You may call me a hopeless romantic, but Feb. 14, is one of my favorite holidays of the year. My annual activities for the day are pretty conservative and traditional. I undress, then grab a couple of strips of goat hide and run through the streets, lightly hitting any woman I meet with the hide in order to bless her with fertility for the rest of the year.
What do these seemingly absurd rituals have to do with Valentine’s Day you may ask? Everything, in fact, for before there was a Valentine’s Day, there was the Lupercalia, the ancient Roman festival of fertility celebrated every Feb. 14. The pagan holiday was extremely popular among the Romans, and so the early Christian community tried to capitalize on it by Christianizing the celebrations around 500 A.D. Today, Valentine’s Day is a universal holiday, celebrated with cards, flowers, chocolate and other romantic offerings. Yet, among the pink hearts and frilly lace, is there perhaps something missing from our modern festivities?
The man behind the modern festivities, St. Valentine himself, is shrouded in mystery and legend. The name Valentine stems from the Latin word valens, meaning “worthy” or “strong.” St. Valentine certainly fulfilled his name’s prophecy. According to the most accurate historical depictions, St. Valentine was a Roman priest who around 280 A.D. refused to denounce Jesus Christ before the Emperor Claudius II and was beheaded because of his faith. Clearly this is not the most auspicious start for a festival of love, so how then did St. Valentine become associated with lovers, flowers and chocolate?
The more elaborate versions of the legend of St. Valentine reveal his crime — the priest was secretly marrying young couples against the decree of the Emperor, who thought that single men made better soldiers for his army. In the time between his sentencing and execution, St. Valentine also supposedly restored the sight and hearing of the jailer’s daughter who had fallen in love with him. As he was led away to his death, he slipped the young woman a note that said “From your Valentine.” Thus, under these morbid circumstances the first valentine was delivered.
As time progressed, so did Valentine’s Day. During the Middle Ages, scholars reasoned that birds first mated on Feb. 14, adding to the romantic character of the day’s festivities. The oldest historical valentines on record come from the Hundred Years War. Valentine’s Day quickly spread throughout the world, with each culture adding different regional elements and traditions to the celebration.
In today’s world, Valentine’s Day suffers from the same problem that plagues most other holidays: commercialization. Valentine’s Day is no longer a creative and intimate celebration of love; instead, it is a worldwide multi-million dollar industry. According to Hallmark, 141 million Valentine’s Day cards are exchanged each year, and that doesn’t even account for flowers, chocolate, jewelry and other signature items. These cards are no longer even handwritten, personal notes of affection; instead, they are pre-made replacements for private imagination. Flowers and chocolates are ordered from halfway around the world, but they are just lazy, monetary substitutions for real, individualized displays of love. In the modern world, love, along with the holiday designated for its celebration, has become impersonal.
So, in order to de-commercialize Valentine’s Day, I suggest a modest proposal: the first annual Georgetown Lupercalia. Such a celebration would allow us to return to the roots of Valentine’s Day, to escape the artificial and industrial nature of love today. Besides, is there anything more romantic than the relationship between two young souls and a strip of goat’s hide?
Given the obvious problems with this proposal, perhaps it is more useful to instead look to St. Valentine himself for inspiration on how to better celebrate his holiday. Before there were Cupids and chocolates, there was a young priest in ancient Rome, who out of regard for both God and the people around him, defied an imperial assault on love. Before there were imported flowers and gems from around the world, there was a young man who worked miracles and gave his life out of love. Before there were Candy-grams and Hallmark cards, there was that first Valentine, only three words long. Yet for the jailer’s daughter, those three plain words meant more than anything any professional poet could divine.
So let me offer another modest proposal: This Valentine’s Day, whatever you do, make it personal, no matter how silly it might seem. From goat hide strips to death penalty trips, no valentine’s worth has ever been measured in gold; instead, they are forever measured in proximity to the heart.
Michael Fischer is a sophomore in the School of Foreign Service. He can be contacted at [email protected]. Postscript appears every other Thursday.
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