Most of the Roman holidays have been recast as Christian. For instance, December twenty fifth, Christmas was the feast day of the Roman solar god Sol. Like Labor Day, such holidays regularly evolve, and folks initially overlook what they have been all about. Thus, the Romans have been celebrating Sol, however actually it had grow to be only a vacation, in order that they renamed it Christmas.
Pope Gelasius I (492-496) changed the Roman celebration of Lupercalia with St. Valentine’s Day. Valentine’s Day seems to have been merely an alternative to a cruder Roman Lupercalia vacation on the time known as Lupercalia, selling well being and fertility, which might, at instances, maybe grow to be extra sexual. There have been no presents or goodies being handed out. As for the guts, that appears to have advanced from a seed of a plant used for contraception.
The principle product of Cyrene and town of Barce right now was the silphium plant. This was the primary supply of prosperity have been agriculture and animal husbandry. Horses may graze within the much less fertile areas, the place the silphium plant grew wild. Silphium juice’s worth for being pregnant prevention introduced nice wealth to this area. The historian Pliny tells us that it was a veritable cure-all; it’s stated to have had lots of of medicinal and beauty makes use of. It was used to deal with all the pieces from chills to fevers. Hippocrates tells us that it could possibly be used as a poultice or to appease the abdomen. Cooks additionally used the plant of their recipes.
Nonetheless, this plant was used as a sort of contraception. Certainly, medical proof from classical antiquity informs us that it was the drug of alternative for contraception. The Greek doctor Soranus of Ephesus urged taking a dose of silphium “the scale of a chick-pea” as soon as a month, each to stop conception and “destroy any already current.” The traditional abortion drugs.
It’s also believed that the seed of this plant is the place we get the picture of affection and the guts.
It was so extensively used that it’s now extinct.
The final surviving plant was stated to have been given to Emperor Nero.
