Thanks rdl6989.
You all did see that on the Lupercal I thrice presented him a kingly crown, Which he did thrice refuse. Was this ambition? Yet Brutus says he was ambitious, And, sure, he is an honorable man. [Shakespear, Julius Caesar, Act 3 Scene 2
Posted on 02/11/2022 10:15:44 AM PST by Scarlett156
Lupercalia was an ancient pagan festival held each year in Rome on February 15. Although Valentine’s Day shares its name with a martyred Christian saint, some historians believe the holiday is actually an offshoot of Lupercalia. Unlike Valentine’s Day, however, Lupercalia was a bloody, violent and sexually charged celebration awash with animal sacrifice, random matchmaking and coupling in the hopes of warding off evil spirits and infertility.
Romulus and Remus
No one knows the exact origin of Lupercalia, but it has been traced back as far as the 6th century B.C.
According to Roman legend, the ancient King Amulius ordered Romulus and Remus—his twin nephews and founders of Rome—to be thrown into the Tiber River to drown in retribution for their mother’s broken vow of celibacy.
A servant took pity on them, however, and placed them inside a basket on the river instead. The river-god carried the basket and the brothers downriver to a wild fig tree where it became caught in the branches. The brothers were then rescued and cared for by a she-wolf in a den at the base of Palatine Hill where Rome was founded.
The twins were later adopted by a shepherd and his wife and learned their father’s trade. After killing the uncle who’d ordered their death, they found the cave den of the she-wolf who’d nurtured them and named it Lupercal.
It’s thought Lupercalia took place to honor the she-wolf and please the Roman fertility god Lupercus.
Ritual Sacrifice
Lupercalia rituals took place in a few places: Lupercal cave, on Palatine Hill and within the Roman open-air, public meeting place called the Comitium. The festival began at Lupercal cave with the sacrifice of one or more male goats—a representation of sexuality—and a dog.
The sacrifices were performed by Luperci, a group of Roman priests. Afterwards, the foreheads of two naked Luperci were smeared with the animals’ blood using the bloody, sacrificial knife. The blood was then removed with a piece of milk-soaked wool as the Luperci laughed.
Feast of Lupercal In Ancient Rome, feasting began after the ritual sacrifice. When the feast of Lupercal was over, the Luperci cut strips, also called thongs or februa, of goat hide from the newly-sacrificed goats.
They then ran naked or nearly-naked around Palantine whipping any woman within striking distance with the thongs.
During Lupercalia, the men randomly chose a woman’s name from a jar to be coupled with them for the duration of the festival. Often, the couple stayed together until the following year’s festival. Many fell in love and married.
In Plutarch’s Life of Julius Caesar, Caesar famously refuses a golden crown presented to him by Mark Antony during the feast of Lupercalia.
Saint Valentine There are several legends surrounding the life of Saint Valentine. The most common is that on one February 14 during the 3rd century A.D., a man named Valentine was executed by the Roman Emperor Claudius II after being imprisoned for assisting persecuted Christians and secretly marrying Christian couples in love.
As the story goes, during Valentine’s imprisonment he tried converting Claudius to Christianity. Claudius became enraged and ordered Valentine to reject his faith or be killed. He refused to forsake his faith, so Valentine was beheaded.
Legend also tells of another story that happened during Valentine’s imprisonment after he tutored a girl named Julia, the blind daughter of his jailer. The legend states God restored Julia’s sight after she and Valentine prayed together. On the eve of his execution, Valentine supposedly penned a note to Julia and signed it, “From your Valentine.”
Some historians believe more than one man named Valentine was executed by Claudius II. Despite the ambiguity surrounding Valentine and his life, the Catholic Church declared him a saint and listed him in Roman Martyrology as being martyred on February 14.
*yawn* And eye fortot the reset ....
Random coupling might backfire
Dumbass bullshit from the History Channel.
