Why is Venus spanking Cupid?
Did you know that long before the modern world chose Valentine’s Day as its designated day of love, there was an ancient Roman festival called Lupercalia?
Did you know that it began on the Ides (the 13th) and climaxed on the 15th of February, and consisted of purification and fertility rites that held such significance in the Roman calendar that the month of Februarius was named after them?
You might already know January is named after Janus – the Roman god of doorways (the Latin word for door is ianua), which is fitting given January is the entrance to the year. March is also named after a god: Mars, the Roman god of war, as the beginning of Spring marked the start of the military campaigning season. But what about February?
It may surprise you to learn that February was named after the Roman purification ritual of Februa, an ancient rite which was later subsumed by the purging and fertility festival of Lupercalia.
The 1st century historian Plutarch described Lupercalia like this:
“At this time many of the noble youths and of the magistrates run up and down through the city naked, for sport and laughter striking those they meet with shaggy thongs. And many women of rank also purposely get in their way, and like children at school present their hands to be struck, believing that the pregnant will thus be helped in delivery, and the barren to pregnancy.”
These thongs, leather whips cut from sacrificed goats, were also called Februa. Look at the central figure in this mosaic depicting the Roman month of Februarius, and you can’t miss the whip.
In other words, the roots of February’s name are in an ancient naked whipping festival. Isn’t it funny how countless millions around the world will write the word February this month, and never wonder about its origins. The kinky secret hidden by the ancients in plain sight.
Although Lupercalia was a fertility rite, scholars believe its proximity to the contemporary St Valentine’s Day is purely coincidental. And that is why Venus is spanking Cupid in a 17th century woodcut. It depicts the echoes of half-remembered rituals still reverberating, a millennium and a half later.
So if you have someone special in your life, you are blessed. Tell them how much you love them, then show just how much, by baring their bottom and spanking them pink. Send them this post and be waiting ready for a good spanking when they get home.
You’ll be reviving a tradition that goes back over 2000 years. That spanking is love. That a warm bottom inspires a contented heart. Such is the wisdom of the ancients.
And should you need any further inspiration, lend me your imagination, and I’ll whisper you a story…
