With the last Twilight movie coming out next week, I wasn’t surprised that I was asked about the history of vampires. Personally, I love vampires. I watch The Vampire Diaries<\/i>, True Blood<\/i> and have seen tons of vampire movies. Some of my science fiction writing includes vampires and my e-reader is full of vampire novels and short stories by Anne Rice, Laurel Hamiliton and Charlaine Harris. But I know very little about where the legend actually started and I was more than happy to investigate.<\/p>\n
You may or may not be surprised that vampires date back 4,000 years. Most civilized cultures have had some form of a vampire myth. One of the earliest know legends comes from the Mesopotamians. A demon known as Lamastu was believed to come in the night, stealing or killing newborn babies and taking the unborn from the womb. It is believed that this creature helped the Mesopotamian people explain things like sudden infant death syndrome and miscarriages. Lamastu was also blamed for disease, sterility and nightmares in young men from whom she fed.<\/p>\n
If you look to ancient Jewish writings, you will find a similar creature known as Lilith. According to legend, Eve was not the first woman created, Lilith was. When she refused to obey Adam, she left Eden. Angels tried to convince her to return to Eden but she refused and as punishment for each day Lilith was away from Eden they would kill a hundred of her children. In retaliation, she took to destroying human children (if you watch True Blood this might be familiar to you…)<\/p>\n
It is believed the above two figures may be related (either Lilith inspired by Lamastu or both were derived from some other source) because they are depicted in a similar way; a demon with wings with sharp talons. Also, both creatures came in the night, killed children and seduced men.<\/p>\n
The Greeks had their own version of a vampire demon. Again the figure was a woman but she had the body of a snake. Known as Lamia, she had an affair with Zeus. His wife, Hera was furious and cursed her with insanity forcing her to kill and eat all of her children. Appalled by what she did and enraged by Hera’s actions, she turned to killing others children, sucking their blood from their bodies. There was also the empusai, daughters of Hecate (goddess of witchcraft) were who would kill and eat those shepherds they seduced at night.<\/p>\n
If you headed over to Asian, you would have been faced several vampire legends. One of rakshasa, a gargoyle-like shape-shifter that’s victim of choice was children and the vetala that would possess dead bodies and terrorize the living.<\/p>\n
Much later in Eastern Europe (around the 17th-18th century) the vampire hysteria began. People started making claims that they saw dead relatives walking the earth and people crawling out of their graves. In response, people began to exhume bodies of suspected vampires, burn them, stake them through the heart with a wood stake or decapitate them. They took to burying bodies upside down to confuse the vampire when they woke so they’d be unable to dig themselves out of their grave. Sometimes wooden stakes were placed right above the heart attached to the top of the coffin so when the vampire woke they would accidentally stake themselves. <\/p>\n
In addition to going after corpses, the townspeople used things like garlic and holy relics to protect themselves. For one reason or another, they believed that vampires suffered from compulsive behavior. Therefore, they would sprinkle seeds around their houses that the vampires would have to count before moving forward. Mirrors were another form of protection; people believed that vampires had no soul and therefore did not have a reflection. Another explanation for the use of mirrors is that at the time they were made with a silver backing. Silver is a pure metal that many supernatural beings are unable to come in contact with.<\/p>\n
Specifically in Romania around that time, they believed in two types of vampires. One called strigoi which were human spirits that returned from the dead. Originally such a being was like a ghost but over time, people would see the strigoi the same as they were in life. They sucked blood directly from the heart of live humans, brought disease and generally were menacing to their family. The second type of vampire was called a strigoi mort. These were people who were still alive but believed to be doomed to be a strigoi once dead. Disfigured and unbaptized children were especially suspicious. When these people died, the bodies were destroyed to prevent them from rising from the grave.<\/p>\n
So was there any actual scientific evidence that lead to these beliefs? Well… sort of.<\/p>\n
Anemia may have been a disease that was mistaken for a vampire attack victim. The disease causes the red-cell count to be low and less oxygen is carried through the body. An affected person suffers from a paler than normal complexion, fatigue, fainting spells and trouble eating. It was easy to mistake this condition as the transition period from human to vampire… I c<\/i>an only imagine what happened to these poor people. <\/p>\n
Some experts believe that the disease Porphyria<\/i> may have fuelled the belief in vampires. Porphyria is a genetic disease that causes a deficiency of enzymes used in the process of making heme. Because of this, porphyrins and other chemicals build up in the body. This build up causes a person to have sensitivity to sunlight, tight skin around lips and gums leaving the teeth more exposed than normal, abdominal pain and various nervous system and muscle problems. Today, giving hematin intravenously is a treatment for this disease. It’s possible, though not proven, that people tried drinking the blood of others to treat this illness which lead the the rumors of vampires.<\/p>\n
Rabies<\/i> may have even been a disease confused with vampirism. People have erratic sleep patterns, bloody foaming of the mouth and it can even cause people to want to bite another person… so that makes sense.<\/p>\n
A type of seizure disorder known as catalepsy<\/i> causes the body to be come rigid and have decreased sensitivity to stimuli. When in this state, the person can see and hear but are unable to move. Breathing and heart rate become shallow and to those with little medical technology the person appears dead. Horrifyingly enough, often these people were buried alive and once they came out of the state they would try to dig their way out of their grave. When people witnessed this, they believed that the person had rose from the dead- it never occurred to them that they made a mistake in declaring them dead. <\/p>\n
Even something as simple as the way our bodies decompose may have led people to believe in vampires. Once dead, our bodies start to writhe away that creates the illusion of growing hair and nails. Gas fills the body making the corpse appear well fed. If you tired to stake a corpse with this gas, it may escape through the mouth causing a sound similar to a person’s groan. This would generate positive feedback to someone who is convinced a corpse is a vampire.<\/p>\n
Throughout history, there have been individuals who have been accused of being vampires and some who have displayed vampire-like behavior. Elizabeth Bathroy de Ecsed was accused of bathing in the blood of virgins in order to stay young. She would bring young women to her court and had a very strict code of conduct. The punishments for violating the code consisted of brutal torture in almost every form imaginable. According to her own records, Elizabeth killed 650 young women before she was caught. Those who helped her with the murders were killed but she was allowed to (hooray for status) live out her days locked in her home. She died four years later. I guess the blood baths didn’t work…<\/p>\n
Peter Plogojowitz in 1725 died and in the eight days after his death nine people died. Those nine people claimed on their deathbeds that Peter had straggled them in the night. His body was exhumed and it was determined that he showed signs of vampirism (see the above about decomposition) and his body was burned. A very similar situation occurred following the death of Arnold Paole in 1726. These cases were to blame for the spread of the belief of vampires among educated Europeans at the time.<\/p>\n
The most famous “real-life” vampire is probably Prince Vladislav Basarab who
\nimpaled his enemies on long wooden stakes. He was the inspiration for Bram Stroker’s
\nDracula. Other than his cruel ways and
\nstatus though there was little relation to the Prince; no one was known
\nto accuse him of vampirism. Many authors have expanded on
\nthis idea, putting their own twist on things but the modern vampire as we know today is certainly based on Stroker’s vision.<\/p>\n
The fact is it is our own psyche that invented the vampire. All evidence and accounts reviewed here were people just looking for explanations. Vampires
\nwere scapegoats for the evil in the world and yet another way to deal
\nwith death. There is no scientific evidence that vampires now or have ever walked the Earth. But that certainly hasn’t stopped us from enjoying the tales… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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