Public holidays in Germany

The regulations to the statutory public holidays in Germany are in principle within the competence of the individual states . Only the day of German reunification as a national holiday on October 3rd was set by the federal government as part of a state treaty . All other holidays are determined by the countries. There are eight other public holidays that apply in all 16 federal states. In addition to these nine national holidays, all federal states have specified other holidays.

Together with all Sundays , the public holidays are constitutionally guaranteed as "days of rest from work and spiritual exhilaration" ( Art. 139 WRV in conjunction with Art. 140 GG ). This principle is also laid down in some state constitutions .

Overview of all public holidays

Public holidays in Germany are listed here. Unless otherwise stated in the explanations, the list has been valid since 1995. From 1990 to 1994 the day of penance and prayer was a public holiday in all federal states. Before October 3, 1990, the eastern part of Berlin and western Staaken , the present-day states of Brandenburg , Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania , Saxony , Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia as well as the Neuhaus office were on public holidays in the GDR .

Public holidays by federal state

date	Legal terms	BW	BY	BE	BB	HB	HH	HE	MV	NI	NW	RP	SL	SN	ST	SH	TH
References and Notes
January 1st	New year (stag)	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
6th January	Holy Three Kings (Epiphany), Festival of Apparitions	Yes	Yes												Yes
8th of March	women's Day			Yes
Thursday before Easter Sunday	Maundy Thursday
Friday before Easter Sunday	Good Friday	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
see Easter date	Easter Sunday				Yes			Yes *
Monday after Easter Sunday	Easter Monday	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
1st of May	May 1st , Labor Day	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Easter Sunday + 39 days	Ascension Day (day)	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Easter Sunday + 49 days	Pentecost Sunday				Yes			Yes *
Monday after Pentecost Sunday	Whit Monday	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Easter Sunday + 60 days	Corpus Christi (stag)	Yes	Yes					Yes			Yes	Yes	Yes
8th August	Augsburg High Peace Festival
15th of August	Assumption Day (stag)												Yes
September 20th	World Children's Day																Yes
October 3	Day of German unity	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
October 31	Reformation day / festival				Yes	Yes	Yes		Yes	Yes				Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
November 1st	All saints day	Yes	Yes								Yes	Yes	Yes
Wednesday before November 23rd	Day of Prayer and Repentance													Yes
25 December	1st / first Christmas (celebration) day	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
December 26th	2nd / 2nd Christmas (party) day	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Total number		12	14th	10	12	10	10	*	10	10	11	11	12	12	11	10	12
Total number of holidays that are valid in most of a country and that do not always fall on a Sunday		12	13	10	10	10	10	10	10	10	11	11	12	11	11	10	11
of which on a fixed date		7th	8th	6th	6th	6th	6th	5	6th	6th	6th	6th	7th	6th	7th	6th	7th
of which on a fixed weekday		5	5	4th	4th	4th	4th	5	4th	4th	5	5	5	5	4th	4th	4th
		BW	BY	BE	BB	HB	HH	HE	MV	NI	NW	RP	SL	SN	ST	SH	TH
Legend: National public holiday in this state. Regional public holiday in this state. Only school free . Federal holidays * Hesse: No meaningful information can be given, as all Sundays are public holidays.

