Valentine's Day

Saint Valentine's Day is not a public holiday in any country, although it is an official feast day in the Anglican Communion and the Lutheran Church. Many parts of the Eastern Orthodox Church also celebrate Saint Valentine's Day on July 6 in honor of Roman presbyter Saint Valentine, and on July 30 in honor of Hieromartyr Valentine, the Bishop of Interamna (modern Terni).

The oldest record of a valentine being sent was a poem written by a French medieval duke named Charles to his wife in 1415. Charles penned this sweet note to his lover while he was imprisoned in the Tower of London at just 21 years old.

Not until the 1840s did we get the first mass-produced valentines. People started exchanging cards and handwritten letters to both lovers and friends during the 17th century, but it was in the 1840s that the first Valentine's Day cards were mass-produced in the U.S., sold by Esther A. Howland.

Unusual Valentine's Day traditions from around the world

• Poetry games in Norway

The Norwegians celebrate Valentine’s Day in a very similar way to Americans, but with a fun little twist. In Norway, the men anonymously send rhyming love poems called “gækkebrev” to women, with only a clue as to who sent it. They sign the poem with a dot for each letter of their name. If a woman figures out who sent the poem, then that man owes her an Easter Egg on Easter. If the woman doesn’t figure out who sent poem, he reveals himself, and she owes him and Easter Egg.

• Just friends in Estonia

It's what every admirer dreads hearing, especially on Valentine's Day. Let's be friends. But in Estonia Valentine's Day is called Sōbrapäev, or ‘Friends Day.’

People exchange cards and gifts among friends with a cheery ‘Happy Friends Day.’

• Love spoons in Wales

The Welsh do Valentine’s Day a bit earlier, on 25th January. And they do it a bit differently – by giving love-spoons.

The spoons are an age-old tradition where Welsh men would carefully carve spoons and present them to the woman they were interested in.

The designs they carved were symbolic and often had hidden clues. For example, the number of beads attached represented the number of children the man was expecting his beloved to produce.