The History of Valentine's Day: From Saint Valentine to Chaucer to Cards
The history of Valentine's Day is really two stories that got tangled together. The first is about early Christian martyrs named Valentine, remembered on February 14. The second, which is the romantic part, starts much later, in the 1300s, when English poets wrote that birds chose their mates on Saint Valentine's Day. From there, the day picked up love letters in the 1400s, printed verses and lace-paper cards in the 1700s and 1800s, and a Massachusetts businesswoman named Esther Howland who helped turn the valentine card into an American tradition.
Along the way, a lot of colorful legends grew up: a priest secretly marrying soldiers, a farewell note signed "from your Valentine," and a Roman festival called Lupercalia supposedly turned into a Christian holiday. Some of those stories are repeated so often that they feel like fact. In this guide, we'll separate what the historical record actually shows from what's legend, step by step, with dates and sources.
The history of Valentine's Day in brief
If you only have a minute, here's the whole story in order.
- Third century: At least two Christian martyrs named Valentine, a priest in Rome and a bishop of Terni, are later remembered on February 14. Almost nothing reliable is known about their lives.
- Before 1386: Geoffrey Chaucer writes The Parlement of Foules, a poem set "on seynt Valentynes day," when every bird comes to choose its mate. This is one of the earliest links between the saint's day and romantic love.
- February 1477: In England, Margery Brews writes to John Paston, calling him her "ryght welebeloved Voluntyne." It's one of the oldest surviving valentine letters in English.
- Shakespeare's time: In Hamlet, Ophelia sings a song about being someone's valentine on Saint Valentine's Day morning, showing the custom was well known.
- 1700s to early 1800s: People write handmade valentines and buy "valentine writers," booklets of ready-made verses.
- 1840s to 1850s: Printed and lithographed valentines spread in the United States. Esther Howland of Worcester, Massachusetts, begins her valentine business, with her first newspaper ad in 1850.
- Late 1800s: Valentines become mass-produced and elaborate, with makers in England, Germany and the United States.
Now let's look at each piece more closely.
Who was Saint Valentine?
The honest answer is: we don't really know, and there may have been more than one. The Catholic Encyclopedia's entry on St. Valentine, published on New Advent, says at least three different martyrs named Valentine appear in early church calendars under February 14.
- A priest at Rome.
- A bishop of Interamna, the town known today as Terni, in central Italy.
- A third Valentine who died in Africa with several companions, about whom nothing more is known.
According to the same entry, the priest and the bishop both seem to have died in the second half of the third century and were buried along the Via Flaminia, the Flaminian Way, an old Roman road running north from the city, at different distances from Rome. The encyclopedia adds that in the Middle Ages, the city gate we now call the Porta del Popolo was known as the Gate of St. Valentine, probably because of a church nearby.
Here's the key point for anyone curious about the romance: the encyclopedia says the surviving accounts of these saints' lives were written late and have no historical value. In other words, the church remembered the names and the date, but the details of their stories weren't reliably recorded.
What the early record doesn't say
Notice what's missing from the Catholic Encyclopedia's account: love. Nothing in it connects either the priest or the bishop to couples, weddings or romance. The romantic meaning of the day arrives much later, and from a completely different direction.
The legends: secret weddings and a farewell note
If the early record is so thin, where do the popular Valentine stories come from? They're legends that grew up over many centuries, and they're worth knowing as legends.
The farewell note
One version is retold on the American Antiquarian Society's "Origins" page for its valentine exhibition. It says that during the reign of the emperor Claudius II in the third century, a Roman priest named Valentinus was imprisoned for helping Christian martyrs, and that on the eve of his execution he wrote a farewell note to his jailer's daughter, signed "From Your Valentine," on February 14.
It's a lovely story, and it explains why people sign cards that way. But it's the kind of detail the Catholic Encyclopedia warns about: it comes from late accounts, not from anything written at the time.
The secret weddings
You may also have heard that Valentine secretly married young couples after an emperor banned soldiers from marrying. This story is very popular online, but it doesn't appear in the early records summarized by the Catholic Encyclopedia. Treat it as a legend, not history.
