There’s a skull in Rome that is ostensibly St. Valentine’s and is festooned with flowers and a big label and I’m just saying it would be a great thing to draw for a Valentine’s Day card pic.twitter.com/bJ3p5e6kVZ
— jd vance's "holler aunt" (@markpopham) February 13, 2021
A SKULL RESIDES IN A glass reliquary in Rome’s Basilica di Santa Maria in Cosmedin, surrounded by flowers. Lettering painted across the forehead identify the owner as none other than of the patron saint of lovers, St. Valentine.
Knowing just exactly whose skull it is, though, is complicated. There was more than one Catholic saint known as Saint Valentine, and there was approximately 1500 years between those martyrs’ deaths and the enthusiastic distribution and labeling of bodies in the Victorian era. Finally, and most troubling, there is the fact that no less than 10 places around the world claim to house the saint’s relics.
(It's near the Mouth of Truth.)