Subject: True Origins of Valentine's Day Revealed
From: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 6 Feb 1998 13:46:40 EST

From The Letter - Kentucky's gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender newspaper,
February 1998

True Origins of Valentine's Day Revealed

by Bronson Majors

In the past decade or so, Christian fundamentalists have been waging a
campaign to eliminate Halloween from the American holiday calendar because of
its ties to pagan beliefs and witchcraft.  Thank God they haven't found out
about the origins of Valentine's Day, or all hell would break loose.

According to Sarah Dening in her book, The Mythology of Sex, Valentine's Day
can be traced back to the Lupercalian festivals in classical Rome.  Those
festivities were held each year in the Lupercal grotto, where the wolf-bitch
Lupa was believed to have suckled Romulus and Remus, mythical founders of
Rome.

During the Lupercaliae--actually purification ceremonies for the Roman new
year in February-- goats (a fertility symbol) were sacrificed and young men
smeared with their blood.  The priests then donned the raw goat hides and,
using strips of the skin, slapped the hands of any woman present who wished to
conceive, in order to increase her chances.

After the men and women exchanged clothing, each man would then pick a slip of
paper with the name of a woman written on it and they'd proceed to have sex.
A general orgy ensued.

After Rome was Christianized, the Church attempted to stamp out the
Lupercalian festivals altogether, but the tradition was so strong it had to
resort to compromises.  It came up with a mythical martyr, St. Valentine, to
bless the day.  And the slips of paper?  They evolved into today's Valentine's
cards.

Fortunately the goat rituals haven't survived--though we do wonder sometimes
what Southern Baptists do when no one's looking.

Incidentally, the month of February itself is named after Juno Februata, the
Roman goddess of the fever of love.  Lordy, Miss Mabel, bring me my smelling
salts!

So if you were wondering what the Southern Baptists will be boycotting next,
wonder no more:  Wal-Mart, Walgreen's, K-Mart, Kroger, Hallmark Cards, and
just about any other store in America that dares to celebrate that most pagan
of all holidays:  Valentines Day.