Novruz

The four Tuesdays

Preparations start a month early, focusing on the last four Tuesdays of winter. Each day honours a fundamental element: water, fire, wind, and earth. The opening Tuesday highlights purification through water. The second focuses on fire, where neighbours ignite outdoor blazes and leap over the flames to shed sickness and hardship. Wind marks the third Tuesday, bringing the chill of late winter and a custom of tending family graves. The final Tuesday celebrates the earth reviving for spring. During this evening, children go from house to house leaving hats or pouches on doorsteps to receive baked sweets, while young women use candles and mirrors for traditional fortune-telling.

The festive table

At the centre of the household is the khoncha, a celebratory tray of polished copper or silver. Its centerpiece is samani, a shallow dish of bright green sprouted wheat grains that represent agricultural fertility. Surrounding the sprouts are dyed eggs, lit candles, and seven distinct foods whose names share a single initial sound in the local language, including milk, vinegar, and ground sumac. Families bake pastries such as pakhlava, shekerbura, and shorgoghal, while mixing fried wheat berries with raisins and walnuts. Leaving the main entrance unlocked welcomes guests, and keeping lights burning throughout the first night wards off misfortune.

Public rituals and street theatre

Public squares fill with dancers, musicians, tightrope walkers, and traditional wrestlers testing their strength. Central to the outdoor fun is a humorous folk performance featuring two stock characters named Kosa and Kechal. Kosa, wearing an artificial beard to represent winter, engages in playful squabbles with Kechal, a mischievous bald figure representing the warmth of summer. Their theatrical bout always concludes with Kechal emerging victorious, symbolising the triumph of warmer weather. In addition to music and games, family members playfully splash water on one another on the final evening of the year to wash away past troubles.

How Novruz is kept

Celebrations unfold across several weeks, starting with four successive Tuesdays devoted to water, fire, wind, and earth. People cleanse their dwellings, visit ancestral resting places, and jump over bonfires. On the eve of the equinox, families assemble around a festive khoncha tray decorated with samani wheatgrass, painted eggs, and specific holiday pastries. Children visit neighbours to collect treats in their caps, while public squares host folk music, tightrope walking, wrestling matches, and comic skits dramatising the defeat of winter.

When and where

Novruz coincides with the astronomical vernal equinox in March, inaugurating the new year on the Solar Hijri calendar. Observances begin four Tuesdays prior, typically in late February, and continue through a five-day public holiday period.

Novruz is celebrated nationwide across Azerbaijan, where it is an official state holiday. Festivities take place inside private family homes, in neighbourhood courtyards, and throughout public town squares.

What Novruz means

The festival centers on rebirth, cleanliness, and the victory of light and warmth over winter's dormancy. Samani wheatgrass denotes fertility, while jumping over bonfires purges past burdens and illness. Reflective mirrors signify happiness, and glowing candles keep away malevolent spirits. An unlocked household doorway expresses generous hospitality, and splashing water symbolizes shedding old hardships.

On the table

• Samani
• Shekerbura
• Pakhlava
• Shorgoghal
• Govurga
• Sumakh
• Sud
• Sirke

Flavours: Sumac

Questions people ask about Novruz

See also

NowruzThe Iranian new year at the March equinox, kept with fire, greenery and picnicsYaldā NightA solstice night of poetry, fruit and family, kept from Iran through Central AsiaChaharshanbe SuriAn Iranian festival of fire and renewal celebrated on the eve of the final Wednesday before spring.HıdırellezA spring festival marking the meeting of two prophets, celebrated across Turkey and the Balkans.

Good reading and sources

• Nawrouz, Novruz, Nowrouz, Nowrouz, Nawrouz, Nauryz, Nooruz, Nowruz, Navruz, Nevruz, Nowruz, NavruzUNESCO, Heritage listing
• Nawrouz, Novruz, Nowrouz, Nowrouz, Nawrouz, Nauryz, Nooruz, Nowruz, Navruz, Nevruz, Nowruz, NavruzUNESCO, Article

• Novruz in Azerbaijan on WikipediaEncyclopedia
• More photos on Wikimedia CommonsPhotos and video
• Wikidata recordOpen data

It may contain mistakes. Traditions differ from one family, village and community to the next, and the people who keep them know them best. If something is wrong, tell us. Last refreshed 2026-10-04.