Holiday Calendar

National Alina Day

Next celebratedThursday, November 19, 2026

Alina entered Finland's almanac in 1872 as a fashionable name, and that calendar is legal property: in 2000 the Supreme Court left a magazine owing 60,440.26 markkaa for reprinting it. November 19 has no owner at all.

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Last updated September 7, 2026 · by the Holiday Calendar TeamHave an update or spot an error?
YEARLY DATENovember 19
OBSERVED INInternationally
CATEGORYNames
ORIGIN

Community Origin

FOUNDING ENTITY
Not documented
FIRST OBSERVED
Not documented
“Four other dates carry this name. Not one of them is this one.
HOW THE HOLIDAY CAME TO BE

The trail stops at a holiday listing built in July 2022.

No founder, proclamation or establishing record has been identified for National Alina Day, and no source states why it falls on 19 November. The earliest page this research could date carrying the observance was created in July 2022, and it names no originator either.

+ Know the story? Submit a founder Help us complete this holiday
INTRO

Finland's name-day list went to the Supreme Court

National Alina Day has no author. No founder claims it, no proclamation created it, and no source found explains the date it keeps.

The name it honours is not nearly so undocumented. In Finland, Alina has a day of her own on 22 April, and that day is legal property. The country's Supreme Court ruled in 2000 that the name-day list published by the University of Helsinki is a protected catalogue under the Copyright Act, and left a magazine owing 60,440.26 markkaa for reprinting it.

That is the odd shape of this page. One of these days is an internet artifact with nothing behind it. The other is a slot in a catalogue a university owns, licenses, and has defended in court.

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ORIGINS

Alina Day history

INTRODUCTION

Finland's name days are older than Finland. When the country was separated from Sweden in 1809, the right to publish almanacs passed from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences to the Åbo Akademi, and travelled with it when that academy moved to Helsinki.

An almanac in that era was not a neutral document. Finland had become a grand duchy of the Russian Empire, so the calendar made room for the tsar's family, taking in Alexander in 1816 and Olga in 1869. Alongside them it absorbed whatever names Finnish families were actually using.

CHAPTER 01

The year a fashionable name got a day

Alina arrived in 1872, in the same wave that brought Ester the year before and Selma six years later. The university's own history calls these the modenamn, the fashionable names of the century. Nothing about the arrival was ceremonial, because the almanac was tracking what people named their daughters.

CHAPTER 02

Losing a monopoly is not losing a right

By 1950 the placement was settled enough that the decade's reform document tabulated Alina at 22 April and left her exactly where she was. The larger change came on 1 January 1995, when the university's exclusive right to publish Finnish and Swedish almanacs was repealed under competition policy and Article 16 of the EEA Agreement.

The monopoly went. The list did not go with it. The weekly 7 päivää put the year's name days in its first issue of 1995, on the newsstand from 5 to 11 January, and the university's rights company sued over it and won at every level.

CHAPTER 03

A day with none of that behind it

No comparable record has turned up for National Alina Day. A search of the US Federal Register returns no document carrying the phrase. The earliest page this research could date carrying the November observance was created in July 2022, and it names nobody either.

That is not a scandal. It is how a great many modern name days work, and it is why the honest version of this page spends its time on the calendar that does keep receipts.

BY THE NUMBERS

National Alina Day by the Numbers

104,157
Women and girls in Poland named Alina
123
Girls named Alina born in Poland, 2025
2,204
Girls named Alina born in the US, 2025
834
Names in Finland's 2014 calendar

GOOD TO KNOW

Surprising facts about National Alina Day

Finland runs four official name-day calendars

The University of Helsinki maintains the Finnish and Finland-Swedish lists and the Finnish Orthodox Church keeps the Orthodox one. The Sami calendar was compiled by a single scholar, Professor Emeritus Pekka Sammallahti.

Names get evicted from the calendar

The revision the Supreme Court examined added 39 names to the Finnish list, removed two outright, and shifted six to a different day. A name day is a tenancy, not a freehold.

Donizetti left her out of his own title

The libretto printed for the Teatro Carlo Felice in the spring of 1828 is headed simply La regina di Golconda. Alina appears only at the top of the cast list, which is where the modern title took her from.

Her biggest American years are all recent

In the Social Security Administration's 146-year national series, the five years in which the most American girls were named Alina are 2021 through 2025.

GOOD TO KNOW

National Alina Day Around the World

Finland

the only country here that gives the name two official dates: the Orthodox calendar keeps 13 June, filed under the martyr Akylina, while the university's Finnish and Finland-Swedish lists keep 22 April

Poland

two name days rather than one, on 16 June and again on 16 December

Lithuania

16 December, the later of Poland's two dates

Romania

no name day is indexed here, but Behind the Name records Alina in regular Romanian use, one of nine languages that also take in Polish, Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, Slovene, German, Italian and Spanish

The University of Helsinki holds the copyright to its name day lists, including the name day lists of Finnish- and Swedish-speakers and the name day lists of cats, dogs and horses.
University of Helsinki Almanac OfficePublisher of Finland's official name-day calendars

WHY THIS DAY MATTERS

Why National Alina Day Matters

RECORDS

A name day is earned on frequency, not on sentiment.