1. ↑ ^{a b c} Sources BW: Law on Sundays and Public Holidays (Public Holidays Act - FTG).  - According to FTG § 4 Paragraph 3, schoolchildren have no school on Maundy Thursday and Reformation Day. As a rule, the Ministry of Culture sets the vacation dates in such a way that these two days fall into the Easter vacation or the autumn vacation.
2. ^ Sources BY: Law on the Protection of Sundays and Public Holidays (Public Holidays Act - FTG). 
3. ^ Sources BE: Law on Sundays and Holidays. 
4. ^ Sources BB: Law on Sundays and Public Holidays (Public Holidays Act - FTG). 
5. ^ Sources HB: Law on Sundays and Holidays. 
6. ↑ Sources HH: Law on Sundays, Holidays, Remembrance Days and Days of Mourning (Holidays Law).  , Holiday Protection Ordinance. 
7. ↑ Sources HE: Hessian Holiday Act (HFeiertagsG). 
8. ^ Sources MV: Law on Sundays and Public Holidays (Public Holidays Act Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania - FTG MV). 
9. ^ Sources NI: Lower Saxony law on public holidays (NFeiertagsG). 
10. ^ Sources NW: Law on Sundays and Holidays (Holiday Law NW). 
11. ^ Sources RP: State law on the protection of Sundays and public holidays (Public Holidays Act - LFtG). 
12. ^ Sources SL: Law on Sundays and Holidays (Public Holidays Act - SFG). 
13. ↑ ^{a b} Sources SN: Law on Sundays and Holidays in the Free State of Saxony (SächsSFG).  - Corpus Christi is a public holiday in the communities named in the Corpus Christi ordinance. In the remaining municipalities of Saxony, Corpus Christi is protected as a religious holiday by Section 3 (1) of the Saxon Public Holidays Act.
14. ^ Sources ST: Law on Sundays and Holidays (Holiday LSA). 
15. ^ Sources SH: Law on Sundays and Holidays (SFTG). 
16. ↑ ^{a b} Sources TH: Thuringian Celebration and Remembrance Day Act (ThürFGtG).  - Corpus Christi is a public holiday in the communities defined in accordance with Section 2, Paragraph 2 and Section 10, Paragraph 1 of the ThürFGtG, see community key for Corpus Christi Day.  . In the remaining municipalities of Thuringia, Corpus Christi is protected as a religious holiday by § 3 Paragraph 1 No. 2 of the Thuringian Celebration and Remembrance Day Act.
17. ↑ ^{a b c} In the Judeo-Christian tradition of counting, the 40th, 50th or 61st day of the Easter festival circle is usually spoken of, the first day of which is Easter Sunday.
18. ↑ The Augsburg Peace Festival is only a public holiday in the city of Augsburg (but not in the surrounding area) (Art. 1 Para. 2 Bavarian Law on the Protection of Sundays and Holidays).
19. ↑ Assumption of the Virgin Mary is a public holiday in Bavaria in currently 1704 (since 2014; until 2013: 1700, see After census - Bavarian municipalities lose public holiday ) municipalities with a predominantly Catholic population, in the remaining 352 (since 2014; until 2013: 356) municipalities Not. “Predominantly” does not refer to the total population, but to the comparison between the Protestant and the Catholic population. According to Art. 1 Para. 3 of the Bavarian Public Holidays Act, it is the task of the Bavarian State Office for Statistics and Data Processing to determine in which municipalities the Assumption Day is a public holiday. The current stipulation, which has been in effect since 2014, is based on the result of the last census carried out in the Federal Republic of Germany on May 9, 2011, the regulation valid until 2013 on the result of the census of May 25, 1987. According to Art. 4 Para. 3 of the Bavarian According to the public holiday law, there is no teaching in schools of all types in the entire state on Assumption of Mary. This stipulation also applies expressly in parts of Bavaria where this day is not a public holiday. Usually, however, the day is during the school holidays anyway. The Bavarian State Office for Statistics and Data Processing provides a list and overview map of the communities in which the Assumption of Mary is a public holiday. Archive.org version from 2017-11-07. 
20. ↑ Determination by federal law, the day is thus a national holiday even without country-specific determination. All federal states except Baden-Württemberg have nevertheless adopted the day in their respective state holiday law. Unification Agreement Art 2 - Laws on the Internet. 
21. ↑ October 31, 2017 was celebrated once as a national holiday in memory of the 500th anniversary of the beginning of the Reformation. Corresponding laws and ordinances have been passed by all federal states in which Reformation Day is not a public holiday anyway.
22. ↑ The day of repentance and prayer , which used to be nationally uniform , has only been a non-working holiday in Saxony since 1995 (the costs of which are borne by the employees alone through a higher share of the contributions to the statutory long-term care insurance compared to other countries ). However, since it is also an important holiday of the Protestant Church in all other countries, it is subject to special legal protection and an employer may only refuse unpaid leave of absence to employees for this day in justified exceptional cases.
23. ↑ In accordance with Art. 4 No. 3 of the Bavarian Public Holidays Act, there are no classes in all schools on the day of repentance and prayer in the entire state.
24. ↑ ^{a b c}
    • Bavaria: with Assumption of Mary, without a peace festival
    • Baden-Württemberg and Bavaria: no special regulations for schoolchildren
    • Brandenburg: excluding Easter Sunday and Pentecost Sunday
    • Hessen: without all Sundays
    • Saxony and Thuringia: without Corpus Christi

Calendar dates

Moving Holidays

A holiday is said to be movable if it does not occur on the same date every year. Moving holidays are almost always related to the church year . Most of the time, the day on which they fall depends on the Easter date and therefore has a fixed daily interval before or after Easter.

