Today we celebrate Valentine's Day, the holiday dedicated to lovers, which occurs every year on February 14. This commemoration takes its name from the Christian patron saint of couples, whose connection with love, however, remains obscure.
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The origin of the celebration probably dates back to the fourteenth century, in medieval England, where the cult of Saint Valentine may have taken hold also due to the Roman celebrations of Lupercalia, dedicated to fertility.
The figure of Saint Valentine
Regarding the figure of Saint Valentine, we know that he was a priest, and perhaps a bishop, who was martyred in Rome in the third century. The first official documentation of his feast day dates back to 469, when Pope Gelasius I mentioned that he was a man whose name was "properly revered," although his meritorious deeds were "known only to God." This suggests that Saint Valentine's life was shrouded in mystery, even at the time of his canonization.
Ancient documents refer to three different figures of Saint Valentine connected to February 14, without clarifying whether they are distinct people or different stories of the same life. One of these figures was originally from Terni and became a bishop, another was a Roman priest and the last was a bishop of the Roman province of Africa.
The association with love
Until the late Middle Ages, Saint Valentine was not particularly well known. It was the author and poet Geoffrey Chaucer who revived his memory, associating the saint with tales of romantic adventures, thus helping to make him the symbol of “courtly love”. This assumption of Saint Valentine by Chaucer coincides with the period in which the concept of courtly love began to flourish in the European aristocracy.
Stories and legends surrounding Saint Valentine began to proliferate. In a blog post, Leonardo Tondelli describes an imaginary dialogue with the saint, where he explores various theories about his actions. For example, he is said to have restored the sight of a jailer’s daughter and to have written her a letter, signing it “Your Valentine.” Tondelli also reports a theory according to which he reconciled two lovers by surrounding them with a flock of pigeons.
The legacy of the party
The tradition of Saint Valentine has gained prominence, perhaps also because his festivity coincided with the Roman customs of rational celebration of love. Over the centuries, this celebration was assimilated in the Anglo-Saxon world, and then arrived in the United States, where it took on strongly commercial connotations, threatening to obscure the historical figure of the saint.
In Anglo-Saxon countries, the term Valentine has become synonymous with love letters exchanged on February 14. The oldest evidence of this usage dates back to a letter written in French by the duke and poet Charles of Orleans, who addressed his wife by this name while he was a prisoner in the Tower of London in 1415.
Article published on 14 February 2025 - 08:21
I read the article about Valentine's Day with interest, but there are some things that don't add up. For example, I don't understand why there are three different figures. Modern celebrations seem to have distorted the original meaning of the holiday and that's a shame.