Europe has somewhere between 44 and 50 countries depending on where you draw the eastern edge, and the Council of Europe counts 46 member states. Almost every one of them has a national day. One does not, one has three and cannot decide, and the most unusual of the lot is not a country at all. If you are thinking of building a trip around one, here is how they actually differ, and which are worth the airfare. The pattern across Europe is different from the rest of the world. Globally most national days mark independence from a colonial power. In Europe, which did most of the colonising, far fewer countries have an independence date to celebrate, so the days tend to commemorate constitutions, unifications, revolutions and monarchs instead. |Country|Date|What it marks| |Norway|17 May|The 1814 constitution| |Netherlands|27 April|The King's birthday| |Greece|25 March|The 1821 revolt against Ottoman rule| |Poland|3 May|The 1791 constitution| |Sweden|6 June|Gustav Vasa's election in 1523| |Portugal|10 June|The death of the poet Camoes| |Iceland|17 June|The 1944 republic| |Luxembourg|23 June|The Grand Duke's official birthday| |Belgium|21 July|The first king's oath in 1831| |Switzerland|1 August|The 1291 confederation| |Gibraltar|10 September|The 1967 sovereignty referendum| |Malta|21 September|Independence in 1964| |Germany|3 October|Reunification in 1990| |Spain|12 October|Columbus reaching the Americas| |Austria|26 October|The 1955 neutrality declaration| |France|14 July|The storming of the Bastille in 1789| |Italy|2 June|The 1946 vote for a republic| |Ireland|17 March|Saint Patrick| |Finland|6 December|Independence from Russia in 1917| Two things jump out of that list. Only a handful mark independence, and the dates spread across the entire calendar rather than clustering the way they do elsewhere in the world. The **United Kingdom** has no official national day at all, which is a strange position for a country of its size and history. It dropped Empire Day in 1958 and never replaced it, and the four patron saints' days are not UK wide holidays. We go into why in our piece on [how many countries have a national day](/blog/how-many-countries-have-a-national-day). **Denmark** has the opposite problem, three candidate dates and no official one. Constitution Day on 5 June is the closest thing, and it is a working half day for many people rather than a full holiday. So the two European countries with the least settled national day are both wealthy, old and stable. Having nothing to be liberated from turns out to be a poor foundation for a national holiday. Ask around and **Norway's 17 May** usually wins, and deservedly. It is built almost entirely around children. Every town holds a barnetog, a children's parade, and the crowd lining the route is made up of adults watching other people's children march past. There is no military element, which is unusual for a national day. A very large proportion of the population wears the bunad, the regional folk costume, which costs a serious amount of money and is treated as a lifetime purchase. The result is a national day with no obvious enemy in it. It is about the place rather than against anybody, and it is genuinely moving to watch even if you have no connection to Norway at all. The catch is cost. Mid May in Oslo is expensive, and a short trip built around one day adds up quickly. It is also a long way north for a day that depends on being outdoors. Norwegians will tell you 17 May can be beautiful or it can be six degrees and raining sideways, and both are within normal. **Gibraltar's 10 September** should not work. It is a national day for a territory that is not a country, held by a population of under 38,000, marking a referendum in which people voted to remain part of somewhere else, and the somewhere else has no national day of its own. It works anyway, and it works better than the arithmetic suggests. The vote it commemorates was held on 10 September 1967 and asked Gibraltarians whether to pass under Spanish sovereignty or stay British with self government. Turnout was 95.8 per cent. The result was 12,138 to 44. National Day itself began in 1992, on the referendum's twenty fifth anniversary, and has been held every year since. > Norway celebrates a constitution. France celebrates a revolution. Gibraltar celebrates a question it was asked once and has never changed its mind about. This is the practical argument, and it is the one that matters if you are choosing between them. Most European national days happen in capital cities. You watch from behind a barrier a long way back, you fight the transport, and the event is spread across a city too big to take in. Bastille Day in Paris and Unity Day in Berlin are both like this. Gibraltar is 6.7 square kilometres. The whole territory is smaller than most European airports. The rally, the street party, the music at Grand Casemates Square and the harbour display are all within a walk of each other and of wherever you are s