The date of the day of repentance and prayer, however, is fixed on the Wednesday before eternity Sunday . In the Protestant churches, this is the last Sunday of the church year before the new church year begins on the first Sunday in Advent . Mathematically, therefore, the day of penance and prayer always falls on the last Wednesday before November 23rd.

Dates of legally recognized mobile holidays in Germany

designation	2019	2020	2021	2022	2023	2024	2025	2026	2027	2028	2029	from	to	Distance (days)	Day
Maundy Thursday (1)	April 18	04/09	04/01	04/14	06.04.	28.03.	04/17	04/02	25.03.	April 13th	29.03.	19.03.	04/22	−3	do
Good Friday	April 19	04/10	04/02	April 15	04/07	29.03.	April 18	04/03	26.03.	04/14	30.03.	March 20	04/23	−2	Fr.
Easter Sunday	04/21	04/12	04/04	04/17	04/09	March 31	April 20	05.04.	28.03.	04/16	04/01	22.03.	04/25	± 0	So
Easter Monday	04/22	April 13th	05.04.	April 18	04/10	04/01	04/21	06.04.	29.03.	04/17	04/02	23.03.	04/26	+1	Mon
Ascension of Christ	05/30	05/21	13.05.	May 26th	May 18	09.05.	05/29	14.05.	06.05.	25.05.	05/10	04/30	03.06.	+39	do
Pentecost Sunday	09.06.	05/31	05/23	05.06.	05/28	19.05.	08.06.	May 24th	16.05.	04.06.	05/20	05/10	13.06.	+49	So
Whit Monday	10.06.	01.06.	May 24th	06.06.	05/29	05/20	09.06.	25.05.	05/17	05.06.	05/21	05/11	14.06.	+50	Mon
Corpus Christi	June 20	06/11	03.06.	16.06.	08.06.	05/30	19.06.	04.06.	05/27	15.06.	05/31	05/21	June 24th	+60	do
Day of Repentance and Prayer (2)	November 20	11/18	11/17	11/16	11/22	November 20	November 19	11/18	11/17	11/22	11/21	11/16	11/22	-	Wed

⁽¹⁾ Statutory school-free day in Baden-Württemberg

⁽²⁾ Public holiday in the Free State of Saxony, legally non-school day in Bavaria

Non-moving holidays

The New Year's Day on 1 January, the Labor Day on 1 May, the Day of German Unity on 3 October and the Christmas holidays on December 25 and 26 are holidays with a fixed date, nationwide valid. Assumption Day on August 15 and Epiphany on January 6, Reformation Day and All Saints' Day on October 31 and November 1 and Women's Day are only public holidays in some federal states.

Non-moving public holidays fall on a different day of the week each year than in the at least four years before and after. In a year that is not a leap year , New Year, Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve fall on the same day of the week, including the first and last day of the year. Christmas Day always falls on the same day of the week as Labor Day. Christmas Day always falls on the same day of the week as Assumption Day, the day of German unity and the day of the Reformation. Women's Day always falls on the same day of the week as All Saints' Day.

In order to differentiate between the 14 different annual calendars (regardless of the date of Easter), a so-called Sunday letter is traditionally assigned to each year based on the first Sunday of the year: A if this falls on January 1st to G if it falls on January 7th falls. In leap years, the preceding letter is placed in the back, this is the Sunday letter from March, i.e. for all dates after the leap day: AG, BA, etc. In every leap year there is at least one, in every normal year at least two weekdays on which no fixed holiday falls.

