The History of St. Valentine’s Day Vol 7 rel 1

Believe it or not, Valentine’s Day is one of America’s more popular holidays, for more than 62% of its population celebrate it by either sending greeting cards and flowers, giving candy and gifts, or having a romantic dinner, or doing all three.

First, the Proof that Valentine's is one of the more Popular Holidays...

Valentine’s Day Statistics	Data
Average annual Valentine’s Day spending	$13,290,000,000
Number of Valentine’s Day cards exchanged annually	180 Million
Average number of roses produced for Valentine’s Day	198,000,000
Percent of Valentine’s Day cards bought by women	85 %
Percent of all flowers purchased by men	73 %
Percent of women who send themselves flowers on Valentine’s Day	14 %
Amount the average consumer spends on Valentine’s Day	$116.21
Percent of consumers who celebrate Valentine’s Day	61.8 %
Percent of women who would end their relationship if they didn’t get something for Valentines day.	53 %
Average number of children conceived on Valentine’s day	11,000

Gifts Most Often Given on Valentines Day (Allowing for multiple gifts given)	Data
Candy	47.5 %
Flowers	34.3 %
Cards	52.1 %
Jewelry	17.3 %
Dining / Eating Out	34.6 %
Clothing	14.4 %
Gift Cards	12.6 %
Other Gifts	11.2 %

Valentine Related Business Statistics
Number of locations producing chocolate and cocoa products	1,233
Number of people employed by these establishments	38,794
Revenue of domestically cut flowers	$403 Million
Number of florists nationwide	24,600
Number of people employed by florists	123,600
Number of jewelry stores in the U.S.	27,484
Annual revenue from jewelry stores	$2.2 Billion

Relationship Statistics
Ratio of single men in their 20's to single women in their 20's	1.2 to 1
Ratio of sinlgle men 65 or older to single women 65 or older	0.33 to 1
Number of dating service establishments nationwide	904
Average number of marriages annually	2.16 million

Actually...

We wish that the origins of the holiday were as sweet as the traditions; however, the history of the origins of Valentine’s Day are somewhat sorted and violent than one would expect.  According to the annals of history, the roots of Valentine’s Day come from a Roman Fertility Festival held mid-February, called Lupercalia.

Hungry Like the Wolf…

Lupercalia, ancient Roman festival that was conducted annually on February 15 under the superintendence of a corporation of priests called Luperci. The origins of the festival are obscure, although the likely derivation of its name from lupus (Latin: “wolf”) has variously suggested connection with an ancient deity who protected herds from wolves and with the legendary she-wolf who nursed Romulus and Remus. As a fertility rite, the festival is also associated with the god Faunus.

Lupercalia was celebrated in the 5 century B.C as a festival for fertility.  The priests, the Luperci, would clothe themselves with strips of skin from sacrificed goats their foreheads were touched with a bloody knife, and the blood was wiped off with wool dipped in milk; the ritual required that the two young priests laugh and run through the streets in Rome.  "They bore whips in their hand, made of strips of goatskin; with these they struck women who ran in their way, if you got hit, it would supposedly increase the likeliness of your getting pregnant. The thongs bore the name of febrza, a word connected... with purificatory ritual. 

Wait, It Gets Better…

Being one's valentine on this day was indulged in by all. "It was about the middle of the month that the names of willing young ladies were put in a box and well shaken up, so that each young blood could draw out one at random; the girl thus won was to remain his companion while the gaieties lasted" (The English Festivals, Whistler, p. 90).

This festival was dedicated to the goddess Venus and the feast was "characterized in the later Roman period by wanton raillery and unkindled freedom ..." (Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, James Hastings, Vol. 111, p. 226). 

In Roman mythology, this goddess of sexual immorality had sons, called "Cupids," whoattended her on this festival. They were believed to cause love and also make it cease — a sort of love potion (Roman Antiquities, Alexander Adam, p. 279). This was done by shooting arrows at the hearts of the victims. Cupid was generally represented as a winged boy with bow and arrow, often shooting at a young man's or a young woman's heart. These cupids were naked, winged, and blinded, armed with a bow, arrows, and a torch. Any resemblance to the little nude boys on Valentine's Day cards? The cupids are often used as decorative symbolism in theaters, cards, signs on inns, etc.

Timing is Everything…

In the Attic calendar, the month of Gamelion, January-February was also the Athenian month of marriage. There is a strong prevailing thought that many Christian holidays are extensions of Pagan ones and going on the writings of the Venerable Bede (an early Church historian), Pope Gelasius I banned Pagan festivals like Lupercalia and introduced the Christian feast of the purification of the Virgin Mary. The fact that purification (fasting, for those that are not familiar) was one of the principle tenets of Lupercalia, make the comparison quite straightforward.

How is this Valentine’s Day?

Seeing that the Roman love feast of Lupercalia was outright pagan, why then did the Christian-professing church accept and keep such a day — of course under a different name? Whatever possessed the leaders of the church to approve of this heathen fertility feast and keep it as a "Christian" festival under the name of St. Valentine's Day?

