Everyone knows that Valentine’s day is the day of love. You either love the holiday or you hate it because you think it’s a scheme made by big cooperations to make some money. Though many people have strong feelings towards this holiday most people couldn’t tell you any of the history behind it. 

Valentine’s Day is centered around a mystery. There is a multitude of explanations for the holiday, with no one being able to agree on one reasoning. 

Everyone agrees that the holiday gets its name from a famous saint. The most famous belief about St. Valentine is that he was a priest from Rome in the third century AD. While others believe that he could have been a bishop of Interamma or a martyr in the Roman province of Africa.

Emperor Claudius believed that single Roman men were stronger than those with wives. The emperor was having a hard time getting soldiers to join his army because of their strong attachment to their wives and families. To fix this problem Claudius banned all marriages and engagements in Rome. St. Valentine realized how inhumane this was to the citizens and continued to perform marriages in secret. 

After the emperor found out about his secret marriages, St. Valentine was given a death sentence which was carried out on February 14th. 

For his sacrifices of honoring the citizens of Rome’s right to love he was named a saint after his death.