Ban Valentine's Day?
It's 14th February - Valentine’s Day - or hadn't you noticed? Who was St Valentine? His popularity, at least commercially, seems strong. No one really knows who he was - or who they were. There are several legends. One Valentine was a Christian clubbed to death on the Flaminian Way in Rome about AD 269 during the reign of the Emperor Claudius II. This emperor had forbidden marriage. He thought single men made better soldiers and he needed soldiers. Valentine conducted secret marriage ceremonies for young lovers in defiance of the emperor. This Valentine is said to have cared for persecuted Christians before his own conversion. Another Valentine was a Bishop of Terni, taken to Rome and martyred. The accounts of both these martyrdoms are probably unreliable. So is the story that Valentine fell in love with his gaoler’s daughter and that when he went to his death he left her a note signed ‘your Valentine’. So, what’s the connection between this person or people and the cel...