---
title: "All Saints in Europe: Six Places Where 1st November Becomes a Festival of Light"
description: "Candlelit cemeteries in Poland, Lithuania, Slovenia, Croatia and Hungary, and Sicily's Festa dei Morti: where to see Europe's 1st November traditions."
author: Dr Marina Nani (Editor-in-Chief)
date: 2026-10-22T14:47:31.905Z
updated: 2026-10-22T15:11:58.090Z
canonical: https://richtravelmagazine.com/article/all-saints-in-europe
image: https://cdn.nanimediahouse.com/pexels-29190202.webp
categories: Destinations, Food & Culture
content_type: Feature
region: Europe
publication: Rich Travel Magazine
access: members
schema_type: Article
---

As darkness falls on 1st November, the brightest places in many European cities are not the shopping streets. They are the cemeteries. Across Poland, Lithuania, Slovenia, Croatia and Hungary, families walk through the gates carrying flowers and glass lanterns, and by nightfall entire hillsides of graves glow red, amber and white. In Sicily, the same night ends with children searching their homes for gifts left by grandparents they never met.

The custom has a shared root. In 835, Pope Gregory IV extended the feast of All Saints on 1st November across the lands of the Frankish empire. Around the year 998, Odilo, abbot of the great Burgundian monastery of Cluny, added a day of prayer for all the dead on 2nd November. A millennium later, the two dates still run through [the calendar of Catholic Europe](https://richtravelmagazine.com/article/sacred-routes-europe) like a shared thread, and the gesture at the heart of them has a name in every language along the way: znicz in Polish, žvakė in Lithuanian, sveča in Slovene, svijeća in Croatian, mécses in Hungarian, lumino in Italian. Each word means a small light left for someone gone.

This year, 1st November falls on a Sunday and All Souls' Day on Monday 2nd November, which makes [a long weekend](https://richtravelmagazine.com/article/escape-to-europe-where-to-go-before-the-season-turns) for anyone who wants to see it.

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