Be Mine - Valentines Contest time!
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1847 - Esther Howland, of Worchester, Massachusetts, becomes one of the first U.S. manufacturers of valentines
The ancient Roman festival Lupercalia (festival of the wolf) is considered to be one precursor to Valentines Day. Celebrated from February 13-15, it was a purification and fertility ceremony. Reminiscent of the modern-day exchange of love notes on Valentines Day, boys would draw a girls name from a box on the eve of the festival and then escort her to the festival the next dayor, some scholars say, she would be his sexual partner for the next year.
In ancient Greece, Cupid was known as Eros, the young son of Aphrodite, the goddess of love and beauty
During the ancient Roman festival Lupercalia (an ancient precursor to Valentine’s Day), two boys would run through crowds of people swinging strings made from goatskins. If the strings touched a girl, it was divined that she would have healthy children when she grew up. The goatskins were called februa, which means to make clean and from which “February” derives.
A True Love Knot, or Endless Knot of Love, was a very popular Valentine in England and the U.S. in the seventeenth century. As their name implies, these Valentines were drawn as a knot and could be read from any line and still make sense.
Some of the oldest handmade Valentines are rebuses, which is Latin for “things” or “that which is indicated by things.” A rebus is a kind of puzzle or riddle, and the pictures indicate the meaning of the card. For example, a picture of a bee and a picture of a gold mine would indicate the sentiment “Be mine.”
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