Days of the week of fixed holidays

Type	01.01.	December 24th, December 31st	May 1st, December 25th	August 15, October 03, October 31, December 26	March 8th, November 1st	06.01.	no	at least free	maximum. free	Sample years	Proportion of (%)
A.	So	So	Mon	Tuesday	Wed	Fr.	Thursday, Saturday	4th	7th	2017, 2023, 2034	10¾	14th	14½
BA	Sat					do	Fr.			2028	03¼		14th
B.		Sat	So	Mon	Tuesday		Wed, Fri	2	5	2022, 2033, 2039	10¾	14½
CB	Fr.					Wed	do	3	6th	2016	03¾		14½
C.		Fr.	Sat	So	Mon		Tuesday, Thursday	1	5	2021, 2027, 2038	10¾	14th
DC	do					Tuesday	Wed			2032	03¼		14¼
D.		do	Fr.	Sat	So		Mon, Wed	3	6th	2026, 2037, 2043	11	14½
ED	Wed					Mon	Tuesday			2020	03½		14¼
E.		Wed	do	Fr.	Sat		So, Tue	5	9	2025, 2031, 2042	10¾	14¼
FE	Tuesday					So	Mon		8th	2036	03½		14½
F.		Tuesday	Wed	do	Fr.		Sat, Mon		9	2019, 2030, 2041	11	14¼
GF	Mon					Sat	So			2024	03¼		14th
G		Mon	Tuesday	Wed	do		Fri, Sun			2018, 2029, 2035	10¾	14½
AG	So					Fr.	Sat	4th		2040	03¾		s. O.

In the 400-year cycle of the Gregorian calendar , the 14 possible annual calendars do not appear equally often, but every holiday with a fixed day of the month falls 56, 57 or 58 times on every weekday. This corresponds to a frequency of 14, 14¼ and 14½ percent with an average of about 14.286 percent.

Calendar week

In Germany, the DIN ISO 8601 standard is usually used to determine the calendar week . The first day of the week is then Monday , while according to Christian tradition it is Sunday. This means that the day of the week traditionally referred to as Wednesday is no longer the middle day of the week that originally gave it its name; at most, in a working week set from Monday to Friday, Wednesday is still in the middle.

The first week of a year in the weekly counting is the one that contains January 4th or - equivalent - the first Thursday in January. In other words, the week that contains the turn of the year counts to the year in which more (i.e. at least 4) days fall. This means that a maximum of the first three days of a year can still belong to the last week of the previous year, and conversely, a maximum of the last 3 days of the previous year can already belong to the 1st week of the new year. Naturally, the weekly and annual limits only coincide in one seventh of the cases.

This fact results in an apparently irregular pattern, according to which some years have 53 instead of the usual 52 calendar weeks. The fixed-date holidays as well as the day of Repentance and Prayer each fall in one of two calendar weeks, except that the last week of the year, which can be New Year's Eve or New Year, is sometimes week 52 and sometimes week 53.

possible calendar weeks of German public holidays and national traditional days without depending on the Easter date

holiday	date	Mon	Tuesday	Wed	do	Fr.	Sat	So
New Year	01.01.	KW01				KW53	KW52, KW53	KW52
Holy Three Kings	06.01.	KW02		KW01
International Women's Day	08.03.	KW10, KW11	Week 10
Labor Day	01.05.	KW18					KW17, KW18	KW17
Assumption Day	08/15	KW33						KW32, KW33
Day of German unity	03.10.	Week 40						KW39, KW40
Reformation day	October 31	KW44						KW43, KW44
All Saints Day	01.11.	KW44, KW45	KW44
Day of Prayer and Repentance	≺ 11/23	-		KW46, KW47	-
Christmas eve	12/24	KW52				KW51, KW52	KW51
1st Christmas Day	25.12.	KW52					KW51, KW52	KW51
2nd Christmas Day	26.12.	KW52						KW51, KW52
New Year's Eve	December 31	KW01			KW53	KW52, KW53	KW52

The movable church holidays, which are dependent on the date of Easter, vary over a period of 5 calendar weeks. Very rarely do they fall into a subsequent 6th week.

Frequency distribution of the calendar weeks of the holidays and customs depending on the Easter date

date	relative	early	medium early	medium	medium late	late	very late
carnival	−8	KW05	KW06	KW07	KW08	KW09	Week 10
Holy Week	−1	KW12	Week 13	Week 14	Week 15	KW16	KW17
Easter Sunday (common years)		April 22-28	29.03. – 04.04.	April 5th - 11th	April 12-18	April 19-25	never
Easter Sunday (leap years)		March 22-27	28.03. – 03.04.	04-10.04.	April 11-17	April 18–24	04/25
Easter week	± 0	Week 13	Week 14	Week 15	KW16	KW17	KW18
Ascension	+5	KW18	KW19	Week 20	KW21	KW22	KW23
Pentecost Sunday	+6	KW19	Week 20	KW21	KW22	KW23	KW24
Whit Monday	+7	Week 20	KW21	KW22	KW23	KW24	KW25
Corpus Christi	+8	KW21	KW22	KW23	KW24	KW25	KW26
frequency		12.1%	23.5%	23.2%	23.3%	17.6%	0.3%

Only in the calendar weeks CW 03–04, CW 11 and CW 27–31 are there never any national customs or public holidays. However, the "very late" dates have not yet existed since the Gregorian calendar reform in 1583 and, according to the current status, they will not occur in the 3rd millennium either, so week 10 and week 26 are also de facto free from festive days. The Augsburg Peace Festival can take place on the Sunday of the 31st week. In the period from week 48–50 only the Sundays in Advent fall.

