I was feeling like a "clever boots" and was going to write an entry about the early Christians' converting or morphing the ancient Roman fertility festival of Lupercalia into St. Valentine's Day. It is a plausible concept, and a quick check via Google shows there is much support for this. But what is the quality of that support? With all due respect to any "witches" out thar, I felt a little suspect of the objectivity of a website called "witchology". The other sites looked better, but I wanted to find out more.
Two websites had what sound like more carefully thought out explanations and firmly based arguments: Encyclopedia Brittanica's website is better known than that of Prof. Bill Thayer's, but his had a much longer and more precisely reasoned discussion. I'm pasting in the links in case you are curious.
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Lupercalia
http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/e/roman/texts/secondary/smigra*/lupercalia.html
The answer I'm accepting is: nope, this is probably not a direct conversion of a pagan holiday/ritual into a Christian one. (How one defines "direct conversion" is entirely another matter.)
Instead I will blither on a bit about AMOR.
{Ahem, I hope no one's sensibilities are disturbed by the following photos. The ancients did have a wider attitude than some moderns do towards nudity, and generally showed only the deities so "costumed", mainly to glory in the perfection of heavenly forms that only deities can have. All these images were taken in public museums, archeological sites or churches. But "loves makes the world go round", so I hope you will enjoy these in the spirit of good cheer of today's holiday.}
Cupid and Psyche were a popular motif and appear on many sarcophagi.
I am starting with a
3rd Century AD sarcophagus, with Cupid (Amore) and Psyche
on both corners.
(Museo della Terme).
Here they are again, this time in the so-called House of Cupid and Psyche (pre 200 AD) in Ostia Antiqua, the long-buried former seaport of ancient Rome. 
There are several frescoed rooms recovered from an ancient villa on the banks of the Tiber that are now on beautifully restored display in the museum in the Palazzo Massimo.
Ancient Roman bedrooms were small, usually smaller than these from a very upper class villa (possibly even belonging to someone in the family of the Emperor Augustus). These rooms were called "cubiculum". OF COURSE, no one's office cubicle is anything like these!
Amorous scenes were a frequent topic. The men were usually shown deeply tanned from being outside a great deal, and the upper class women were very pale, staying inside more often. Um, yes, that is a servant (slave) standing there in the room while what should be very private matters were going on.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Roman_Museum will take you to a very brief webpage from Wikipedia on these four astonishing museums.
I haven't said much about the legends around Cupid and Psyche. There are versions that center around the surface level, and others that provide far more detail and delve deeper into human psychology. The thumbnail version is that love (Cupid) is part and parcel of the human soul (Psyche). Ah, if life were only as simple as that. Even these two deities had a LONG struggle to be able to be finally happily united.
Many of the steps on their struggles have been rendered in astonishingly wonderful art. Many people know the basic part of the tale, that a beautiful maiden is united with someone she can not see (for unrevealed reasons). She begins to have doubts about her paramour, and holds an oil lamp over him one night, expecting to find the worst possible fellow.
Of course it is the original "Mr. Cutie-Pie", handsome Cupid. And of course she is so startled, she accidentally lets some of the hot oil from the lamp fall on him. He leaves. {This is the bedroom pope Paul III Farnese (died 1549) had done up for himself in the papal fortress of the Castel Sant' Angelo. The tale runs around the cornice of the entire room.}
Psyche despairs after being unceremoniously dumped back on earth. She faces trials and tasks set by his disapproving mother, Venus (Aphrodite). There is a VERY happy ending!
Mercury (Hermes) the messenger of the Gods, is dispatched to bring Psyche into heaven, where Venus finally agrees to the wedding with the urging of all the other gods. A jolly banquet follows.
 |
| {These three photos are from the Villa Farnesina, the "modern" part built in the early 1500's for an incredibly wealthy banker, Agostino Chigi. Being a "new man" in Rome, and extremely wealthy, he wanted to make an impression on the other upper class nobles. He did so, especially when holding banquets under this ceiling. The room was originally open to his gardens and not glassed in as it is now. Chigi had the very best painters of the time, including Raphael, decorate his villa. It is a splendid museum. Wonderful books have been written about this little bit of heaven, so I'm giving you just a tiny drop of its treasures. This website will give you an idea of the place.} http://www.villafarnesina.it/?page_id=47&lang=en |
There is a great deal more that I can blither on about art, love and Rome, as well as the dialogue in paintings about "sacred" love and more earthly "profane" love, but that will take more time, and I need to hit ye olde hay.
I hope you and yours have a lovely St. Valentine's Day!
ciao, Carol
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