V-day and X-mas
Am I the only one who sees Valentine’s day as a holiday made only to spend money on things that have no meaning? I mean if I’m in a relationship I expect boats of chocolate every day, not only one day of the year. I also expect love and attention every day. Despite that, people still spend hundreds of dollars on valentines day presents every year. So let’s see what happened with these two magical holidays, starting with V-day of course.
Valentine’s day
Origin of this magical holiday goes something like this: St. Valentine was a priest who served during the third century in Rome. When Emperor Claudius II decided that single men made better soldiers than those with wives and families, he outlawed marriage for young men. Valentine continued to perform marriages for young lovers in secret. When Valentine’s actions were discovered, Claudius ordered that he be put to death.
There is also a story of a festival called Lupercalia- a fertility festival dedicated to Faunus, the Roman god of agriculture. The priests would sacrifice a goat and a dog on the festival, rip the goat apart, dip the pieces into sacrificial blood and then go around slapping people and crops with it. Which legend is right? I have no idea.
The „money spending“ part of Valentine’s day started in 1840s when a woman named Esther Howland began selling the first ever mass-produced valentines in America. Companies have been using Valentine’s day to boost their sales ever since.
Christmas
I’m sure we all know where Christmas came from so I won’t waste your time on telling you the story from the begging. However, I will tell u that the Advent calendar was invented by a Munich housewife who got tired of having to answer when Christmas would come. The first commercial calendars were printed in Germany in 1851.
Towards the end of the 18th century the practice of giving gifts to family members was already well established. Around 1980s the term Black Friday came to life and got associated with Christmas, as it was taking place a month before the Christmas gift giving. Since then, more „retail holidays“ spawned such as Cyber Monday and Small Business Saturday. Those holidays are the reason we associate Christmas with consumerism these days.
What do you think about these holidays? Can you still feel their magic? Or do you see them as money spending days like me? Write to us in the
Written by: Kristina Matić