Why legends matter anyway
Legends aren't worthless. They tell us what people wanted Valentine's Day to mean. A priest who defies authority for love, or who sends a tender note before he dies, is exactly the kind of hero a romantic holiday needs. The stories grew because the holiday grew, not the other way around.
Lupercalia: the Roman festival and the myth of a link
Perhaps the most repeated claim about the history of Valentine's Day is that it's a Christian makeover of Lupercalia, an ancient Roman festival held in February. Let's look at what Lupercalia actually was.
The Greek writer Plutarch describes it in his Life of Romulus, chapter 21, which you can read in the 1914 Loeb Classical Library translation on the University of Chicago's LacusCurtius site. He places the festival in February. Priests sacrificed goats, then two young men of noble birth cut the goatskins into strips and ran through the streets striking people they met with them. Plutarch says young married women didn't avoid the blows, believing they would help them conceive and have an easy childbirth. He also notes that the name seems to mean something like "feast of wolves," connected to the story of the she-wolf who raised Romulus and Remus.
So Lupercalia was a fertility and purification rite. It wasn't about romantic love, cards or sweethearts in the modern sense.
So did Valentine's Day replace Lupercalia?
This is where you have to be careful. The American Antiquarian Society's "Origins" page suggests that Valentinus's death fell at the time of Lupercalia and that the two probably became linked. That idea is widely repeated. But it's a theory, not a documented fact. Notice what's missing: no ancient or early medieval text in our sources says the church replaced Lupercalia with Saint Valentine's Day, and the earliest documents that tie February 14 to romantic love are 14th-century poems, from many centuries after Plutarch's day.
Why the Lupercalia story is so sticky
It's easy to see why the theory spreads. Both events happen in February. Both involve Rome. And the idea of a church quietly swapping a pagan party for a saint's day makes a satisfying story. But a shared month isn't proof of a shared origin. When you read a confident claim that Valentine's Day "is" Lupercalia, look for the source. Usually there isn't one older than a modern retelling.
The Catholic Encyclopedia offers a different explanation for the romance, which we'll look at next: a medieval belief about birds.
Chaucer and the birds: where the romance began
The Catholic Encyclopedia says Valentine's Day customs grew out of a belief, common in medieval England and France, that birds began to pair off around the middle of February. Because of this, the day became connected with lovers, who sent each other letters and tokens, and the people chosen were called each other's "Valentines." It names Chaucer, John Gower and the Paston family letters as early examples.
Chaucer's poem The Parlement of Foules (The Parliament of Birds) is the most famous. In it, the narrator dreams of a gathering of birds before the goddess Nature, who have come to choose their mates. Lines 309 and 310, as printed in Walter Skeat's edition, Chaucer's Works, Volume 1, on Project Gutenberg, read:
For this was on seynt Valentynes day,
Whan every foul cometh ther to chese his make,
In modern English: "For this was on Saint Valentine's Day, when every bird comes there to choose his mate." A "make" in Middle English is a mate or partner.
When was it written? Skeat's life of Chaucer in the same volume says Chaucer wrote The Parlement of Foules while living in his house over Aldgate in London, which he gave up in October 1386. The poem's closing Latin line, also printed there, describes it as the parliament of birds held on the day of Saint Valentine.
Why this matters
Chaucer didn't invent the idea out of nowhere. He seems to be drawing on a belief his readers already knew. But his poem is one of the clearest early places where Saint Valentine's Day and choosing a mate appear together in writing, and it's a big reason the romantic version of the day took hold.
Chaucer even wrote another short poem, "An Amorous Compleint," in which the speaker makes his complaint "on seint Valentynes day," echoing the same idea that every bird chooses its mate. The theme clearly appealed to him.
The first valentine letters in English
About a century after Chaucer, we get something wonderful: real people calling each other "Valentine" in their letters. The Paston family of Norfolk, in eastern England, left behind a large collection of family letters from the 1400s, now printed in six volumes, and in February 1477 it captures a courtship in progress.
