Vampires, in science, are actually called a special kind of bats from the family "Desmodontidae" (Desmodontids), found only in the tropics, in South America. In the darkness of the night, softly and inaudibly, the vampire flies up to a sleeping person or animal, hovers over him, soporific overtaking the warm air with his wings.
Right on the fly, with razor-sharp teeth, he lightly cuts off a thin layer of skin and gently, gently, absolutely painlessly licks off blood, which does not even think to clot - there are anticoagulants in saliva. Only in the morning, through bloody streaks on the necks of horses or on their own limbs, unlucky travelers discover the presence of vampires.
However, we will talk about human vampires, at least about those who were credited with the role of merciless night bloodsuckers (not to be confused with cannibals!), And not cinematic, with an incredible amount of mysticism and stupidity, but real ones. More recently, in 1989, a message flashed in the newspapers that a boy from the family of the famous prince Dracula, who was considered a vampire, was baptized in Paris! Some were seriously worried that the "holy" water would harm the baby. No, it didn't. In addition, Vlad Dracula himself was not a vampire during his lifetime, he did not know about "evil spirits", although he was too bloody. But - in the war.
By the way, the Americans, from whom the Dracula movie went (several dozen films were shot), learned about him unusually late and distorted. It was invented by a writer and theater impresario from Ireland, Abram Stoker (1847-1912), in the novel Dracula (1897). But in Russia, oddly enough, Dracula has been known since ancient times! You can read about this in anthologies, you can find out in textbooks (eg History of Russian Literature XI -XVII centuries. M.: Education, 1985).
The Russian "Tale of Dracula" was compiled in the 80s of the 15th century by a member of the Russian embassy who traveled to Moldova and Hungary during those years. It is believed that the author was the then well-known figure, the head of the embassy Fyodor Kuritsyn. The story described the deeds of Prince Vlad Tepes, who was famous for his cruelty and was nicknamed "Dracula" - the son of a dragon (in fact, "the son of the devil").
In this story, he is not at all a bloodsucking vampire, but simply an immensely cruel person who burns, for example, the poor (at the request of “delivering” them from poverty); nailing caps to the heads of Turkish ambassadors (for not removing them); planting hundreds on stakes ("tepesh" - stake) along the roads of their enemies (for military leaders - with a gilded top).
But even in these ancient descriptions there was a lot of purely fabulous, literary. Historically, when Byzantium lost its former power under the blows of the crusaders, the Turks began to finish it off, who by 1451 captured almost all of Greece and the territory of present-day Bulgaria, and by 1481 - parts of modern Romania and Yugoslavia.
It was during this period that the defender of Romania, Vlad Dracula (son of "Draku", the dragon), appeared on the scene. He did not enter into major battles, but, destroying the vanguards of the Turkish troops, he terrified the enemy with endless rows of stakes with Turkish soldiers still living on them.
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However, Dracula is a special case, an isolated one, but how did the legend about vampires (in other words - ghouls, ghouls) arise at night from a coffin and attack living people?
A number of legends clearly went from the simple: people in the forest, sometimes bloodsuckers, arthropods, clouds of mosquitoes, midges, and other gnats (in the tropics - land leeches) were bled to a drop. But, nevertheless, sometimes they encountered a human vampire.
The ancient writer Marcellus Sidetsky (Ancient Rome, II century) already believed that it was a mental illness of "lycanotropy", when a person imagined that he was a wild beast, that he was forever bewitched, etc. According to another version, narcotic substances were to blame, for example, ergot in bread flour or some herbal decoctions practiced by "witches". There is also an assumption about another disease associated with a lack of pigment, when a person cannot stand the bright daylight at all. Etc.
But such versions, alas, do not explain some historical episodes. The assumption about people who, for one reason or another, fell into a lethargic sleep, found themselves in a state of clinical death and were buried alive, seems no less convincing.
Imagine (although it is, perhaps, even creepy to imagine) that you, as, say, in the movie "Escape" (USA) were buried alive in a grave. And so I want to live! Live! And the man frantically tries to get out. Often nothing happens, death comes from suffocation, from hunger, from horror. But sometimes the deceased manages to accomplish the impossible - to get out!