The University of Helsinki renews its name-day lists every five years on the prevalence of names, so the calendar doubles as a running record of Finnish naming. The Supreme Court leaned on exactly that, finding that which names got in rested on a broad study of how often each first name had been given in Finland.

OWNERSHIP

Printing a name day is a licensing question

The Almanac Office allows free publication of up to two weeks of name days, or fifteen names from its alphabetical list. Past that, a copyright fee applies, scaled to the number of copies printed.

REGISTERS

The name is checkable rather than folkloric

Poland's Ministry of Digital Affairs publishes the first name of every living person in the national population register, and the United States publishes every name given to at least five babies of one sex in a year. Claims about how many people carry a name can therefore be tested against a file instead of repeated.

GET INVOLVED

How to Observe National Alina Day

EDITOR'S PICK

Look the name up in Finland's official calendar

The University of Helsinki's Almanac Office runs a public name-day search. It covers the Finnish, Swedish, Orthodox and Sami lists in one place.

READ

Read the judgment that made a calendar property

Finlex publishes the 2000 Supreme Court ruling in full, in Finnish and Swedish. It sets out how the list was built and why the court decided it could be owned.

DOWNLOAD

Download a national register and count for yourself

Poland's open-data portal and the Social Security Administration both publish raw name files by year. Neither needs an account, and the arithmetic is a few lines long.

MARK

Mark 22 April the way Finland actually does

The Almanac Office describes the custom plainly: coffee parties are often organised for the honourees, who are greeted with small gifts and flowers. It costs nothing to send a note on the date the calendar assigns.

ASK

Ask an Alina which day she keeps

The answer depends on the country, and in Finland it depends on which of the four calendars she follows. Several dates are equally correct, which is the interesting part.

Test your knowledge

How well do you know National Alina Day?

1 / 8

In which year did Finland's Supreme Court rule that the University of Helsinki's name-day list is protected?

Answer

No. No official or legal status has been located for it, and the US Federal Register carries no document naming it.

COLOPHON

Sources

How we know what’s on this page. References, not endorsements.

12sources
11primary records
8independently dated
Primary records
Finlex2000-05-09
KKO:2000:56
The Supreme Court of Finland's judgment of 9 May 2000 holding the University of Helsinki's name-day list a protected catalogue under section 49 of the Copyright Act, with the lower courts' findings on the list's 752 names, the 1995 repeal of the almanac monopoly, and the 60,440.26-markka award against the magazine that reprinted it.
View source
University of Helsinki Almanac Office
Copyright to name days
The rights holder's own statement of what it owns and what it charges for, including the free-use allowance of two weeks of name days or fifteen names from the alphabetical list.
View source
University of Helsinki Almanac Office
Name Days in Finland
The office's account of Finland's four official name-day calendars, which body maintains each, the five-year renewal cycle, and how a Finnish name day is customarily kept.
View source
University of Helsinki Almanac Office2014
Yliopiston nimipaivaalmanakka 2014
The 2014 university almanac, showing Alina on 22 April in both the Finnish and Finland-Swedish lists and on 13 June in the Orthodox one, and giving the calendars' own sizes.
View source
University of Helsinki Almanac Office1999
Yliopiston nimipaivaalmanakka 1999
The 1999 almanac, whose history essay dates Alina's entry into the Finnish almanac to 1872, describes the 1809 transfer of the almanac privilege to the Åbo Akademi, and lists the imperial names the calendar took in before it.
View source
University of Helsinki Almanac Office1950
Nimiuudistus 1950
The 1950 name reform proposal, whose April table lists Alina at 22 April among the names already in use and keeps her there, the earliest direct evidence located for that placement.
View source
Polish Ministry of Digital Affairs2026-01-30
Wykaz imion zenskich osob zyjacych w rejestrze PESEL
The first name of every living woman and girl in Poland's national population register, giving 104,157 Alinas.
View source
Polish Ministry of Digital Affairs2026-01-30
Imiona zenskie nadane dzieciom w Polsce w 2025 r.
Girls' first names registered in Poland during 2025 with their counts, giving 123 Alinas among 119,788 girls.
View source
US Social Security Administration
Beyond the Top 1000 Names, national data
Every first name given to at least five American babies of one sex in a year, 1880 to 2025, the file behind the name's 1892 first appearance and its 2021 to 2025 run of largest years.
View source
Federal Register
Documents search, exact phrase National Alina Day
The federal document index, which carries zero documents naming the day.
View source
Library of Congress1828
La regina di Golconda, Teatro Carlo Felice, spring 1828
The printed libretto for the Genoa season, music by Gaetano Donizetti and words by Felice Romani, whose title page names the opera without its heroine.
View source
Additional coverage
Behind the Name2024-12-01
Alina
The name's etymology as a short form of Adelina and Albina, its nine languages of regular use, and the four national name days indexed for it.
View source
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