[3] It is celebrated as a Christian festival with particular regard to Saint Nicholas' reputation as a bringer of gifts, as well as through the attendance of church services.

[10] He was released after Constantine the Great promulgated the Edict of Milan in 313, which allowed for the public practice of Christianity in the Roman Empire.

[10] The saint was entombed in St. Nicholas Church, Demre, though in 1087, Italian soldiers transferred his remains to Italy, where they were enshrined in the Basilica di San Nicola and are held to this day.

[10] In the 11th century, Christian nuns in Belgium and France initiated the practice of giving the poor gifts in the name of Saint Nicholas.

St. Nicholas is the protector of sailors, he is considered the patron saint of the Greek Navy, military and merchant alike, and his day is marked by festivities aboard all ships and boats, at sea and in port.

According to the tradition, it is Agios Nikolaos who makes the winds rage and cease, he can walk on the seas and whenever there is a ship in trouble, he would save it.

Therefore, by tradition, homes should have already been laid with carpets, removed for the warm season, by St. Andrew's Day (30 November), a week ahead of the Nikolobárbara.

Families invite relatives, sponsors, and neighbors for a meal of fish (usually ribnik, a carp wrapped in dough) and two loaves of ceremonial bread, all of which are blessed at church or at home.

In the days leading up to 5 December, young children put their shoes in front of the chimneys and sing Sinterklaas songs.

He arrives by steamboat around mid-November every year when he makes his annual entry in Antwerp, an event that is usually attended by hundreds of children.

Sinterklaas wears a bishop's robes including a red cape and mitre and rides a white horse named Schimmel or Amerigo in the Netherlands and Slecht Weer Vandaag (bad weather today) in Flanders.

In Slovenia, Miklavž (Sveti Miklavž) and in Croatia, Nikolaus (Sveti Nikola) who visits on Saint Nicholas day (Nikolinje in Croatia and "Miklavževanje" in Slovenia) brings gifts to children commending them for their good behavior over the past year and exhorting them to continue in the same manner in the year to come.

Also, the tradition of caring for the needy is increasingly respected: both in the form of charity events in church communities and in secular charitable projects.

[uk]" takes place: the city organizes the "Saint Nicholas Factory", where residents bring gifts and donations for orphans; campaign activists distribute them to children in the evenings of 18 and 19 December.

[31] In 2010, President Viktor Yanukovych instructed the government to provide in the state budget for 2011 funds for the construction of the Estate of Saint Nicholas in the Hutsulshchyna National Park.

The film tells about the faith of modern children in a good wizard who comes with gifts on the night before Saint Nicholas Day.

Bakeries and home kitchens are hives of activity as spiced gingerbread biscuits and mannala (a brioche shaped like the saint) are baked.

He is sometimes accompanied by an actor playing Père Fouettard, who, like his German counterpart Krampus, carries switches to threaten the children who fear he will advise Saint Nicolas to pass them by on his gift-giving rounds.

Saint Nicholas fills the boot with gifts and sweets overnight, and at the same time checks up on the children to see if they were good, polite and helpful the last year.

Nicholas is often portrayed in Northern German folklore as being accompanied by Knecht Ruprecht who inquires of the children if they have been saying their prayers, and if not, he shakes his bag of ashes at them, or beats them with a stick.

Sometimes a Nikolaus impersonator also visits the children at school or in their homes and asks them if they have been good (sometimes ostensibly checking his golden book for their record), handing out presents on the basis of their behavior.

In more Catholic regions, Saint Nikolaus is dressed very much like a bishop, rides on a horse, and is welcomed at public places by large crowds.

In Poland Mikołaj is often also accompanied by an angel (anděl / anjel / anioł / anhel) who acts as a counterweight to the ominous devil or Knecht Ruprecht (czart).

In Austria, Bavaria and South-Tyrol (Austro-Bavarian regions), Saint Nicholas is accompanied by Krampus, represented as a beast-like creature, generally demonic in appearance.

In Czechia and Slovakia children receive some candies for their good deeds from Saint Nicholas (Mikuláš) and potatoes or coal from Chort (čert) for their sins.

As Saint Nicholas is said to protect children and virgins, on 6 December there is a ritual called the Rito delle nubili: unmarried women wishing to find a husband can attend to an early-morning Mass, in which they have to turn around a column seven times.

A similar tradition is currently observed in Sassari, where during the day of Saint Nicholas, patron of the city, gifts are given to young women who need help to get married.

In the provinces of Trieste, Udine, Belluno, Bari (Terlizzi and Molfetta), South Tyrol, Trentino and in the eastern part of the Province of Treviso, St. Nicholas (San Niccolò) is celebrated with gifts given to children on the morning of 6 December and with a fair called Fiera di San Niccolò[38] during the first weeks of December.

It was designed by the Maltese architect, Lorenzo Gafà, with the portico and naves being added by Nikola Zammit in the latter half of the 19th century.

While feasts of Saint Nicholas are not observed nationally, cities with strong German influences like Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Evansville, Indiana, Teutopolis, Illinois; Cincinnati, Ohio; Fredericksburg, Texas; Newport News, Virginia; St. Louis, Missouri; and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania celebrate Saint Nicholas Day on a scale similar to the German custom.