule!)

In Marian’s analysis on his website, he explains that he groups together German, Czech and Slovak because the latter two languages adopted an old German word for “holy night” into their lexicon.

He also explains that Romanian and Hungarian, even though Romanian is an Indo-European language like the other Romance languages, while Hungarian is from a completely different family, seem to have gotten their word for Christmas from the same root in either Proto-Slavic or Latin.

Maybe you didn’t know that Christmas is celebrated differently all over Europe, and in many places, it’s not over yet. Orthodox Christians in Russia, Ukraine, and parts of the Balkans will be celebrating the Nativity on January 7th, due to a difference in the ceremonial calendar that they use, and get national holidays to match.

However, in countries that spent most of the 20th century under Soviet control, suppression of religion prevented celebrating Christmas, which meant that Christmas celebrations were largely rebranded and merged with New Year’s Eve. As a result, many cultures as you go east celebrate New Year’s Eve more heavily than Christmas to this day, often mixing imagery from the two holidays. (Conveniently, Marian has included a map for that too!)

Here are all of the phrases listed on the map, if you need to copy and paste them:

Albanian : Gëzuar Krishtlindjet Basque : Eguberri on Belarusian : з Калядамі or з Божым Нараджэннем (z Kaljádami or z Bozym Naradžénnjem) Breton : Nedeleg laouen Bulgarian : Весела Коледа or Честито Рождество Христово (Vesela Koleda or Chestito Roždestvo Hristovo) Catalan : Bon Nadal Croatian : Sretan Božić Czech : Veselé Vánoce Danish God jul or Glædelig jul Dutch : Vrolijk Kerstfeest English : Merry Christmas or Happy Christmas Estonian : Häid jõule Finnish : Hyvää joulua French : Joyeux Noël Galician : Bo Nadal German : Fröhliche Weihnachten or Frohe Weihnachten Greek : Καλά Χριστούγεννα ( K alá Christoúgenna ) Hungarian : Boldog karácsonyt Icelandic : Gleðileg jól Irish : Nollaig Shona + Dhuit (singular) or Daoibh (plural) Italian : Buon Natale Latvian : Priecīgus Ziemassvētkus Lithuanian : Linksmų Kalėdų Luxembourgish : Schéine Chrëschtdag Macedonian : Среќен Божиќ or Христос се роди (Sreḱen Božiḱ or Hristos se rodi) Maltese : il-Milied it-Tajjeb Norwegian : God jul Northern Sami : Buorit juovllat Romanian : Crăciun fericit Occitan : Bon Nadal Polish : Wesołych Świąt (Bożego Narodzenia) Portuguese: Feliz Natal Russian : с Рождеством (Христовым) (s Roždestvóm [Hristóvym]) Scottish Gaelic : Nollaig Chridheil Serbian : Srećan Božić or Hristos se rodi Sardinian : Bona Pasca de Nadale Slovak : Veselé Vianoce Slovene : Vesel božič Spanish : Feliz Navidad Swedish : God jul Turkish : Mutlu Noeller Ukrainian : з Різдвом (Христовим) (z Rizdvóm [Hrystóvym]) Welsh : Nadolig Llawen

Jakub Marian’s books and map prints can be found on his official website .

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