Post by Kendra_Corvinus on Jan 1, 2006 20:10:19 GMT 1
During the 18th century there was a major vampire scare in Eastern Europe. Even government officials frequently got dragged into the hunting and staking of vampires.
The word vampire only came into the English language in 1732 via an English translation of a German report of the much-publicized Arnold Paole vampire staking in Serbia.
It all started with an outbreak of alleged vampire attacks in East Prussia in 1721 and in the Austro-Hungarian Empire from 1725 to 1734. Two famous cases involved Peter Plogojowitz and Arnold Paole. As the story goes, Plogojowitz died at the age of 62, but came back a couple of times after his death asking his son for food. When the son refused, he was found dead the next day. Soon Plogojowitz returned and attacked some neighbours who died from loss of blood.
In the other famous case, Arnold Paole, an ex-soldier turned farmer who had allegedly been attacked by a vampire years before, died while haying. After his death, people began to die, and it was believed by everyone that Paole had returned to prey on the neighbours.
These two incidents were extremely well documented. Government officials examined the cases and the bodies, wrote them up in reports, and books were published afterwards of the Paole case and distributed around Europe. The controversy raged for a generation. The problem was exacerbated by rural epidemics of so-claimed vampire attacks, with locals digging up bodies. Many scholars said vampires did not exist, and attributed reports to premature burial, or rabies. Nonetheless, Dom Augustine Calmet, a well-respected French theologian and scholar, put together a carefully thought out treatise in 1746 in which he claimed vampires did exist. This had considerable influence on other scholars at the time.
Eventually, Empress Maria Theresa of Austria sent her personal physician to investigate. He concluded that vampires do not exist, and the Empress passed laws prohibiting the opening of graves and desecration of bodies. This was the end of the vampire epidemics. By then, though, many knew about vampires, and soon authors would adopt and adapt the concept of vampire, making it known to the general public.
Contemporary belief in vampires
Belief in vampires still persists across the globe.
During late 2002 and early 2003, hysteria about alleged attacks of vampires swept through the African country of Malawi. Mobs stoned one individual to death and attacked at least four others, including Governor Eric Chiwaya, due to a belief that the government was colluding with vampires.[1]
In Romania, several relatives of Toma Petre dug up his body, tore out his heart, burned the organ and drank its ashes in water in February of 2004, thinking that he had become a vampire.[2]
In January 2005, it was reported that an attacker had bitten a number of people in Birmingham, England, fueling concerns about a vampire roaming the streets. However, local police stated that no such crimes had been reported to them, and this case appears to be an urban legend.[3]
In the modern folklore of Latin America, the chupacabra (goat-sucker) is said to be a creature that feeds upon the flesh or drinks the blood of domesticated animals, leading some to consider it vampiric.
The word vampire only came into the English language in 1732 via an English translation of a German report of the much-publicized Arnold Paole vampire staking in Serbia.
It all started with an outbreak of alleged vampire attacks in East Prussia in 1721 and in the Austro-Hungarian Empire from 1725 to 1734. Two famous cases involved Peter Plogojowitz and Arnold Paole. As the story goes, Plogojowitz died at the age of 62, but came back a couple of times after his death asking his son for food. When the son refused, he was found dead the next day. Soon Plogojowitz returned and attacked some neighbours who died from loss of blood.
In the other famous case, Arnold Paole, an ex-soldier turned farmer who had allegedly been attacked by a vampire years before, died while haying. After his death, people began to die, and it was believed by everyone that Paole had returned to prey on the neighbours.
These two incidents were extremely well documented. Government officials examined the cases and the bodies, wrote them up in reports, and books were published afterwards of the Paole case and distributed around Europe. The controversy raged for a generation. The problem was exacerbated by rural epidemics of so-claimed vampire attacks, with locals digging up bodies. Many scholars said vampires did not exist, and attributed reports to premature burial, or rabies. Nonetheless, Dom Augustine Calmet, a well-respected French theologian and scholar, put together a carefully thought out treatise in 1746 in which he claimed vampires did exist. This had considerable influence on other scholars at the time.
Eventually, Empress Maria Theresa of Austria sent her personal physician to investigate. He concluded that vampires do not exist, and the Empress passed laws prohibiting the opening of graves and desecration of bodies. This was the end of the vampire epidemics. By then, though, many knew about vampires, and soon authors would adopt and adapt the concept of vampire, making it known to the general public.
Contemporary belief in vampires
Belief in vampires still persists across the globe.
During late 2002 and early 2003, hysteria about alleged attacks of vampires swept through the African country of Malawi. Mobs stoned one individual to death and attacked at least four others, including Governor Eric Chiwaya, due to a belief that the government was colluding with vampires.[1]
In Romania, several relatives of Toma Petre dug up his body, tore out his heart, burned the organ and drank its ashes in water in February of 2004, thinking that he had become a vampire.[2]
In January 2005, it was reported that an attacker had bitten a number of people in Birmingham, England, fueling concerns about a vampire roaming the streets. However, local police stated that no such crimes had been reported to them, and this case appears to be an urban legend.[3]
In the modern folklore of Latin America, the chupacabra (goat-sucker) is said to be a creature that feeds upon the flesh or drinks the blood of domesticated animals, leading some to consider it vampiric.
