February 14th is Saint Valentine’s Day, the holiday of lovers, when people all over the world surprise their loved ones with flowers and small gifts.
The exact origin of Valentine’s Day is lost in obscurity; we know, however, that the pagan cult of nature, the Roman love of life, folk customs and the tradition of the Christian faith all left their mark on the tradition and customs of this holiday. Many centuries or even a few millennia ago, festivals of fertility were closely linked to natural phenomena. Mid-February is the beginning of the mating season for birds in the temperate zone, and this observation may have served as the basis for the belief that this day is favorable for marriage predictions and love spells.
In ancient Rome, the Lupercalia, an important festival of fertility, atonement, and purification dedicated to the god of the grazing sheep in the fields, was held on February 15th. On this night, young women wrote down and placed their names in a ceramic jar, men drew, and the resulting couples remained together for the duration of the festival or even for the rest of their lives.
The Catholic Church recorded at least three different holy martyrs named Valentine. The best-known Valentine served as a priest in ancient Rome at the time when Emperor Claudius II (268-270) forbade young men from marrying, believing that single men made better soldiers than married men. Valentine refused to comply with the edict, and secretly continued to marry couples, for which he was executed.
Another legend claims that he had to die because he helped Christians avoid imprisonment that would have brought certain death for them. According to the most widespread legend, he restored the sight of his jailer’s blind daughter in prison, and before his execution he sent her a letter signed: “Your Valentine.” (Contrary to popular belief, neither the persons nor the lives of any of these persons named Valentine can be directly connected with the customs of Valentine’s Day; the “Christianization” of the pagan Lupercalia, however, is very likely to have played a role in its celebration.) Valentine was canonized by Pope Gelasius in 489, his feast day was set for February 14th, and Lupercalia was banned and replaced with the celebration of the Purification of the Virgin Mary, the Feast of the Annunciation.
The English poet Geoffrey Chaucer was the first to link Valentine’s Day with romantic love in his poem The Parliament of Fowls in 1382. A few decades later, another Valentine’s Day-related prison message dates back to 1415, when Charles, Duke of Orleans, who was imprisoned in the Tower of London during the Hundred Years’ War, sent this poem to his wife in 1415. Six years later, King Henry V hired a poet to write a message in verse to his wife, Catherine of Valois, on Valentine’s Day.
This day has been widely celebrated in England from as early 1446: girls’ names were written on heart-shaped pieces of paper, placed in a jar, then young men drew the names of their future sweethearts and wore the hearts pinned to their coats for a few days. The first Valentine’s Day letter in English dates from 1477 and is now held by The British Library. Books of poetry were soon published for Valentine’s Day, and young people sent each other love letters called “valentines”. These letters can be considered the ancestors of today’s Valentine’s Day greeting cards, even though sending them became a widespread custom only in the 19th century.
The American Esther Holland was the first person ever to market a postcard for this day on a wholesale scale in 1840, which is why she is called the “mother of valentines”. In the Victorian era, when the display of emotions was strongly discouraged, lovers sent messages using pre-made cards, and the spread of the custom was also facilitated by low postal rates. Soon, children also started sending messages to their parents, teachers, adult relatives, and friends.
Although Valentine’s Day is now celebrated in almost every country in the world, its greatest cult is in the Anglo-Saxon and French-speaking areas, where Valentine is considered the patron saint of lovers as a result of the blending of different beliefs.
On this day, more than a billion cards are sent in America, the second busiest time of year for mail after Christmas. (Interestingly, teachers receive the majority of the messages from their students.) On this day, countless gifts are also given, the most popular being flowers, heart-shaped boxes of chocolates, and jewelry. With the spread of the Internet, people naturally started sending millions of digital greeting cards and coupons to their loved ones.
Valentine’s Day is celebrated all over the world: in South Korea and Japan, for example, only women give gifts, while men return the gesture on the so-called “White Day.” In 2011, Peru declared February 14th a public holiday. In the Italian city of Terni, it is a tradition for couples to arrive from all over Italy on the eve of Valentine’s Day and publicly announce their engagement in the city’s basilica, at the tomb of San Valentino (Saint Valentine).