The origin of valentine’s or heart’s day.
The history of
heart’s day,as so called,dates back before Christianity.It’s important to know
that the Valentine’s day we do celebrate today came from the name of a benevolent priest called ST.VALENTINE who was
killed by then Roman emperor known as CLAUDIUS II around 270 A.D.
But it was
believed that heart’s day started when Christians decided to place
St.valentine’s feast day in the middle of every February in an effort to
Christianize the pagan belief and tradition of LUPERCALIA .It was learnt that
Lupercalia was a fertility feastival dedicated to FAUNAS,the Roman God of agriculture and also to Romulus
and Remus believed to be Roman founders.
To start the
feastival,members of the luperci would gather at a sacred cave where the
infants Romulus and Remus where believed to have been caved by a she-wolf or Lupa to sacrifice a goat for
fertility and a dog for purity.They would then strip the goat’s hide into
strips dip them into the sacrificial blood and take to the streets,gently
slapping both women and fields with the goat’s hide.Far from being fearful,Roman women welcomed the touch
of the hides because it was believed to
make them more fertile in the coming year.Later in the day,all the young women
in the city would place their names in a big urn or container where the city’s
bachelors would each choose a name and
become paired for the year with their choosen woman.These matches often ended
in marriage.
It was observed that Lupercalia feastival survived the initial rise of Christianity but later
outlawed as it was deemed un-christian while a Christian version of it is now
placed by pope Galasius around 5th century through the aforementioned priest known as
St.Valentine.
It is also
useful to understand that some countries consider February 14th as
the beginning of “birds mating season” which added to the idea that it should
be a day for romance.
Well,wish you
all happy VAL.
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