Legal meaning

Employees

Holidays are generally non-working for employees , which results from Section 9 of the Working Hours Act . According to Section 2 of the Continued Payment Act, you are to be paid a holiday allowance . It can be stipulated that the work lost due to the holiday must be completed or made up for, but this may not be requested free of charge. For civil servants , the exemption from work follows from Section 3 Paragraph 3 of the Federal Working Time Ordinance and comparable state regulations. Any holiday surcharges are tax -free in accordance with Section 3b of the Income Tax Act.

For employees who work in a different federal state than the one in which they are domiciled , the public holiday law of the country in which they are to work on the specific day applies. The seat of the employer does not matter. The validity of the law on public holidays cannot be waived by agreements.

In the absence of a provision in the collective agreement, shiftworkers in the public service must take vacation days on public holidays on which they want to be free.

Outlets

Sales outlets must generally be closed on public holidays in accordance with the shop opening laws of the federal states; there are exemptions z. B. for pharmacies , gas stations, etc. a.

Road traffic

In principle, trucks are not allowed to drive on public holidays ( Section 30 (3 ) of the StVO ) and are not allowed to park in certain areas of built-up areas ( Section 12 (3a) of the StVO). This can be problematic for cross-federal long-distance traffic on non-federal public holidays, as a fine may be due when crossing a state border if the day in question is a working day in the country of departure but a public holiday in the country of arrival. For example, a truck driver driving from Bad Bentheim on the A 30 and A 2 to Hanover crosses the border between Lower Saxony and North Rhine-Westphalia four times . There are problems when driving through North Rhine-Westphalia on Corpus Christi and All Saints' Day.

On the Assumption Day and on the Day of Repentance and Prayer, no driving bans are stipulated in Section 30, Paragraph 4 of the StVO. Likewise, the public holidays newly introduced in some countries in 2018 and 2019 are not explicitly listed.

Restaurants and event companies

→ Main article : Dance ban in Germany

On public holidays that are also considered a silent day (see below), for example Good Friday, musical performances, sporting events and other programs that go beyond regular pub operation may be prohibited. The days in question, the scope of the ban and possible administrative penalties are determined by the federal states.

Regional particularities

Apart from the regional differences in the public holiday regulation already mentioned, there are the following regional peculiarities:

Quiet days

In addition to public holidays, the public holiday laws of the individual federal states prescribe quiet days (in some federal states also referred to as “quiet public holidays”) on which special restrictions must be observed, which, however, differ from state to state. The best known is probably the ban on dancing on Good Friday. Also, according to the official declaration of the FSK regarding § 29 , film productions do not receive any public holiday releases , the "nature of which contradicts these [silent] holidays so much that a violation of religious and moral feelings is to be feared". In Saxony and Bavaria , some ecclesiastical celebrations that are not legally free from work (for example, the Conception of Mary ) are also covered by the protection of the silent days. The day of repentance and prayer, which was abolished as a public holiday everywhere except in Saxony in 1995, is protected in this way, and the day of national mourning as a day of remembrance ordered by the state has a meaning that goes beyond the regular Sunday protection in all countries. Sometimes only the time of the main service is protected, sometimes the whole day and sometimes only the afternoon and evening. More details must be found in the federal state holiday laws in individual cases. The silent days that are generally subject to protection vary from country to country and can include:

• Christmas Eve (December 24th)
• Ash Wednesday (46 days before Easter Sunday)
• Holy Week from Palm Sunday (7 days before Easter Sunday)
• Maundy Thursday (3 days before Easter Sunday)
• Good Friday (2 days before Easter Sunday)
• Holy Saturday (1 day before Easter Sunday)
• Easter Sunday
• Pentecost Sunday (7 weeks after Easter Sunday)
• All Saints' Day (November 1st)
• All Souls Day (November 2nd)
• Memorial day (2 weeks before the 1st Sunday in Advent)
• Repentance and Prayer Day (Wednesday before November 23)
• Dead Sunday (also: Eternity Sunday, 1 week before the 1st Sunday in Advent)

The ban can also include "all non-public entertainment events outside of homes". For example, a landlord in Cologne was prohibited from renting out his premises for a Muslim circumcision ceremony . The judges pointed out that circumcision celebrations in Islamic culture are not tied to a calendar day and therefore do not have to take place on Good Friday.