John Paston was hoping to marry Margery Brews. In letter No. 896 in The Paston Letters, Volume 5, on Project Gutenberg, Margery's mother, Dame Elizabeth Brews, writes to John that "uppon Fryday is Sent Volentynes Day, and every brydde chesyth hym a make." That's the same bird belief Chaucer used, now in a family letter. The editor notes that St. Valentine's Day fell on a Friday that year, which is how the letter can be dated to 1477.
Then, in letter No. 897, Margery herself writes to John. The address on the outside reads "Unto my ryght welebelovyd Voluntyn, John Paston, Squyer," and the letter opens: "Ryght reverent and wurschypfull, and my ryght welebeloved Voluntyne."
That's a young woman in 1477 calling her sweetheart her valentine. It's one of the oldest surviving examples of the word used that way in an English letter, and you can feel the nervous warmth in it more than five centuries later. If you enjoy reading old letters like this, we're also publishing a separate guide to famous love letters in history.
"Make," "Voluntyne" and other old words
| As written | Modern English | Where it appears |
|---|---|---|
| seynt Valentynes day | Saint Valentine's Day | Chaucer, Parlement of Foules, line 309 |
| foul | bird (from "fowl") | Chaucer, line 310 |
| chese his make | choose his mate | Chaucer, line 310 |
| brydde chesyth hym a make | bird chooses itself a mate | Elizabeth Brews, Paston letter No. 896 |
| Voluntyne | Valentine | Margery Brews, Paston letter No. 897 |
| welebeloved | well-beloved | Margery Brews, Paston letter No. 897 |
Shakespeare's Valentine and the "first person you see" custom
By Shakespeare's time, Valentine's Day customs were familiar enough to drop into a play without explanation. In Hamlet, Act 4, Scene 5, Ophelia sings a song that begins "To-morrow is Saint Valentine's day." In the song, a young woman goes to a man's window early on Valentine's morning to be his valentine. You can find the song in the Folger Shakespeare Library's text of Hamlet, Act 4, Scene 5.
The song reflects a custom the American Antiquarian Society also mentions: in England in the 1500s and 1600s, a superstition grew up that the first person you met on Valentine's Day, or meeting your true love that day, had special meaning. The day was also becoming a time for gift giving.
In Hamlet, the song comes at a sad point in the play, so it's not exactly a cheerful card verse. But it's clear evidence that Shakespeare's audiences knew what it meant to be someone's valentine.
Valentine writers, lace paper and comic cards
For a long time, valentines were made by hand. The American Antiquarian Society's page on early valentines describes how personal and creative they were before mass production took over in the United States.
Help with the words: valentine writers
Not everyone felt like a poet. So publishers sold "valentine writers," small booklets of ready-made verses you could copy into your own card. The AAS page notes that many verses were tailored to particular trades. A fishmonger's verse says "Thou art a dish of dainty fish," and a mason's complains that his beloved's heart is "harder than stone." The example the society shows was written under the joke name "Peter Quizumall, Esq." in May 1823.
Some verses were acrostics: poems where the first letter of each line spells out the recipient's name. It's a charming idea that still works today.
Imported and printed valentines
The most fashionable valentines in America were imported from England, with a satin or painted center and an embossed lace-paper border. Some had a tiny envelope holding a locket, a lock of hair or a private note.
According to the AAS, lithographed valentines appeared in the United States between 1840 and 1850. (Lithography is a printing method that made it cheaper to reproduce pictures.) One hand-colored example by Turner and Fisher of Philadelphia and New York is dated February 14, 1840. Some people found the new fashion excessive: in February 1849, the magazine Godey's Lady's Book criticized costly imported valentines and suggested a magazine subscription as a more sensible gift.
The not-so-sweet side: comic valentines
Not every valentine was kind. The AAS notes that by 1840, comic valentines were being produced commercially on a large scale. They were often cruel and usually sent anonymously, and most were printed from wood blocks. They're a reminder that the day has always had a teasing side as well as a tender one.
Valentines in wartime
Valentines also traveled with soldiers. The AAS describes many valentines published during the Civil War, including a hand-painted card dated 1863 that held a chestnut-colored curl of hair and went with a Union soldier.
