What Valentines is all about

Apparently when it first started in the 4th Century BC in the hills of Italy. The festival was called Lupercalia and was all about "purification and fertility". St. Valentines Day isn't only hard for the singles amongst us, but also for those that are trying to conceive.

The process of Lupercalia is a bit more like a swingers party where you draw key's out of a hat. Then, young men would draw the names of teenage girls from a box which became the forerunners of Valentine cards. For the rest of the year the man and the women will be sexual partners.

The church outlawed the festival in 496AD to prevent the sexual nature of it, but kept the lottery part where people where given names of Saints that they had to emulate that year.

How Valentines got it's name was from St. Valentine who thought that an edict from Emperor Claudius II that prevented soldiers from marrying was unjust so he performed the services in secret. From this young lovers would swap handwritten messages of affection which mentioned St. Valentine.