On November 27, 2016, the Federal Constitutional Court declared a regulation of the Bavarian Law on the Protection of Sundays and Holidays (FTG) to be unconstitutional, according to which an exemption from the prohibitions on Good Friday was excluded from the outset, even for important reasons. For cases in which an event that runs counter to the legal protection of silence falls within the scope of protection of freedom of belief and belief ( Article 4, Paragraph 1 and 2 of the Basic Law) or the freedom of assembly ( Article 8, Paragraph 1 of the Basic Law), the legislature must have the option provide for an exception to confidentiality obligations to cease and desist. The lawsuit was brought by the Bund für Geistesfreiheit .

Dates of moving quiet days in Bavaria

designation	2019	2020	2021	2022	2023	2024	2025	2026	2027	2028	2029	from	to	Distance (days)	Day
Ash Wednesday	06.03.	02/26	02/17	02.03.	02/22	02/14	05.03.	02/18	02/10	01.03.	02/14	04.02.	10.03.	−46	Wed
Maundy Thursday	April 18	04/09	04/01	04/14	06.04.	28.03.	04/17	04/02	25.03.	April 13th	29.03.	19.03.	04/22	−3	do
Good Friday	April 19	04/10	04/02	April 15	04/07	29.03.	April 18	04/03	26.03.	04/14	30.03.	March 20	04/23	−2	Fr.
Holy Saturday	April 20	04/11	04/03	04/16	April 8th	30.03.	April 19	04/04	27.03.	April 15	March 31	21.03.	04/24	−1	Sat
Memorial Day	11/17	11/15	11/14	11/13	November 19	11/17	11/16	11/15	11/14	November 19	11/18	11/13	November 19	-	So
Day of Prayer and Repentance	November 20	11/18	11/17	11/16	11/22	November 20	November 19	11/18	11/17	11/22	11/21	11/16	11/22	-	Wed
Dead Sunday	11/24	11/22	11/21	November 20	11/26	11/24	11/23	11/22	11/21	11/26	25.11.	November 20	11/26	-	So

Other regionally limited festivals

On a number of days, festive events take place in certain regions, during which work may be suspended or restricted. In many cases, shops are only open half a day. However, since these are not public holidays stipulated by the legislator, one speaks in this case of "bogus public holidays" or "traditional days". Examples of such days are:

Carnival

Weiberfastnacht , fat Thursday , fat Thursday (52 days before Easter Sunday)

Rose Monday (48 days before Easter Sunday)

Violet Tuesday , Mardi Gras (47 days before Easter Sunday)

" Eleventh in Eleventh " (November 11)

Folk festivals

Frankfurter Wäldchestag (51 days after Easter Sunday, i.e. on the Tuesday after Pentecost)

Regardless of the region, this day was celebrated as a company holiday in many industrial companies (e.g. at Siemens) until the 1970s.

May market Tuesday in Mannheim (10 days after the last Saturday in April)

Ulm Oath Monday (penultimate Monday in July)

Fair Monday in Crailsheim (penultimate Monday in September)

Neuss Shooting Festival Monday (Monday after the last weekend in August)

" Half public holidays " (practically nationwide)

Christmas Eve (December 24th), often also a silent day

New Years Eve (December 31st)

High Holidays

In some North Sea ports the so-called "high holidays" are celebrated, these are New Year , Easter Sunday , May Day , Pentecost Sunday and Christmas . On the days before these public holidays (pre-holiday), work will be stopped at 12 noon (port rest). In contrast to Sundays and simple public holidays, there is a general ban on work on these “major public holidays”.

Coincidence of two public holidays

In Germany, the public holidays are such that normally two cannot fall on the same day (excluding Sundays). The only possible exception is an unusually early Easter date and occurs in years when Easter Sunday falls on March 23rd: Ascension Day is then celebrated at the same time as the immovable Labor Day on May 1st. This rare case occurs at irregular intervals about once per century. In the 21st century , the only time Ascension Day fell on May 1st in 2008. The next time this will not happen again until 2160. Before that, Ascension Day last fell on May 1st in 1913, but this has only been a public holiday in Germany since 1933.