Esther Howland and the American valentine card
If one person shaped the American valentine, it was Esther Howland. The American Antiquarian Society's page on Esther Howland tells her story.
- She was born in 1828 at 16 Summer Street in Worcester, Massachusetts.
- She graduated from Mount Holyoke in 1847.
- After graduating, she received an English valentine and was fascinated by the idea of making similar ones.
- She imported paper lace and floral decorations from England, because American lace paper wasn't produced until well after the English versions.
- Her first newspaper advertisement ran in Worcester's Daily Spy on February 5, 1850.
- She ran a home-based assembly line that grew into a large and successful business.
- She retired in 1881 and sold the business to the George C. Whitney Company.
Simple math from those dates: Howland's first ad came about three years after her 1847 graduation (1850 minus 1847), and she ran the business for roughly three decades before retiring in 1881 (1881 minus 1850 is 31 years).
The AAS's "Origins" page adds that by the middle of the 19th century, Worcester had become a center of valentine production, and that Howland founded one of the first commercial valentine businesses in America.
George C. Whitney carries it on
The company that bought Howland's business became a giant in its own right. The AAS page on George C. Whitney says the company operated from 1866 to 1942. It began as a wholesale stationery store on Main Street in Worcester, and by 1888 it was one of the largest valentine publishers in the United States, with offices in New York, Boston and Chicago. Whitney installed machinery to emboss paper and make paper lace in-house, so he didn't need to import those materials from England. Collectors can often tell early Whitney cards from Howland's by a small red "W," usually on the back.
Victorian valentines and the age of mass production
By the late 1800s, valentines had become an industry. The AAS page on Victorian valentines describes how quickly styles changed in those last decades of the century.
- Cards became more elaborate, and the delicate simplicity of earlier valentines faded. The society notes that the paper lace "coarsened."
- Brightly colored lithographs grew popular, often showing sweet pictures of children.
- Some cards had cardboard backs so they could stand on a table; others were made to hang on the wall. Mechanical pull-out cards appeared as novelties.
- Many cards were imported from Germany. In the 1870s and 1880s, some American publishers, including Louis Prang of Boston, made greeting cards.
- By the turn of the century, valentines were mass-produced in many countries. Raphael Tuck and Sons of London made one popular style.
- The illustrator Kate Greenaway of London introduced a much-imitated style showing delicately painted children in old-fashioned costume.
From there, it's a fairly short step to the cards you can buy today. The materials changed, but the basic idea, a picture, a verse and a name, has stayed remarkably steady since the 1800s.
Why the valentine card took off in the 1800s
Valentine's Day was romantic for centuries before it became a card-giving holiday. So what changed in the 1800s? Putting together the details from the American Antiquarian Society's exhibition, a few forces worked together.
Printing got cheaper
Lithography let printers reproduce pictures in quantity. Once lithographed valentines appeared in the 1840s, a pretty card no longer had to be painted by hand. That opened the custom up to many more people.
Materials became local
Early on, Americans depended on English imports for the lace paper and embossed blanks that made a fine valentine. Esther Howland herself started by importing them. When George C. Whitney's company began embossing paper and making paper lace in-house, valentine makers no longer had to wait for shipments from abroad.
Someone organized production
Howland's home-based assembly line is a good example of how a craft became a business. Instead of one person making one card, a team could produce many cards in a consistent style. Whitney then scaled that up further, with offices in several major cities by 1888.
The words were ready-made
Valentine writers had already solved the hardest part for many people: what to say. A buyer could choose a printed card and copy in a verse, or pick one with the verse already printed. Whitney, the AAS notes, became skilled at writing verses for his own cards.
Not everyone approved
Change brought pushback. Godey's Lady's Book grumbled in 1849 about expensive imported valentines, and the popularity of cruel comic valentines shows that the new mass market had a rough edge. Still, by the end of the century, sending a card on February 14 had become a fixed part of the calendar.
