Valentines Day Primer

By Author: Peter Smith
Total Articles: 7
Comment this article

Although most people assume that Valentines Day, and the tradition of Valentines gifts, began with a person named St. Valentine, no-one really knows if this is where the tradition began for the holiday or if he was even a true historic person. While many today give cards or a Valentines gift as part of the holiday, it wasn't always the case.

We do know that there are at least three people named either Valentine or Valentinus that have been recognized by the Roman Catholic Church as saints and one of these may well have been the one connected with the ideas of Valentines Day Gifts giving and romance. One of these three saints was supposed to have secretly married young couples at a time when the Roman Emperor decided that unmarried men made better soldiers and so outlawed marriage for young men: this would make him a great candidate for the patron saint of a day where Valentines presents are tokens of love between partners.

However, since the church often borrowing pagan holidays and turning them into ...
... Christian holidays, it is not surprising to discover that Lupercalia, a ancient roman festival celebrating spring took place on the ides of February, the first day of spring. That just happens to be February 14th. Part of the festivities involved a lottery where eligible women put their name in a jar and young men would pick one out as his date for the year. Many of these pairings ended in marriage, and so the tradition of linking romance and Feb 14th was begun. No mention of any version of Valentines presents is seen historically, but then maybe they weren't the kind anyone wants to brag about.

In the early 1600s it was a tradition to greet a friend or lover with a special Valentine's Day greeting on this day and by the time a hundred years had passed, small tokens that were probably the forerunners of today's Valentines gifts were exchanged. Small handwritten notes became more common and when the printing press made pre-printed cards available they became very popular for Valentines Day gift giving. Today the holiday is surpassed only by Christmas Day as the most popular card-giving holiday.

So we can see how an ancient pagan festival celebrating the beginning of spring was turned into a day to buy such Valentines gifts as a box of chocolates or flowers by a Roman Catholic saint who did secret marriages. So don't let any of this interesting and highly questionable history stop you from going out and getting a great Valentines Day present for the one you love. It doesn't matter who made the holiday, we still get to celebrate it.