Page 3 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - Febrary/March 2020 Edition

The Dark Origins of Valentine’s Day 3

The Dark Origins Of stop it from being a day of fertility and love."
Around the same time, the Normans OYSTER FACTS
Valentine's Day celebrated Galatin's Day. Galatin meant "lover
of women." That was likely confused with St.
Valentine's Day at some point, in part because
by Arnie Seipel
they sound alike.

Shakespeare In Love
Valentine's Day is a time to celebrate romance
and love and kissy-face fealty. But the origins of
As the years went on, the holiday grew sweeter.
this festival of candy and cupids are actually
Chaucer and Shakespeare romanticized it in
dark, bloody — and a bit muddled.
their work, and it gained popularity throughout
Though no one has pinpointed the exact
Britain and the rest of Europe. Handmade paper
origin of the holiday, one good place to start is
cards became the tokens-du-jour in the Middle • Oysters are bivalveMollusks. All that
ancient Rome, where men hit on women by,
Ages. means is that they have soft flesh and
well, hitting them.
Eventually, the tradition made its way to gills, and live inside a hinged shell.
the New World. The industrial revolution
Those Wild And Crazy Romans
ushered in factory-made cards in the 19th • A “spat” is a baby oyster that attaches
century. And in 1913, Hallmark Cards of Kansas itself to a hard surface - generally another
From Feb. 13 to 15, the Romans celebrated the
City, Mo., began mass producing valentines. oyster’s shell - to grow.
feast of Lupercalia. The men sacrificed a goat
February has not been the same since.
and a dog, then whipped women with the hides Today, the holiday is big business: • The life span of an oyster (if nobody
of the animals they had just slain.
According to market research firm IBIS World, catches it and eats it) tops out at 20 years.
The Roman romantics "were drunk.
Valentine's Day sales reached $17.6 billion last
They were naked," says Noel Lenski, a historian
year; this year's sales are expected to total $18.6 • Humans have four-chambered hearts, red
at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Young
billion. blood, and two kidneys. Oysters have
women would actually line up for the men to hit But that commercialization has spoiled three-chambered hearts, clear blood...and
them, Lenski says. They believed this would
the day for many. Helen Fisher, a sociologist at two kidneys.
make them fertile.
Rutgers University, says we have only ourselves
The brutal fete included a matchmaking
to blame. • An oyster’s gender can change at
lottery, in which young men drew the names of
"This isn't a command performance," she anytime, based on its environment. Most
women from a jar. The couple would then be, says. "If people didn't want to buy Hallmark begin life as males and wind up as
um, coupled up for the duration of the festival —
cards, they would not be bought, and Hallmark females.
or longer, if the match was right.
would go out of business."
The ancient Romans may also be
And so the celebration of Valentine's • Oysters were such big business in late
responsible for the name of our modern day of
Day goes on, in varied ways. Many will break 19th-century Baltimore that a local
love. Emperor Claudius II executed two men — the bank buying jewelry and flowers for their company produced trading cards
both named Valentine — on Feb. 14 of different
beloveds. Others will celebrate in a SAD (that's depicting major local packers, including
years in the 3rd century A.D. Their martyrdom
Single Awareness Day) way, dining alone and Louis Grebb and H.W. Hitchcock. The
was honored by the Catholic Church with the
binging on self-gifted chocolates. A few may cards were handed out to restaurants,
celebration of St. Valentine's Day.
even be spending this day the same way the grocery stores, and oyster bars as a form
Later, Pope Gelasius I muddled things in early Romans did. But let's not go there. [] of promotion.
the 5th century by combining St. Valentine's
Day with Lupercalia to expel the pagan rituals.
To submit your article for publication in • You’re more likely to find crabs inside an
But the festival was more of a theatrical
The ‘X’ Chronicles Newspaper, oyster than a pearl.Only one out of 10,000
interpretation of what it had once been. Lenski oysters contain that treasure.
email,
adds, "It was a little more of a drunken revel, but
the Christians put clothes back on it. That didn't publisher@xchroniclesnewspaper.com