It all began at the time of Constantine the Great in the fourth century. It was this emperor who, it will be remembered, accepted orthodox Christianity. No longer considering himself a pagan, Constantine was encouraged to break with his pagan past. And one of several heathen feasts that had to go was the Lupercalia. But this produced problems.

It was one thing for the Christianized emperor to forego what the church considered a purely pagan festival, but to get the Roman populace at large to cease observing this love feast was another matter. In fact, it proved impossible. The Roman populace wouldn't hear of it.

It was hoped by church circles that the pagan populace would in due time be willing to give up this festival, but this proved to be a false hope.

The Christian-professing church then decided that the only way this matter could be resolved was to let the great masses of the empire — now members of the church — keep the Lupercalia feast, but by another name and for another purpose. It was the year A.D. 496 when Pope Gelasius I "Christianized" the festival and renamed it "St. Valentine's Day." Here is why.

When in Rome…

Once the Roman emperors became Christians, the Orthodox Church grew in numbers. Since her main concern was to convert the pagan populace within the empire as quickly as possible, she felt justified in making it easy on them. Church leaders "clearly perceived that if Christianity was to conquer the world it could do so only by relaxing the too rigid principles of its Founder" (Studies in the History of Oriental Religions, James Frazer, Book 11, p. 202).

The church, in deciding to slightly alter the festival by giving it an acceptable name, went back to the third century. There she came upon a tradition about a certain presbyter named Valentine who had married couples secretly against the edict of Emperor Claudius II. He was caught and beheaded in A.D. 270. To honor this bishop, he had now been elevated to sainthood, and as it happened, his day of commemoration was February 14, the same day as Lupercalia. So Gelasius, bishop of Rome, officially "Christianized" Lupercalia and renamed it St. Valentine's Day.

Later, the Protestant churches rejected the Catholic concept of the Virgin Mary and the saints' association with St. Valentine's Day. Instead, the people went back to drawing the names of ordinary young men and women. It became a less religious ceremony — but still retaining all the pagan embellishments of the Romans, and then some.

All the pagan trappings were maintained — Cupid was still there, the decorative "hearts" continued to be displayed, lots were still drawn as chance directed, and the day was still the original Roman day. It was also believed that birds were said to mate on this day. It was further a widely held tradition that the first person of the opposite sex one encountered on the morning of St. Valentine's Day was to become the future spouse. And love potions were considered to be very potent on February 14th. People would let themselves go at parties, often disregarding the inevitable consequences of such revelry.

Both in England and Scotland, St. Valentine's Day was a welcome diversion from the otherwise dull, cold winter season. Referring to a traveler to these areas in the last century, we read, "On the eve of St. Valentine's Day,' he says 'the young folks in England and Scotland, by a very ancient custom, celebrate a little festival. An equal number of' maids and bachelors get together; each writes their true or some feigned name upon separate billets, which they roll up and draw by way of lots.... Fortune [the name of yet another pagan god!] having thus divided the company into so many couples, the valentines give balls and treats to their mistresses, wear their billets several days upon their bosoms or sleeves, and this little sport often ends in love" (Book of Days, Robert Chambers, Vol. I, part 1, p. 255).

Be my Valentine

By the end of the Middle Ages, the meaning of Valentine’s Day had expanded to incorporate human lovers expressing their feelings in hope of attracting or reaffirming a mate. In February 1477, one would-be lover, Margery Brews, sent the oldest-known “Valentine” in the English language to John Paston, referring to him as her “right welbelouyd Voluntyn”. At the time Brews’s parents were negotiating her marriage to Paston, a member of the Norfolk gentry, but he was not satisfied with the size of the dowry offered by her father.

The earliest Valentine: from Margery Brews to John Paston. British Library

The couple married shortly after, so Margery’s heartfelt letters clearly appealed to her beloved. While we have to wait until the Tudor period to witness the now familiar concept of bestowing material gifts on one’s Valentine, it is Margery’s Valentine that best captures the essence of how the saint’s day transformed from being a lesser-known feast on the medieval liturgical calendar to one of the most important days of the year for hopeful and hopeless romantics, regardless of religion.

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Source(s)

• http://www.history.com/topics/valentines-day/history-of-valentines-day/videos
• https://www.britannica.com/topic/Lupercalia
• https://thedailybeagle.net/2013/02/14/valentines-day-were-the-ancients-telling-us-to-rut/
• http://www.wrcog.net/biblelight_valentineorigin.html
• http://theconversation.com/st-valentines-a-minor-day-in-a-medieval-calendar-packed-with-festivals-71225
•  http://www.wrcog.net/biblelight_valentineno.html
• https://www.statisticbrain.com/valentines-day-statistics/

So “Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;”

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About Rick Ricker

An IT professional with over 23 years experience in Information Security, wireless broadband, network and Infrastructure design, development, and support.

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