What holiday is celebrated on November 17: everything about this day

On November 17, Orthodox believers honor the memory of St. Gregory, Bishop of Neocaesarea. Name days are celebrated by Hennadiy, Hryhoriy, Zakhar, Ivan, Mykhailo, Yana, and Victoria.

The world celebrates International Students' Day, World Premature Infants' Day, International No Smoking Day, and in Ukraine - Agricultural Workers' Day. OBOZ.UA tells about the holidays and significant events of this day.

What holidays are celebrated on November 17

November 17, according to the New Julian calendar, is the day of remembrance of St. Gregory the Wonderworker, who was the Bishop of Neocaesarea. Gregory lived in the desert, defending the outcasts and the poor. He became famous for his sermons. When Gregory entered the cathedral, there were only 17 Christians in Neocesarea, but before his death there were only a few pagans left.

International Students' Day is celebrated around the world every year on November 17, commemorating an event that took place in Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia. On October 28, 1939, students and professors of Prague universities held a peaceful demonstration. The participants were arrested and shot by the Nazis, and the survivors were sent to concentration camps.

According to a presidential decree of 1993, the professional holiday of workers of the agricultural and agro-industrial complex, organizations and enterprises for the processing of agricultural raw materials, service and procurement enterprises, and the food industry is celebrated on the third Sunday of November. November 17, 2024 is also the Farmer's Day and the holiday of all farmers.

Other countries around the world also celebrate November 17:

• World Day of Remembrance for Road Traffic Victims;
• World Day of Preterm Infants;
• Day of Struggle for Freedom and Democracy in the Czech Republic and Slovakia;
• National Revival Day of Azerbaijan;
• National Black Cat Day in the United States.

Notable historical events on November 17

• 1663 - the so-called "Baturyn Articles" are signed between Hetman I. Bryukhovetsky and the Moscow government, limiting the hetman's power in Ukraine in favor of the Moscow tsar.

• 1804 - Kharkiv University is founded.
• 1869 - the Suez Canal was officially opened in Egypt.
• 1913 - The first ship sailed through the Panama Canal.
• 1939 - Thousands of Prague students and their teachers took to the streets to protest the Nazi occupation, but were arrested and shot or sent to concentration camps.
• 1969 - Soviet-American negotiations on strategic arms limitation begin in Helsinki.
• 1971 - military coup in Northern Ireland.
• 1989 - police dispersed a student demonstration in Prague, timed to coincide with the 50th anniversary of protests against the Nazi occupation of 1939. This actually began the "Velvet Revolution" that overthrew communist rule in the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic.
• 1994 - The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine repealed the Declaration of Sovereignty of Crimea.
• 2019 - the first person infected with COVID-19 was detected in China.

Who was born on November 17

• 9 - Vespasian, Roman emperor, founder of the Flavian dynasty.
• 1749 - Nicolas Apère, French inventor; developed a method of food preservation.
• 1790 - August Ferdinand Möbius, German geometer and astronomer.
• 1811 - Mykola Ivanyshev, professor at Kyiv University, author of works on the history of Ukrainian legal institutions.
• 1901 - Lee Strasberg, American director, actor and producer of Ukrainian descent.
• 1906 - Honda Soichiro, Japanese engineer and entrepreneur. In 1948 he founded the Honda company.
• 1942 - Martin Scorsese, director of American and world cinema.
• 1944 - Danny DeVito, comedy actor.
• 1965 - Ruslana Pysanka, Ukrainian actress and TV presenter.
• 1966 - Sophie Marceau, French actress and film director.
• 1982 - Sofia Andrukhovych, Ukrainian writer, translator, and publicist.

Died on this day:

• 1558 - Mary I Tudor, Queen of England (1553-1558), nicknamed Bloody Mary.
• 1776 - James Ferguson, Scottish mathematician and astronomer, creator of the eighteenth-century instruments.
• 1917 - Auguste Rodin, French sculptor.
• 1940 - Raymond Pearl, American zoologist, one of the founders of biometrics.
• 1954 - Tadeusz Banachowicz, Polish astronomer and mathematician.
• 2013 - Doris Lessing, English feminist writer and poet, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature.

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