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Formal veneration of the saint
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Among the Greeks and Italians, he is a favorite of sailors, fishermen, ships and sailing. As such, he has become over time the patron saint of several cities maintaining harbors. In centuries of Greek folklore, Nicholas was seen as "The Lord of the Sea", often described by modern Greek scholars as more or less a christianized version of Poseidon. In modern Greece, he is still easily among the most recognizable saints and December 6 finds many cities celebrating their patron saint. He is also the patron saint of all of Greece.
In addition, he is celebrated as a great gift-giver in several Western European countries. His reputation for gift giving comes partly from a story of three young women who were too poor to afford a dowry for their marriages: as each reached a marriageable age, Nicholas surreptitiously threw a bag of gold into the house at night. Some versions of the legend say that the girls' father, trying to discover their benefactor, kept watch on the third occasion, but Nicholas dropped the third bag down the chimney instead. For his helping the "financially challenged", St. Nicholas is the patron saint of pawnbrokers; the three gold balls traditionally hung outside a pawnshop are symbolic of the three sacks of gold. People then began to suspect that he was behind a large number of other anonymous gifts to the poor, using the inheritance from his wealthy parents. After he died, people in the region continued to give to the poor anonymously, and such gifts were still often attributed to St. Nicholas. It should be noted perhaps that a nearly identical story is attributed by Greek folklore to Basil of Caesarea. Basil's feast day on January 1 is also considered a time of exchanging gifts.
Due to modern association with Christmas, St. Nicholas is a patron saint of Christmas, as well as pawnbrokers. He was also a patron of the Varangian Guard of the Eastern Roman Emperors, who protected his relics in Bari.
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