Valentine's Day in the Roman Era
February 14th, a holiday celebrated in honor of Juno, the queen of gods and goddesses in Rome, was also celebrated as the Lupercalia Festival. On this festival day, young people whose lives were restricted and forbidden to be together could be partners with each other only on this day of the year. Partners were determined by writing names on small pieces of paper and drawing lots, and they would get married after the festival. Emperor Claudius II, who was the emperor of that time, had banned marriages and engagements in order to find soldiers to fight. Emperor Claudius II, who ruled Rome with strict rules, learned that a priest named Saint Valentine, who served in the Christian Church, was secretly marrying couples, and had him killed.
Christians began to celebrate this day, February 14, 270 AD, when he was buried as a Christian martyr, as the Lupercalia Festival. Also on this day, pagans living in Rome began to celebrate the Lupercalia Festival for pagans, adhering to their own ceremonies. Priests serving in the Christian Church, disturbed by the association of unmarried young people with pagans during this period, named the Lupercalia Festival Saint Valentine's Day to find a solution to this situation. This Valentine's Day, which began to be celebrated every year after this event in 270 AD, has come down to our day.