In the Federal Republic of Germany, June 17th from 1954 to 1990 was a national holiday as the Day of German Unity . During this period, it coincided three times with the holiday of Corpus Christi (which was also not nationally standardized at the time) (1954, 1965 and 1976).

As described in the section Non-moving public holidays , in some years - next time in 2021 - up to six public holidays fall on a weekend, four of them on a Sunday and two on a Saturday. However, with the exception of Augsburg , a maximum of five public holidays in a federal state are affected, as nowhere are both Assumption Day and Reformation Day public holidays. Unlike in some other countries, a public holiday in Germany is not postponed if it falls on a Sunday.

Unlike in countries where the coincidence of public holidays z. B. is not unusual due to the mixing of the Islamic and Gregorian calendars, the German legislature has not provided any substitute regulations for this exceptional case. In the public holiday laws of some German states, the following wording can be found: "On public holidays with the exception of May 1st and October 3rd, the following is prohibited: [...]". This creates difficulties in particular when assessing the validity of the ban on dancing and the ban on publicly noticeable activities and events, because on Ascension Day public meetings and entertainment events are generally not permitted or only permitted to a limited extent, while they are characteristic and expressly permitted for Labor Day .

criticism

Erosion of the legitimation of Christian holidays

Most of the holidays in Germany are of Christian origin, but 40% of the population no longer belong to any denomination (which, however, is not necessarily to be equated with a rejection of traditional holidays). It is perceived as absurd that when determining the cities and municipalities in Bavaria on which the Assumption of Mary is a public holiday, it is only checked whether there are more Catholics than Protestants in the place concerned. In this way, August 15 is a public holiday in Munich , although a minority of the residents there belong to one of the two denominations.

In the course of the decline in the importance of church and religion in Germany, the unjust distribution of non-national holidays is increasingly criticized. For example, in Bavaria there are at least two, in extreme cases (city of Augsburg) even four more statutory days off than in many northern German states, although these additional public holidays are no longer celebrated in their original sense by a significant part of the population, but simply as additional ones days off that are not available to citizens of other countries.

Demands for a reform of the German holiday laws, such as Hans-Christian Ströbele's proposal to set up a Muslim holiday, however, hardly met with interest. The university initiative “The Laicists” even calls for the abolition of all religious holidays in order to ensure the ideological neutrality of the state.

Different treatment of students and their parents

Holiday regulations, which mean a day off for schoolchildren , but not equally for their working parents, are complained about as a considerable burden, especially in Bavaria. This applies in particular to the day of penance and prayer, which is free of school in Bavaria, but a normal working day for employed people. The same situation arises if the parents' place of work is in a country other than their place of residence and if the day in question is a working day at the place of work, but a public holiday at the children's school. On Assumption of Mary, this situation can even arise in Bavaria if parents reside in a place with more Catholic than Protestant residents in a predominantly Protestant neighboring community where the day is not recognized as a public holiday. For single parents in particular, but also if both parents are employed, it can be time-consuming to organize childcare for such days. In other countries, too, there are different holiday regulations from place to place (e.g. in Saxony).

In Lower Saxony, in predominantly Protestant areas, school lessons were canceled on Reformation Day (which was not a public holiday there before 2017), and in predominantly Catholic areas on Corpus Christi and All Saints' Day. In the meantime, in Lower Saxony, only those Catholic students who actually take part in a Holy Mass or a procession on their public holiday are granted exemption from teaching for the corresponding period.

Negative consequences of country-specific holiday regulations

When trucks approach the border to one of the federal states in Germany where the day in question is a public holiday, they must, if possible, bypass the country in question or take a compulsory break. Such a compulsory break results in costs of € 600 per truck and leads to overcrowding in parking spaces on motorways in front of the state border.

Positive consequences of country-specific holiday regulations

However, different holiday regulations also have advantages: For example, every year retail sales in Osnabrück or Hanover on Corpus Christi and All Saints' Day clearly increase because shops in North Rhine-Westphalia are closed and their customers have time to shop in neighboring Lower Saxony. The opposite effect has occurred on Reformation Day since 2017. Brandenburgers can shop on Reformation Day in Berlin, Berliners on International Women's Day in Brandenburg. Fixing the date of attractive events such as garden festivals on Corpus Christi until the following Sunday in a state like Lower Saxony is only worthwhile because many working visitors from neighboring, densely populated North Rhine-Westphalia can visit the event on their public holiday or the following Friday ( bridging day ) .

