Why do we celebrate Valentine’s Day?

For many, Valentine’s Day is one of the most romantic days of the year. It is filled with chocolates, cards and expensive dinners.

However, if you are not in a romantic relationship, it could be a day to dread. This is especially true if you are one of those who have a cynical view of love. Others believe it is nothing more than a commercial ploy to get people to spend money they wouldn’t otherwise spend.

Whatever your view, one thing is for sure. Year after year, it rolls by with the same media schemes that fill most of us with a sense of romance. For the rest of the year, we are usually too busy and worried about finances to shower our partners with gifts. But that’s okay, because on Valentine’s Day, we will spoil them rotten!

But how did this holiday come to be? There are many different versions of the history of Valentine’s Day. The most common is that it has its root in the time of the ancient pagans in Rome. The holiday of romance has its roots in an ancient Roman fertility rite known as Lupercalia. Celebrated on February 15, Lupercalia was a fertility rite in honour of the gods Lupercus and Faunus (associated with Pan) and the founders of Rome, Romulus and Remus. The celebration began at the Lupercal cave, where the wolf Lupa was said to have suckled the infants Romulus and Remus. Afterwards, priests would sacrifice a goat (symbol of fertility) and a dog (symbol of protection) to the gods, anoint themselves with the blood and run through the streets whipping onlookers, mostly females, with a thong made from the goat’s and dog’s skin. The whipping was believed to help ease childbirth and promote fertility.

Also during the festival, young men would draw the names of eligible girls from a pot or urn. These couples would be paired up until the next Lupercalia, often in intimate and sexual ways. This drawing of Valentine lots continued into the Middle Ages in Europe. A young man would wear a slip bearing his Valentine’s name on his sleeve, and attend to the lady with flowers, gifts and words of affection.

As Christianity became more prevalent, the celebration of love became associated with the patron saint of love and couples – St Valentine. No one has verified the original Valentine to whom the day is dedicated, although two likely candidates have emerged. One Valentine, a priest during the reign of Emperor Claudius, was jailed for secretly marrying couples in defiance of orders from the emperor that all marriages be stopped. This Valentine was jailed and died in prison for his devotion to love.

Another Valentine was jailed for helping Christians during the third century AD. In prison, he fell in love with the jailer’s daughter and allegedly cured her of blindness. He was executed on February 14, 289 AD. All of the Valentine stories were finally combined and in 496, Pope Gelasius declared February 14 in honour of St Valentine.

It wasn’t until the Renaissance of the 14th century that customs returned to celebrations of love and life rather than faith and death. People began to break free of some of the bonds imposed upon them by the church and move towards a humanistic view of nature, society and the individual. Moving towards more sensual art and literature, there was no shortage of poets and authors connecting the dawning of spring with love, sexuality and procreation.

As with so many other holidays that have pagan roots, divination came to play an important role in the development of modern Valentine’s Day. People looked to all sorts of things, primarily in nature, in order to find some sign about who might become their mate for life – their ‘One True Love’. There were also, of course, things which came to be used to induce love and lust.

Today, capitalist commercialism is the biggest aspect of Valentine’s Day. Hundreds of millions of rands are spent on chocolate, candy, flowers, dinners, hotel rooms, jewellery and other gifts used to celebrate February 14. There is a lot of money to be made from people’s desire to commemorate the day. Whatever the real origins are, one thing is for sure: Valentine’s Day definitely rakes in the money! And it’s worth it for those of us who like to get romantic and spend a candlelit evening with our partner, even if it’s just one night of the year.