[val-uh
n-tahyn] 
| 1. | a card or message, usually amatory or sentimental but sometimes satirical or comical, or a token or gift sent by one person to another on Valentine Day, sometimes anonymously. |
| 2. | a sweetheart chosen or greeted on this day. |
| 3. | a written or other artistic work, message, token, etc., expressing affection for something or someone: His photographic essay is a valentine to Paris. |
[val-uhn-tahyn] | 1. | Saint, died a.d. c270, Christian martyr at Rome. |
| 2. | Also, Valentinus. pope a.d. 827. |
| 3. | a male given name: from a Latin word meaning “strong.” |
| val·en·tine (vāl'ən-tīn') n.
[After Saint Valentine.] Word History: Lovers and the greeting card industry may have Geoffrey Chaucer to thank for the holiday that warms the coldest month. Although reference books abound with mentions of Roman festivals from which Valentine's Day may derive, Jack B. Oruch has shown that no evidence supports these connections and that Chaucer was probably the first to link the saint's day with the custom of choosing sweethearts. No such link has been found before the writings of Chaucer and several literary contemporaries who also mention it, but after them the association becomes widespread. It seems likely that Chaucer, the most imaginative of the group, invented it. The fullest and perhaps earliest description of the Valentine's Day tradition occurs in Chaucer's Parlement of Foules, composed around 1380, which takes place "on Seynt Valentynes day,/Whan every foul cometh there to chese [choose] his make [mate]." |
| Val·en·tine (vāl'ən-tīn') Roman Christian who according to tradition was martyred during the persecution of Christians by Emperor Claudius II. Saint Valentine's Day was primarily celebrated in his honor, but was also inspired by another martyr named Valentine, who was bishop of Terni, a region in central Italy. |
"For this was on seynt Volantynys dayProbably the date was the informal first day of spring in whatever Fr. region invented the custom (many surviving medieval calendars reckon the start of spring on the 7th or 22nd of February). No evidence connects it with the Roman Lupercalia (an 18c. theory) or to any romantic or avian quality in either of the saints. The custom of sending special cards or letters on this date flourished in England c.1840-1870, declined around the turn of the 20th century, and revived 1920s.
Whan euery bryd cometh there to chese his make."
[Chaucer, "Parlement of Foules," c.1381]
