The Valentine’s Edition
The Hilight
THE NEWSPAPER OF CULLMAN HIGH SCHOOL SENIORS: ONLY 68 DAYS TIL GRADUATION
Volume LXXXVII Issue 4 Februrary 11, 2022 510 13th St. Cullman, AL 35055
The History of Valentine’s Day Love is in the air
Samantha Johnson, Staff Writer As Valentine's Day approaches, it is important to brush up on the history of the international holiday. There are a few significant historical events that led to the holiday that everyone knows. The first major event is the Pagan festival of Lupercalia. This was a festival for fertility. Many animals were slaughtered and then women were taken in the streets and slapped with the bloody hides as a fertility blessing. Later the women would add their names to an urn to be drawn out and paired with a man for the year. Many people believe Valentine’s Day originates from this; however, the festival was on the fifteenth of February, not the fourteenth. So how did Valentine’s Day end up on the fourteenth? This brings us to our second major event. The Catholic church named February fourteenth St. Valentine's Day, as a way to override and do away with Lupercalia. Although there is some confusion over which Valentine they are naming the holiday after, because there were three saints named Valentine. The first legend of Saint Valentine states that he was a priest who was beheaded for helping christians escape from jail. He was beheaded by Claudius II. The second legend states that Valentine was a priest in Africa that was martyred with his companions and Queen Emma added his head to the New Minster abbey in Winchester, England in 1041. This is all that is known about this Valentine. The third story is the one most people believe. It has a few more details. In the third legend, Claudius II outlawed marriage among young men to make them better soldiers. Saint Valentine kept marrying young lovers in secret. When Claudius II found out about this, he
threw Valentine in prison. While in prison he got to know his jailer and the jailer’s blind daughter. Over the course of his time in jail he fell in love with the jailer's daughter, and used his faith to heal her eyes, so she could see. Right before he was sent to be beheaded by Claudius II he sent a note to the daughter, and signed it “From your Valentine”. And so the first Valentine was sent! There is another story about the first known valentine, though. This one has proof of truth, though. This valentine was also sent from a jail, but not by a saint. This one was sent by Charles, Duke of Orleans (Not to be confused with New Orleans in Louisiana). Charles sent a poem to his second wife on Valentine’s Day after he was captured during the Battle of Agincourt in 1415. He was imprisoned for over 20 years and never got to see his wife's reaction to the poem he sent her. The poem, on the original card, is preserved in the British Library in London. One last Valentine's tradition to leave you with is the Letters to Juliet. Since the 1930s people from all around the world have been writing letters to Juliet, the fictional figure from the famous Shakespearean play Romeo and Juliet. They send these letters to Verona, Italy, the scene of the play. These letters are then answered by the “Juliet Club,” a group of writers who volunteer to answer the letters to Juliet. At the end of the season of love, the most romantic letter sent to Juliet wins the “Cara Giulietta Prize” or the Dear Juliet Prize. So maybe one year you can send a letter to Juliet, and who knows, maybe you're romantic enough to win. (NOT PICTURED BELOW: SAMANTHA JOHNSON, VIRTUAL MEMBER OF HILIGHT)
HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY!
LOVE, THE HILIGHT