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According to the U.S. Greeting Card Association. on February 14th, 20 million People in the USA will send Valentines & flowers to themselves. It seems that Americans need to know that some one out there cares - even if it is pretend. In some Muslim countries, hundreds of young couples will be arrested by religious police while authorities ban the sale of red roses and red heart-shaped artifacts. 16 million heart-felt e-cards will be sent on the Internet. In the US alone 200 million extra letters will be delivered by postal workers and 700 million school kids will hand deliver letters to each other (with teachers getting the largest share).
In Japan, South Korea and Singapore millions of men will give chocolates to women, but those gals who do not get any will end the day in a restaurant eating Black Noodles to mourn their single lives. All across the globe, hearts will glow or be broken as lovers, and friends spend billions of dollars on jewelry, candy, flowers and cards. We call it Valentines Day while in Latin America it is called Dia Del Amor y La Amistad (Day of Love and Friendship). Do you know how all this got started?
Named after early Christian martyrs St. Saint Valentines Day was established by Pope Gelasius I in 496 AD but was removed from the Christian Calendar of Saints in 1969 by Pope Paul VI. In 1382 we see the first recorded association of Valentine's Day with romantic love in Geoffrey Chaucer's Parlement of Foules. In 1400 the french began using the language of the law courts for the rituals of courtly love to deal with love contracts, betrayals, and violence against women. Judges were selected by women on the basis of a poetry reading.
The earliest known valentine is a 15th-century rondeau written by Charles, Duke of Orléans to his wife while was being held prisoner in the Tower of London after the Battle of Agincourt. The Duke wrote: "For this was Saint Valentine's Day, when every bird cometh there to choose his mate." In 1797, a British publisher issued The Young Man's Valentine Writer which was filled with sentimental verses for the young lover who was unable to compose his own verse. Printers had already begun producing a limited number of cards with verses and sketches, called "mechanical valentines," and a reduction in postal rates in the 19th century England ushered in the less personal but easier practice of mailing Valentines. This made it possible to send cards anonymously, which is why racy verses suddenly appeared in the prudish Victorian age.
In the 1840's the originally Christain Saint Valentine's Day was reinvented as Valentines Day, and paper Valentines were such a hit in 19th century England that factories began to make fancy cards with real lace and ribbons. The first mass-produced valentines of embossed paper lace were produced and sold In the United States in 1847 by Esther Howland. Today the U.S. Greeting Card Association estimates that approximately 190 million valentines are sent each year and that 85% of these are bought and sent by women who very often send Valentines to themselves! It is speculated that, in some cases, it is wives performing the service on behalf of forgetful husbands, but most are sent as a way for a person to feel good about themselves or to maintain the illusion that they have an admirer.
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