Reading an antique valentine: a collector's guide
If you ever find an old valentine in a family album, an antique shop or a museum, the details from the American Antiquarian Society's exhibition can help you place it. Here's a simple guide. It won't date a card precisely, but it will point you in the right direction.
| What you see | What it may suggest |
|---|---|
| Hand-cut paper, hand-painted pictures, handwritten verse | A homemade valentine, the norm before mass production |
| Satin or painted center with an embossed lace-paper border | The fashionable imported English style |
| A tiny envelope holding a lock of hair or a note | A personal keepsake valentine, a style the AAS describes among early examples |
| A verse built for a trade, or an acrostic of a name | Possibly copied from a "valentine writer" booklet |
| Lithographed picture with a blank space filled in by hand | Printed valentines of the 1840s or later |
| A small red "W," usually on the back | A George C. Whitney card, from the company's 1866 to 1942 run |
| Coarser lace, bright colors, children, pull-out parts or a stand-up back | Late Victorian mass-produced styles |
| Delicately painted children in old-fashioned costume | The Kate Greenaway style or one of its many imitators |
| A cheaply printed, mocking picture and verse | A comic valentine, made on a large scale by 1840 |
Caring for an old valentine
Old paper lace is fragile. If you have a family valentine, handle it as little as possible, keep it flat and out of direct sunlight, and store it away from damp. A local historical society or museum can often advise on safe storage. And if it has a handwritten name or date, make a note of it somewhere safe, because that small detail is often what makes a card meaningful to the next generation.
Valentine's Day timeline at a glance
| Date | Event | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Ancient Rome | Lupercalia held in February | Plutarch, Life of Romulus 21 |
| Second half of 3rd century | Deaths of Valentine the priest and Valentine the bishop, as far as can be told | Catholic Encyclopedia |
| Before October 1386 | Chaucer writes The Parlement of Foules | Skeat, Chaucer's Works, Vol. 1 |
| February 1477 | Margery Brews writes to her "Voluntyne," John Paston | The Paston Letters, Vol. 5 |
| 1500s to 1600s | Gift giving and "true love" superstitions grow in England | American Antiquarian Society |
| May 1823 | Example "valentine writer" verse booklet published | American Antiquarian Society |
| 1840 to 1850 | Lithographed valentines appear in the US | American Antiquarian Society |
| February 5, 1850 | Esther Howland's first newspaper ad | American Antiquarian Society |
| 1866 | George C. Whitney company begins | American Antiquarian Society |
| 1881 | Howland retires and sells to Whitney | American Antiquarian Society |
| 1888 | Whitney is among the largest US valentine publishers | American Antiquarian Society |
| 1942 | Whitney company closes | American Antiquarian Society |
Valentine's Day myths and facts
Here's a quick way to sort the popular stories from the documented history.
| Claim | Verdict | What the sources say |
|---|---|---|
| There was one Saint Valentine. | Not quite | At least three martyrs named Valentine are listed under February 14. |
| Valentine secretly married soldiers. | Legend | Not in the early record; the surviving saints' lives are late and unreliable. |
| He signed a note "From Your Valentine." | Legend | A popular story, retold by the AAS, but not documented at the time. |
| Valentine's Day replaced Lupercalia. | Unproven theory | Lupercalia was a February fertility rite; no early source links it to the saint's day. |
| Chaucer linked the day to love. | Documented | His Parlement of Foules sets birds choosing mates on Saint Valentine's Day. |
| People wrote valentines in the Middle Ages. | Documented | Margery Brews's 1477 letter to her "Voluntyne." |
| Valentine cards are a 20th-century invention. | False | Handmade and printed valentines go back well into the 1800s and earlier. |
Try it yourself: a valentine the old-fashioned way
You can borrow centuries of tradition for your own card this year. Here are three classic methods, with illustrative examples.
1. Write an acrostic
Pick your partner's name or pet name and write one line for each letter. Here's an illustrative one for the name "ANNA":
- Always the first face I look for in a crowd,
- Never too busy to make me laugh,
- Night or morning, you're my favorite company,
- And every year I'd choose you again.
2. Borrow the "valentine writer" trade trick
Old valentine writers had verses for fishmongers and masons. Make one for your partner's job or hobby. For a baker (illustrative): "You knead no reason to rise to the occasion; you've always been the best thing since sliced bread." Silly is fine. Silly is traditional.
