What is Shrove Tuesday? Here's what it is and how it is celebrated

Have you heard of Shrove Tuesday?

As the annual day brought pancakes and celebration to many Tuesday, some were wondering the meaning behind the name.

Here's an explanation:

What is Shrove Tuesday?

The annual day, which also goes by a number of other recognizable names, "is the last day before the fasting period of Lent (for Western Christians)," according to Time and Date, which notes that the word shrove means "being absolved from sin through confession and penance."

National Geographic reports 'the name comes from the old word ‘shriving’, which means to listen to someone’s sins and forgive them."

"Christians would go to church on Shrove Tuesday to confess their sins and clean their soul. In other words, they would be ‘shriven,'" the publication states.

When is Shrove Tuesday?

This year, Shrove Tuesday falls on Feb. 13, but the date changes annually as it is always 47 days before Easter Sunday.

It is, however, always on a Tuesday.

What other names are used for Shrove Tuesday?

Shrove Tuesday is also called Mardi Gras, Fat Tuesday, or Pancake Day across many parts of the world.

How do people celebrate Shrove Tuesday?

"On Shrove Monday and Shrove Tuesday, people in many countries celebrate Carnival, bake pancakes, and prepare themselves for 40 days of fasting before the most important festival in the Christian Church: Easter," Time and Date states.

Across the U.S., celebrations vary widely.

Festivities marking Mardi Gras, the climactic day of New Orleans’ Carnival season, hit full swing early Tuesday, with costumed revelers gathering on the narrow streets of the French Quarter and families and tourists lining major thoroughfares to watch parades.

The annual pre-Lenten festivities aren't limited to New Orleans. Similar celebrations are held in Louisiana and along the Gulf Coast. Mobile, Alabama, where six parades were scheduled Tuesday, lays claim to the nation's oldest Mardi Gras celebration. And other lavish Carnival celebrations in Brazil and Europe are world renowned.

In celebration of what it calls "National Pancake Day" Tuesday, IHOP restaurants across the country offered customers a free short stack of buttermilk pancakes from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.

While many in the Chicago area Tuesday will celebrate Fat Tuesday with traditional Mardi Gras food, others will enjoy delicious Polish pastries known as Paczki.

The fried pastries, pronounced "puhnch-kee," date back to the 1700s, when people would traditionally use up foods "luxurious" foods like lard and sugar to ensure they wouldn't be wasted during Lent, a 40-day period of fasting in Christianity.