Valentine's Day: Its Unusual Story and Our Guide to Finding the Perfect Gift

Did you know that in ancient Rome, the festival celebrating Lupercus Faunus, the god of nature and fertility, was held between February 13 and 15. This very popular festival, called "the Lupercalia Festival", lasted 3 days. It included tons of unconventional distractions: sacrifices, races, and a grand final banquet. A sort of great lottery was also organised: each girl wrote her name on a piece of parchment paper and placed it in a large jar, and then each boy drew a name, indicating the girl who was to stay with him for the duration of the banquet. Sometimes young people fell in love, the lucky ones got married.
The Lupercalia were very extravagant evenings, totally uninhibited and dedicated to sexuality, love, and reproduction. Debauchery reigns supreme during these 3 days of festivities. These evenings were swiftly put to an end around the year 464! It was Pope Gelasius I who put an end to the feast and decided that February 14 would be the day of 3 holy martyrs. The feast of Lupercalia was much criticized by the high dignitaries of the Christian religion, because at the origin of the Valentines feast is a celebration that is a little too risqué.   
So, who is Valentine? As is often the case, history is subject to controversy and sometimes disappointment; it is impossible to know with 100% certainty who exactly is the Valentine we celebrate on February 14th.  Some accounts claim that one of the three holy martyrs answered to the name of Valentine. He was recognized as the "Priest of Lovers", and secretly celebrated the unions of Christian soldiers despite the Roman Emperor's prohibition. Valentine of Terni was executed on 14 February 270. Over the years, the Christian Church has gradually tempered amorous customs, transforming the February festivities into a more courtly celebration.  In 1496, Pope Alexander VI made Valentine the "patron saint of lovers", marking a real change in the perception and celebration of love.  

With the emergence of Romanticism in the eighteenth century, the expression of love now came through poems, declarations, and sweet messages called "Valentines." These messages were frequently coded to prevent the postman or family from deciphering them. A practice that was banned during the First World War, for fear of German spies... On the other side of the Atlantic, this holiday spread to the United States in 1840, and romantic cards were an instant success. America is going to give a commercial dimension to this holiday, which it does all too well. 

In 2024, the romantic postcards used during wartime are overtaken in favour of gifts, bouquets of flowers, restaurants, and sexting filled with emojis. While the holiday itself has changed profusely throughout the years, the same objective remains since ancient Rome: to find Love, declare it, pay homage to it, and to celebrate it in a way that’s as lustful as it is sensual. So, it's up to us to reinvent Valentine's Day and to take control of our love lives.