3. Use the old words
Open your card the way Margery Brews did: "To my right well-beloved Valentine." Or quote Chaucer: "For this was on Saint Valentine's Day, when every bird comes to choose its mate." A line that's been used for more than six hundred years carries a bit of extra weight.
4. Make a keepsake card in the Victorian style
You don't need antique lace to echo an old valentine. Here's a simple version anyone can make at a kitchen table.
- Fold a sheet of heavy paper or card stock in half.
- Glue a paper doily, or a border you've cut with small scissors, around the front edge to stand in for the embossed lace border.
- Add a center picture: a pressed flower, a small drawing or a printed photo of the two of you.
- Inside, write your verse by hand, the way 1840s buyers filled in the blank space on printed cards.
- Tuck in a tiny envelope with a private note, a nod to the keepsake valentines that held lockets and notes.
- Sign it with your pet name, and add the date so it can be treasured later.
A homemade card like this connects you to nearly two centuries of valentine makers, and it will almost certainly be kept longer than anything bought in a store.
For more modern ideas, from easy dates to small gestures, see our best Valentine's Day ideas. If you want the card to include a sweet name, our list of vintage terms of endearment has old-fashioned options that suit a handmade valentine, and our overview of terms of endearment covers today's favorites.
A quick note on new relationships
If you've only just started seeing someone, a simple card often lands better than a grand gesture. A friendly note and a light pet name can be perfect. Our guide on when to start using pet names can help you judge the tone, and our ideas for making your partner feel special work any day of the year.
What the history of Valentine's Day tells us
Strip away the legends and the history of Valentine's Day is still a great story. It starts with obscure martyrs about whom almost nothing is known. It becomes romantic through medieval poets who imagined birds choosing their mates on the saint's day. Real couples like Margery Brews and John Paston pick up the custom in their letters. Shakespeare's audiences know it well. And in the 1800s, printers, importers and entrepreneurs like Esther Howland turn it into the card-giving holiday we know.
The common thread is choosing someone, and telling them so. Whether you write in Middle English or in a text message, that's the heart of it.
If you'd like a fresh pet name for your valentine this year, try the free nickname generator on our homepage. You pick who it's for (boyfriend, girlfriend, husband, wife, fiancé or fiancée, crush or partner) and a vibe such as cute and sweet, romantic, funny, flirty, unique or classic. Each suggestion comes with a short note on why it works, and you can save favorites to a shortlist or blend your names with the Couple Name Mixer.
Valentine Card Makers Compared
This table lines up the card makers and designers mentioned in the article, so you can see who was known for what.
| Maker | Known for | Detail from the article |
|---|---|---|
| Esther Howland | Turning the valentine card into an American business | Imported paper lace from England and ran a home-based assembly line; her first newspaper ad ran February 5, 1850 |
| George C. Whitney Company | Carrying on Howland's business | Bought her business when she retired in 1881; its cards often have a small red "W" on the back |
| Louis Prang | Making greeting cards in Boston | One of the American publishers who made cards in the 1870s and 1880s |
| Raphael Tuck and Sons | A popular style of mass-produced valentine | Based in London |
| Kate Greenaway | A much-imitated illustration style | Delicately painted children in old-fashioned costume |
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the real history of Valentine's Day?
Valentine's Day began as a church feast for early Christian martyrs named Valentine, remembered on February 14, about whom very little is reliably known. Its romantic meaning came much later. In the 1300s, Chaucer wrote of birds choosing their mates on Saint Valentine's Day, reflecting a medieval belief that birds paired off in mid-February. By 1477, English letter writers were calling their sweethearts their Valentine. Handmade and printed valentine cards followed, and in the 1800s the card-giving custom became a major tradition in America.
Who was the real Saint Valentine?
There were at least three martyrs named Valentine listed under February 14 in early church calendars, according to the Catholic Encyclopedia: a priest at Rome, a bishop of Interamna (modern Terni) and a third Valentine who died in Africa. The priest and the bishop seem to have died in the second half of the third century and were buried along the Flaminian Way. The encyclopedia says the surviving accounts of their lives were written late and have no historical value, so the details are uncertain.
