February
14
/ 2024
Jolene Zigarovich /The Conversation Every Valentine’s Day, we’re inundated with hearts. We purchase cards with hearts and heart-shaped balloons. We wear clothing with hearts and adorn ourselves with heart-shaped jewelry. We ingest heart-shaped foods and candies and send heart emojis in texts. While we may fall victim to Valentine’s Day commodification and heart-logo mania, there was a time in our not too distant past when actual human hearts were cherished, preserved, worn or placed in special urns and enshrined. My research into 18th century preservation practices led me to a favorite book that details these heart histories of the famous and infamous: historian Charles Bradford’s quirky tome, Heart Burial (1933). Amazingly sweeping and entertaining, the book narrates the heart journeys
