Forty Martyrs of Sebaste (Mladenci)
22 March 2026 — Take a little loaf – for health and a sweet spring!
Mladenci, the feast of the Forty Martyrs of Sebaste, falls on 22 March for churches that follow the old (Julian) calendar, including the Serbian Orthodox Church; in Bulgaria it is kept on 9 March. According to Christian tradition, forty Roman soldiers died for their faith in Sebaste (today Sivas, Turkey) in the early 4th century. In folk custom the day merges with the welcoming of spring. In many parts of the Balkans, housewives bake ritual loaves, often sweetened with honey, sometimes forty in number, and share them with neighbours and relatives for health and abundance. The day is also linked with young families and the hope of a fruitful year. The 22 March date comes shortly after the spring equinox (around 20 March), when day and night are nearly equal and the winter constellations begin to give way to the spring ones. In many folk calendars this period marks the start of the farming year. The feast is also kept in other Balkan lands; on this date it is marked above all in Serbia, where it is also linked with the past year's newlyweds.
Flying across the sky: An ethereal, bluish-silver star figure made of luminous dots and fine lines, like a constellation, shaped as a woman in a long apron carrying a tray of tiny round loaves that glimmer as small star clusters
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