Valentine’s Day
14 February is St. Valentine’s Day. This started more than two thousand years ago, as a winter festival, on 15 February. On that day, people asked their gods to give them good fruit and vegetables, and strong animals.
When the Christians came to Britain, they came with a story about a man called Saint Valentine. The story is that Valentine was a Christian who lived in Rome in the third century. The Roman Emperor at the time, Claudius the Second, was not a Christian. Claudius thought that married soldiers did not make good soldiers, so he told his soldiers that they must not marry.
Valentine worked for the church, and one day he helped a soldier who wanted to marry. The emperor said that Valentine had to die because of this, and he sent Valentine to prison. But Valentine fell in love with the daughter of a man who worked there. Just before he died, he sent a note to this woman, and at the end of the note, he wrote: ‘Your Valentine.’ He died on 14 february, so the date of the festival changed from 15 to 14 February and the name changed to Saint Valentine’s Day.
In the early nineteenth century people started to give Valentine’s cards to the person they loved on 14 February.
1. Match the beginnings and endings of the sentences
1. Valentine’s Day started more than…
2. Saint Valentine was a Christian who…
3. Valentine was sent to prison because…
4. When Valentine was in prison, he…
5. People started sending Valentine’s cards…
a) he helped a soldier to marry.
b) in the early nineteenth century.
c) two thousand years ago.
d) lived in Rome.
e) fell in love.