Did Valentine's Day come from Lupercalia?
That's a popular theory, but it isn't proven. Lupercalia was a Roman festival in February that Plutarch describes as a fertility and purification rite, with goat sacrifices and young men running through the streets striking people with strips of goatskin. It had nothing to do with exchanging love notes. No early source in our research says the church replaced Lupercalia with Saint Valentine's Day. The earliest documents linking February 14 to romantic love are 14th-century poems.
When did Valentine's Day become romantic?
The clearest early evidence comes from the 1300s. In The Parlement of Foules, written before 1386, Chaucer sets a gathering of birds choosing their mates on Saint Valentine's Day. The Catholic Encyclopedia explains this through a medieval belief in England and France that birds began to pair around mid-February. By February 1477, Margery Brews was addressing John Paston as her right well-beloved Valentine in a letter, showing that people were using the word for sweethearts.
What is the oldest valentine letter?
One of the oldest surviving valentine letters in English was written in February 1477 by Margery Brews to John Paston, whom she hoped to marry. It's preserved in the Paston family letters. She addresses him as her right well-beloved Valentine, spelled Voluntyne in her English. Her mother, Dame Elizabeth Brews, also wrote to John that Friday was Saint Valentine's Day, when every bird chooses a mate, and the editor uses that Friday to date the letters to 1477.
Who was Esther Howland?
Esther Howland was a Worcester, Massachusetts, businesswoman who helped popularize valentine cards in America. According to the American Antiquarian Society, she was born in 1828, graduated from Mount Holyoke in 1847 and became fascinated with making valentines after receiving one from England. She imported paper lace and decorations, placed her first newspaper ad on February 5, 1850, and built a home-based assembly line into a large business. She retired in 1881 and sold her company to the George C. Whitney Company.
When were the first valentine cards sold in America?
Imported English valentines were the height of fashion in early America, and people also made their own by hand. The American Antiquarian Society says lithographed valentines appeared in the United States between 1840 and 1850, with a dated example from February 14, 1840. Esther Howland's commercial business in Worcester followed, with her first ad in 1850. By 1888, the George C. Whitney Company was one of the largest valentine publishers in the country, with offices in several cities.
What were vinegar or comic valentines?
Comic valentines were the teasing, sometimes mean-spirited side of the holiday. The American Antiquarian Society notes that by 1840 they were being produced commercially on a large scale, were often cruel and were usually sent anonymously. Most were cheaply printed from wood blocks. Instead of declaring love, they mocked the recipient's looks, habits or job. Collectors today often call them vinegar valentines because of their sour tone, though the term itself isn't used on the society's page.
Why do we say Be my Valentine?
The phrase grows out of the old custom of choosing a valentine, a sweetheart for the day or the year. The Catholic Encyclopedia says that, because of the medieval belief that birds chose mates in mid-February, lovers sent each other letters and tokens and called the people they chose their Valentines. Shakespeare's Ophelia sings about going to a window on Valentine's morning to be someone's valentine. Asking someone to be your valentine continues that very old tradition of choosing.
Sources
We checked every source below while writing this guide. Last reviewed October 30, 2026, by Joan Ramos.
- St. Valentine (Catholic Encyclopedia) (New Advent)
- Making Valentines: Origins (American Antiquarian Society)
- Plutarch, Life of Romulus (Loeb Classical Library, 1914) (LacusCurtius, University of Chicago)
- Chaucer's Works, Volume 1: Romaunt of the Rose; Minor Poems (ed. Walter W. Skeat) (Project Gutenberg)
- The Paston Letters, Volume 5 (Project Gutenberg)
- Hamlet, Act 4, Scene 5 (Folger Shakespeare Library)
- Making Valentines: Early Valentines (American Antiquarian Society)
- Making Valentines: Esther Howland (American Antiquarian Society)
- Making Valentines: George Whitney (American Antiquarian Society)
- Making Valentines: Victorian Valentines (American Antiquarian Society)