Former holidays

• The St. Joseph on March 19, was in Baden and Bavaria a public holiday, which was abolished in 1954 and the 1969th
• From 1954 to 1990 the day of German unity was celebrated in the Federal Republic of Germany on June 17, to commemorate the uprising of June 17, 1953 . June 17th remains a national day of remembrance.
• From 1950 to 1989, Republic Day was celebrated in the GDR on October 7th . In addition, the end of the Second World War was celebrated until 1967 and once in 1985 on May 8th as Liberation Day and on May 9th 1975 as Victory Day.
• The Penance Day was in Germany with the exception of Saxony in 1995 in favor of long-term care abolished as a legal holiday.

See also

• List of all days and times depending on the date of Easter
• Holidays in the German Reich 1933–1945
• Holidays in the GDR
• Holidays in Austria
• Holidays in Switzerland
• Holidays international

Web links

Wikibooks: Algorithm collection: Calendar: Holidays - Calculation formulas  - Learning and teaching materials

Individual evidence

1. ↑ National Holidays. Federal Ministry of the Interior, Building and Home Affairs, accessed on February 12, 2019 . 
2. ↑ See e.g. B. Art. 3 para. 1 of the constitution of the state of Baden-Württemberg .
3. ↑ Ordinance on the extension of public holidays , GBl DDR I (No. 18) p. 161, of March 8, 1990.
4. ^ Ordinance on the introduction of public holidays , GBl DDR I (No. 27) p. 248, from May 16, 1990.
5. ^ Robert H. van Gent: The Mathematics of the ISO 8601 Calendar , The 15 ISO calendars ( Memento of March 24, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
6. ^ Irv Bromberg: Symmetry454 Calendar Birthdays, Anniversaries, Memorial Days, Holidays and Annual Events (PDF, p. 4).

   With the ISO leap rule the Gregorian Easter computus yields that following date frequencies:
   

   Mar 21 = 12.1%, Mar 28 = 23.5%, Apr 7 = 23.2%, Apr 14 = 23.3%, Apr 21 = 17.6%, Apr 28 = 0.3%.

   ("Mar 21" corresponds to -W12-7 and "Apr 7" is -W14-7, other dates correspond accordingly.)
7. ^ Robert H. van Gent: A Perpetual Easter and Passover Calculator , Introduction. > Easter Sunday Frequencies .
8. ↑ BAG, judgment of June 25, 1985, Az. 3 AZR 347/83, full text = BAGE 49, 120 = AP No. 48 to § 1 Holiday Wage PaymentG .
9. ↑ BAG, judgment of January 15, 2013, Az. 9 AZR 430/119, full text .
10. ↑ In Baden-Württemberg , events on the other days of Holy Week (Palm Sunday to Holy Saturday) [...] "can be prohibited by the district police at the request of the local police if they are likely to cause offense according to the particular local conditions." Law on Sundays and Public Holidays (Public Holidays Act - FTG) in the version dated May 8, 1995 (Journal of Laws No. 17, p. 450).
11. ↑ D: It is possible to ban circumcision celebrations on Good Friday. In: religion.orf.at. March 24, 2015, accessed March 25, 2015 . 
12. ↑ BVerfG, decision of October 27, 2016, Az. 1 BvR 458/10, full text .
13. ↑ A general ban on dancing on Good Friday in Bavaria is unconstitutional. Süddeutsche Zeitung from November 30, 2016.
14. ↑ The population in the city districts according to selected denominations on December 31, 2018. (PDF) In: muenchen.de. Statistical Office Munich, December 31, 2017, accessed on February 12, 2020 . 
15. ↑ See. Article in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung on 17 November 2004. Paid also online available
16. ↑ The Laizisten: Critical examination of the current holiday laws .
17. ↑ Truck driving ban: Full rest areas on Corpus Christi . ndr.de, from June 20, 2019.
18. ^ Leo Wohleb: State law on the protection of Sundays and public holidays. In: Constitutions of the World. February 26, 1948. Retrieved February 28, 2019 . 
19. ↑ Gebhard Müller: Law on Sundays and Holidays. In: Constitutions of the World. December 13, 1954. Retrieved February 28, 2019 . 

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