The Hidden
History of Valentine's Day: An Emperor, a Priest, and a Goddess
By Sharon Turnbull
The
history of Valentine's Day began with the ancient Festival of Lupercalia which honored the founding of
Held
on the hillside near the Lupercallus ("Wolf-Cave"),
where
Another
part of the celebration involved a lottery in which the names of the unmarried
females were drawn by the eligible bachelors and the couples were paired for
the following year to honor the goddess Juno -- obviously a prototype of
matchmaker.com.
Turn
the clock forward to the third century and you find Claudius II serving as the
Emperor of Rome, which by that time had seen its glory days and was now being
threatened on its borders by the Goths.
Claudius
had a problem on his hands. He definitely needed his army to be at full
strength. He felt that married men weren't very good soldiers, given their
tendency to go A.W.O.L. when it was time to harvest the crops or whenever they
felt the urge for a conjugal visit.
So
concerned was the Emperor that he used his authority to ban the practice of
marriage. And he banned the Festival of Lupercalia as
well, since it was obviously contributing to the high incidence of marriage
that seemed to be destroying his militia.
For
the first time, the pagan Emperor and the growing Christian church found
themselves on the same side of an argument. The Church was also opposed to the
pagan festival of Lupercalia, objecting to its
lustfulness, and especially the practice of the lottery.
Yet it
was a dangerous time to be a Christian priest. A parish priest named Valentine
was part of the Christian underground and, in defiance of the Emperor's edict,
continued to marry couples in secret. He was soon found out and carried off to
prison.
There
must have been something very "special" about Valentine. The Emperor
himself supposedly took the time to visit him in prison and tried to convert
him to the worship of the ancient pagan deities. He failed miserably, and
Valentine was executed on the February 14, in the year 270.
Church
policy in dealing with the ancient religions often included a strategy of
incorporating, rather than just banning, the pagan traditions. And it proved to
be an effective strategy. Many of our contemporary holiday rituals and
traditions are actually based on ancient pagan celebrations.
Anxious
to end the lusty Lupercalia that they saw as a
"festival of the flesh", the Church was a bit more subtle than the
Emperor in their approach to getting rid of it. Having a "Saint's
Day" celebration for the martyred Valentine, and holding it a day earlier
than the pagan festival, was a clever idea indeed.
But
like so many other holidays, Valentine's Day was co-opted once more, this time
by secular, commercial interests. And so today we find ourselves sending
valentines to all sorts of people, even those for whom we haven't the slightest
marital, romantic, or lustful feelings . . . and wonder where all the passion
in our lives has gone.
Sharon
Turnbull, Ph.D., is the editor of The Goddess Path, a free monthly ezine that combines mythology, archetypal psychology,
personal growth and just plain fun. She is also the creator of the popular
online personality assessments, The Goddess Quiz and The Greek Gods Quiz. You
can visit her websites at: http://www.goddessgift.com and http://www.god-goddess.com
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