Do you know the real story about St. Valentine?
 

Saint Valentine was а bishop in Umbria (Italy), in the city of Interamnum.

Many young people gathered around him as he had the gift of healing

various maladies through prayer to God.

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One of the students was the city-head's son, Avundius,

who openly confessed himself a Christian in front of everyone.

At that time, this was a bold thing to do, since pagan polytheism ruled in the world,

and Christianity was persecuted.

 

The wrath of the youth's father and other city leaders

fell upon holy Bishop Valentine.

After much torture, they threw him into prison,

where his students started coming to him.

Learning of this, the city-head gave orders to take

Valentine out of the prison and behead him.

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While some believe that Valentine’s Day is celebrated in the middle of February

to commemorate the anniversary of Valentine’s death or burial,

others claim that the Christian church may have decided to place

St. Valentine’s feast day in the middle of February in an effort to

“Christianize” the pagan celebration of Lupercalia, a fertility festival dedicated

to the pagan god Faunus and the Roman founders Romulus and Remus.

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During the Middle Ages, the day became definitively associated with love.

It was commonly believed in France and England that February 14 was

the beginning of birds’ mating season, which added to the idea that the middle of

Valentine’s Day should be a day for romance.

 

The English poet Geoffrey Chaucer was the first to record St. Valentine’s Day

as a day of romantic celebration in his 1375 poem “Parliament of Foules”,

writing,“For this was sent on Seynt Valentyne’s day / Whan every foul

cometh ther to choose his mate.”

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Valentine greetings were popular as far back as the Middle Ages,

though written Valentine’s didn’t begin to appear until after 1400.

The oldest known valentine still in existence today was a poem written

in 1415 by Charles, Duke of Orleans, to his wife

while he was imprisoned in the Tower of London 

following his capture at the Battle of Agincourt.

(The greeting is now part of the manuscript collection of the

British Library in London, England.)

 

Several years later, it is believed that King Henry V 

hired a writer named John Lydgate

to compose a valentine note to Catherine of Valois.

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By the middle of the 18th, it was common for friends and lovers

of all social classes to exchange small tokens of affection or handwritten notes,

and by 1900 printed cards began to replace written letters

due to improvements in printing technology.

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Today, according to the Greeting Card Association,

an estimated 145 million Valentine’s Day cards are sent each year,

making Valentine’s Day the second largest card-sending holiday of the year

(more cards are sent at Christmas).

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Credit: History.com & Orthodox Life of Saints