[11] In parts of Europe, people continue to light bonfires on Saint Walpurga's Eve in order to ward off evil spirits and witches.

[7] Local variants of Walpurgis Night are observed throughout Northern and Central Europe in the Netherlands, Germany, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Sweden, Lithuania, Latvia, Finland, and Estonia.

[1][6][12] The name of the holiday is often shortened to Walpurgisnacht (German), Valborgsmässoafton ("Valborg's Mass Eve", Swedish), Vappen (Finland Swedish), Vappu (Finnish), Volbriöö (Estonian), Valpurgijos naktis (Lithuanian), Valpurģu nakts or Valpurģi (Latvian), and čarodějnice or Valpuržina noc (Czech).

[17] Born into a prominent Anglo-Saxon family, Saint Walpurga studied medicine and became a Christian missionary to Germany, where she founded a double monastery in Heidenheim.

When the bishop had Saint Walpurga's relics moved to Eichstätt, "miraculous cures were reported as her remains traveled along the route".

[17] Miracle cures were later reported from ailing people who anointed themselves with a fluid known as Walburga's oil that drained from the rock at her shrine at Eichstatt.

[23] Art historian Pamela Berger noted Walpurga's association with sheaves of grain, and suggested that her cult was adapted from pagan agrarian goddesses.

[2] Due to 1 May being the date of Saint Walpurga's feast, it has become associated with other May Day celebrations and regional traditions,[25] especially in Finland and Sweden.

Huge bonfires up to 8 metres (26 ft) tall with a witch figure are built and burnt in the evening, preferably on top of hills.

In Lincolnshire, Walpurgis Night was observed in rural communities until the second half of the 20th century, with a tradition of hanging cowslips to ward off evil.

[28] In Estonia, volbriöö is celebrated throughout the night of 30 April and into the early hours of 1 May, where 1 May is a public holiday called "Spring Day" (kevadpüha).

The celebration, which begins on the evening of 30 April and continues on 1 May, typically centres on the consumption of sima, sparkling wine and other alcoholic beverages.

Some people arrange extremely lavish picnics with pavilions, white tablecloths, silver candelabras, classical music, and extravagant food.

The Brocken Spectre is a magnified shadow of an observer, typically surrounded by rainbow-like bands, thrown onto a bank of cloud in high mountain areas when the sun is low.

From Bram Stoker's short story, Dracula's Guest, an Englishman (whose name is never mentioned) is on a visit to Munich before leaving for Transylvania.

It is Walpurgis Night, and in spite of the hotelier's warning not to be late coming back, the young man later leaves his carriage and wanders toward the direction of an abandoned "unholy" village.

As the carriage departs with the frightened and superstitious driver, a tall and thin stranger scares the horses at the crest of a hill.

In Hungary elderberries decorated the houses, which were used to ward off witches this day, because the Hungarians believed that different plants can protect against various diseases or supernatural dangers.

In Késmárk the Hungarian population still knows about the fairy of the Thököly castle (Thököly vár), who sweeps the area around the Hungarian well at the dawn of Pentecost, and they still know about the witches who walk on May Day and Pentecost, but in most places, the source of evil was replaced by fire, ice, caterpillars and diseases as the country become more secular.

The island of Texel celebrates a festival known as the 'Meierblis [nl]' (roughly translated as 'May-Blaze') on that same day, where bonfires are lit near nightfall, just as on Walpurgis, but with the meaning to drive away the remaining cold of winter and welcome spring.

[34] In 1999, suspicions were raised among local Reformed party members in Putten, Gelderland of a Heksennacht festival celebrated by Satanists.

[36] While the name Walpurgis is taken from the 8th-century British Dumnonian Christian missionary Saint Walburga, valborg, as it is called in Swedish, also marks the arrival of spring.

Walpurgis celebrations are not a family occasion but rather a public event, and local groups often take responsibility for organising them to encourage community spirit in the village or neighbourhood.

Accordingly, this was a day of festivity among the merchants and craftsmen of the town, with trick-or-treat, dancing and singing in preparation for the forthcoming celebration of spring.

Sir James George Frazer in The Golden Bough writes, "The first of May is a great popular festival in the more midland and southern parts of Sweden.

In Southern Sweden, an older tradition, no longer practiced, was for the younger people to collect greenery and branches from the woods at twilight.

On the last day of April, the students don their characteristic white caps and sing songs of welcome to spring, to the budding greenery and to a brighter future.

During the day, people gather in parks, drink considerable amounts of alcoholic beverages, barbecue, and generally enjoy the weather, if it happens to be favorable.

The walls and floors of the old nation buildings are covered in plastic for this occasion, as the champagne is poured around recklessly and sometimes spilled enough to wade in.

In Gothenburg, the carnival parade, The Cortège, which has been held since 1909 by the students at Chalmers University of Technology, is an important part of the celebration.