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Did You Know?
Approximately 150 million Valentine’s Day
cards are exchanged annually, making Valen-
tine’s Day the second most popular card-send-
ing holiday after Christmas.
VALENTINE’S DAY:
A DAY OF ROMANCE
Lupercalia survived the initial rise of
Christianity and but was outlawed—as
it was deemed “un-Christian”–at the end
of the 5th century, when Pope Gelasius
declared February 14 St. Valentine’s
Day. It was not until much later, how-
ever, that the day became definitively
associated with love. During the Mid-
dle Ages, it was commonly believed
in France and England that February
14 was the beginning of birds’ mating
season, which added to the idea that the
middle of Valentine’s Day should be a
day for romance.
Valentine greetings were popular as
far back as the Middle Ages, though
written Valentine’s didn’t begin to ap-
pear until after 1400. The oldest known
valentine still in existence today was a
poem written in 1415 by Charles, Duke
of Orleans, to his wife while he was
imprisoned in the Tower of London fol-
lowing his capture at the Battle
of Agincourt. (The greet-
ing is now part of the
manuscript collection
of the British Library
in London, England.)
Several years later, it
is believed that King
Henry V hired a writer
named John Lydgate to
compose a valentine note
to Catherine of Valois.
TYPICAL VALEN-
TINE’S DAY GREETINGS
In addition to the United States, Val-
entine’s Day is celebrated in Canada,
Mexico, the United Kingdom,
France and Australia. In Great
Britain, Valentine’s Day began
to be popularly celebrated
around the 17th century. By
the middle of the 18th, it was
common for friends and lovers of
all social classes to exchange small
tokens of affection or handwritten notes,
and by 1900 printed cards began to
replace written letters due to improve-
ments in printing technology. Ready-
made cards were an easy way for people
to express their emotions in a time when
direct expression of one’s feelings was
discouraged. Cheaper postage rates
also contributed to an increase in the
popularity of sending Valentine’s Day
greetings.
Americans probably began exchang-
ing hand-made valentines in the early
1700s. In the 1840s, Esther A. Howland
be-
gan selling the first
mass-produced valentines in America.
Howland, known as the “Mother of the
Valentine,” made elaborate creations
with real lace, ribbons and colorful
pictures known as “scrap.” Today, ac-
cording to the Greeting Card Associa-
tion, an estimated 1 billion Valentine’s
Day cards are sent each year, making
Valentine’s Day the second largest
card-sending holiday of the year. (An
estimated 2.6 billion cards are sent for
Christmas.) Women purchase approxi-
mately 85 percent of all valentines.
FEBRUARY 2016 -
SEXY GLAM
MAGAZINE -
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