There was a feast day on the Church’s calendar of saints for St. Valentine, on Feb. 14. But the romantic St. Valentine’s Day was some time in June. Both were so minor that when a Victorian British author (I forget which one) found a story about couples getting married on St. Valentine’s Day, he mistook the June day (an obvious day to get married in England) for the one in February. So unless someone wants to tell me how a day in June was somehow related to Lupercalia, this is utter balls-to-the-wall steaming crap.
Feb. 15 happens to be my wife’s birthday. I had been wondering what to do for a special celebration.
“awash with animal sacrifice”
Oh the PETA “Supermarket culture” brainwashed terminology. We have had celebrations with animal sacrifice all along in ALL cultures. Each has it’s own name for these. We call them Barbecues...
Animal sacrifice, naked people with whips, random sex, public orgies - but enough about the Biden administration...
Sounds like a great opportunity 🤡
In fact, it usually does.
Got a chance to nail this down a bit more: Valentine’s Day had no association at all with Romance until Geoffrey Chaucer. Chaucer’s poem was written for the wedding of Richard II and Anne, which was on May 2. May 3 was the feast of St Valentine, Bishop of Genoa. Since Chaucer refers to lovebirds (literally, the birds) making such a racket, later authors confused him with referring to a feast of February 23, which because of confusion of calendars, was improperly “corrected” to the Feast of St. Valentine that was on Feb. 14.
So, the “history channel” is the ultimate source for all things pagan? And all those mentions of the holiday in books are - oh, who needs to read that?
Eid mubarak!
“Church Socials”, Birthdays, Superbowl, Fiestas, and many more names for gatherings committing animal sacrifice before there were supermarkets.
>> So, the “history channel” is the ultimate source for all things pagan? And all those mentions of the holiday in books are - oh, who needs to read that? <<
Ultimate source? No. History always loves interviewing authors of books for their stories about UFOs, Big Foot, “hidden gospels,” etc. That doesn’t mean they’re not complete and utter B.S.
As for Valentine’s Day being associated with Lupercalia, the idea started with Alban Butler (1756-1759), but no-one knows where he got his ideas about Lupercalia, which had absolutely nothing to do with drawing names from a jar to couple. In fact, on Lupercalia, if you saw a women, you were supposed to strip naked, grab a leather thong, and chase after her, beating her. So NOT romantic! Butler seems to have realized Valentine’s Day fell on roughly the same day as Lupercalia and made the rest up. Only, as explained, he was wrong about which Valentine’s Day fell in ancient days near Lupercalia.
But as History Channel typically does, it presents disproven evidence to make its case for belief in anything metaphysical BESIDES the Christian God, and never mentions the proof the evidence is false.
By the way, ICYWC, there’s also absolutely zero evidence that there was ever a goddess Eostre, that anyone in Great Britain worshipped her, that Eastermonad had anything to do with her; Bede simply hadn’t known that Christians had been on Great Britain centuries earlier, so presumed Eastermonad referred to a different Easter than the Christian one, which is named after facing East, which, being named after Eos, is where you get your tiniest connection to any pagan God. But that’s like saying going to Church on Saturday is like worshipping Saturn.
Speaking of Saturn, there’s also no connection with Saturnalia and Christmas. In fact, the ties to it and Christmas are based on confusing it with the Feast of Sol Invictus, which is a LOT more like Christmas. In fact, it was a pagan invention centuries after Christmas to imitate Christmas. It’s about as related to the origins of Christmas as the Constanza family holiday of Festivus.
Ok but do you understand that this stuff on the istory hannel was stuff I had already read about elsewhere? So I was just passing it on? Shall we argue tediously about Bullfinch’s Mythology next?
Thanks rdl6989.
You all did see that on the Lupercal I thrice presented him a kingly crown, Which he did thrice refuse. Was this ambition? Yet Brutus says he was ambitious, And, sure, he is an honorable man. [Shakespear, Julius Caesar, Act 3 Scene 2
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