Friday, October 24, 2014

Real Dracula: Vlad the Impaler

Vlad III, Prince of Wallachia , was a member of the House of Dracule?ti, a branch of the House of Basarab, also known, using his patronymic, as (Vlad) Draculea or (Vlad) Dracula. He was posthumously dubbed Vlad the Impaler , and was a three-time Voivode of Wallachia, ruling mainly from 1456 to 1462, the period of the incipient Ottoman conquest of the Balkans. His father, Vlad II Dracul, was a member of the Order of the Dragon, which was founded to protect Christianity in Eastern Europe. Vlad III is revered as a folk hero in Romania as well as other parts of Europe for his protection of the Romanian population both south and north of the Danube. A significant number of Romanian and Bulgarian common folk and remaining boyars (nobles) moved north of the Danube to Wallachia, recognized his leadership and settled there following his raids on the Ottomans.

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As the cognomen 'The Impaler' suggests, his practice of impaling his enemies is part of his historical reputation. During his lifetime, his reputation for excessive cruelty spread abroad, to Germany and elsewhere in Europe.

 

His the sucks Blood out of the Host?

Nope but he still drank it in a different way: by dipping chunks of bread into buckets of blood drained from the people he killed.The 15th century manuscript The Story of a Bloodthirsty Madman Called Dracula of Wallachia, by Michel Beheim, describes how Vlad III would invite a few guests to his mansion, provide them with a feast, and then have them immediately impaled right there at the dinner table. With the bodies still draped over the stakes, he would leisurely finish his own dinner and then dip his bread into the blood collecting below the bodies

 

Why was he called the Impaler?

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It’s easy to think of Dracula as a solitary madman, just running around killing people, but that’s not how it was. The man just so happened to be the Prince of Wallachia, and many of his “murders” were his own twisted form of law and order. The thing is, impalement was pretty much the only punishment—whether you stole a loaf of bread or committed murder.Of course, there were exceptions. One account describes a gypsy who stole something while travelling through Dracula’s lands. The Prince had the man boiled, and then forced the other gypsies to eat him. 

 

How many people this Dracula Kill in his life time?

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Historians put the deaths at the hands of Dracula at somewhere between 40,000 and 100,000. The man breathed death and then (literally) ate it for dinner. When the Turkish army got to Targoviste, they found the infamous “Forest of the Impaled”—20,000 Turkish bodies displayed on stakes. 

 

How did he die?

Dracula died on the battlefield fighting against an invasion of Turks.Dracula was buried at the isolated Snagov Monastery near Bucharest, which was also likely used as a prison and torture chamber. When prisoners prayed before an icon of the Blessed Virgin, a trap door opened dropping them onto sharp stakes below.

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In 1931 archaeologists searching Snagov found a casket partially covered in a purple shroud embroidered with gold. The skeleton inside was covered with pieces of faded silk brocade, similar to a shirt depicted in an old painting of Dracula.The casket also contained a cloisonné crown, with turquoise stones. A ring, similar to those worn by the Order of the Dragon, was sewn into a shirtsleeve.The contents were taken to the History Museum in Bucharest but have since disappeared without a trace, leaving the mysteries of the real Prince Dracula unanswered

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