Happy Lupercalia ~
~ or should I say Valentine's? Yeah, so, the lovey day is officially tomorrow, but I thought it'd be more interesting to talk a little bit about Lupercalia, the Before-Valentines Valentine's Day. Taken from history.com, this is an interesting look about the chocolate and flower-filled day before it was full of flowers or chocolate:
To begin the festival, members of the Luperci, an order of Roman priests, would gather at the sacred cave where the infants Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome, were believed to have been cared for by a she-wolf or lupa. The priests would then sacrifice a goat, for fertility, and a dog, for purification.
The boys then sliced the goat's hide into strips, dipped them in the sacrificial blood and took to the streets, gently slapping both women and fields of crops with the goat hide strips. Far from being fearful, Roman women welcomed being touched with the hides because it was believed the strips would make them more fertile in the coming year. Later in the day, according to legend, all the young women in the city would place their names in a big urn. The city's bachelors would then each choose a name out of the urn and become paired for the year with his chosen woman. These matches often ended in marriage. Pope Gelasius declared February 14 St. Valentine's Day around 498 A.D. The Roman 'lottery' system for romantic pairing was deemed un-Christian and outlawed.
I mean, who wouldn't want to be slapped with bloody strips of goat skin and then randomly have your name picked by your new beloved out of a hat - er urn, as it were? Sounds like an amazing holiday, I must say! More interesting than, say, Chaucer's love birds or Esther Howland who re-invented the holiday in 19th century America.
Maybe I'm just too pagan for that kind of thing. I'll take Lupercalia, thanks.
Anyway, have a lovely Lupercalia everyone.
To begin the festival, members of the Luperci, an order of Roman priests, would gather at the sacred cave where the infants Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome, were believed to have been cared for by a she-wolf or lupa. The priests would then sacrifice a goat, for fertility, and a dog, for purification.
The boys then sliced the goat's hide into strips, dipped them in the sacrificial blood and took to the streets, gently slapping both women and fields of crops with the goat hide strips. Far from being fearful, Roman women welcomed being touched with the hides because it was believed the strips would make them more fertile in the coming year. Later in the day, according to legend, all the young women in the city would place their names in a big urn. The city's bachelors would then each choose a name out of the urn and become paired for the year with his chosen woman. These matches often ended in marriage. Pope Gelasius declared February 14 St. Valentine's Day around 498 A.D. The Roman 'lottery' system for romantic pairing was deemed un-Christian and outlawed.
I mean, who wouldn't want to be slapped with bloody strips of goat skin and then randomly have your name picked by your new beloved out of a hat - er urn, as it were? Sounds like an amazing holiday, I must say! More interesting than, say, Chaucer's love birds or Esther Howland who re-invented the holiday in 19th century America.
Maybe I'm just too pagan for that kind of thing. I'll take Lupercalia, thanks.
Anyway, have a lovely Lupercalia everyone.