The acknowledged father of horror literature, the American writer Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849), willingly "collected" creepy examples on a similar topic. Imagine, however, the mental state of a person who, half mad in the grave, nevertheless found himself free.
Not many people in those years were free from religious and mystical superstitions. Society taught that whoever gets out of the grave becomes a vampire. The man who got out actually believed that he was a dead man. But, willy-nilly, he wanted to meet with relatives and friends, to understand whether they would hear from them - is he a spirit or not a spirit? Alive or really - dead ?!
Come in the afternoon? In those years, this was tantamount to suicide. Come at night? But then nobody really understood him - everyone locked themselves in fear or rushed away. So, realizing that he was completely alone, considering himself a "dead man", a person began to play along with other people's fear and his prejudices: he began, like a true "zombie", to carry out the "program" laid down from childhood by faith and superstition - he became a vampire, because he was taught that a dead man is free, it is always a vampire.
How real is this sad version?
Here are some stories taken from an old book by the physician and translator Polycarp Puzina (1834) about prejudice. According to one, at the end of the 16th century in Bohemia, in the vicinity of Kadam, in one village a dead shepherd "showed up". He appeared at night and called out the names of some of his acquaintances. And, either from general horror, or simply from a common infectious disease, so frequent then, several more people died.
Frightened peasants considered that the matter was in the first dead man, they went to the cemetery in order, as usual in such cases, to use a strong aspen stake as a last resort against evil spirits.
“They dug up his grave and nailed his body with a large stake to the ground. The next night he appeared again, frightening many good old women, and strangled several people. Then his corpse was given up for burning. The dead man bellowed with fury, beat his hands and feet as if he were alive (which he probably was - author's note), and when they started to burn him, he screamed terribly, poured out a lot of blood, very red and never appeared again."
Of course, one can expect fairy tales about vampires, but some of these horror stories show in a number of details and with their documentaries that we are talking about "bylichs", cases that actually happened to someone.
P. Puzina gives a case, described in Serbia, when one old man died, who, however, three days after his death, appeared at night to his son and asked for food.
“He offered him a hearty table. The old man ate with good appetite and left without saying a single word.
When this was revealed, then in the village, either from fear, or by accidental coincidence of circumstances, five more peasants died.
“The government, learning about this incident, sent two knowledgeable people to investigate the matter. They opened the graves of all the dead in six weeks and found that this old man had open eyes, a red complexion, natural breathing, but, incidentally, was motionless, like a dead …"
Here, as they say, it is necessary to urgently call "03" and call the resuscitator, but, alas, the concepts and procedures were completely different before. Aspen stake - that was the only "cure" of society from sorcerers and "evil spirits".
Puzina cites other cases as well. And with the same fatal outcome. For example, in Hungary, while working, a peasant named Arnold was accidentally crushed by a wagon. He was considered dead, buried according to all the rules, but then, after events similar to the two above-described cases, it was considered that the deceased harbored evil on people and became a vampire. Then the usual murder began:
“Arnold was open and showed all the signs of vampirism. His body was fresh, his hair, nails and beard were growing back, and his veins were filled with liquid blood, which flowed from his whole body into the grave (cuts for checking - author's note).
The local judge, at which the autopsy was performed, a keen man, ordered, according to custom, to thrust a sharp stake into the heart of Arnold, who screamed terribly (a scream could also be escaped from a dead person due to a sharp squeezing of the chest, - author's note). Then they cut off his head and burned him. After that, he no longer appeared …"
Let's pay attention to the word "showed", "seemed", "appeared", that is, in fact … "dreamed", "dreamed". So was it all in reality, or was it some kind of mass hallucination caused by fears? And are not these cases, which P. Puzina talks about, invented?
In the articles of modern mystics, the mentioned stories were encountered more than once, as absolutely proven, but, as always, without dates, places and specific names. However, if you “search” (and mystics do not like to do this, because they often come to exposure), then in the literature it is possible, nevertheless, to find more accurate dating of all these, at first glance, completely nameless events.
One of the sources, newspaper-digest "Courier for you" (4.1991), according to the magazine "History" (France):
“In 1725, the governor of Hradanski was forced to send a detachment of soldiers to free the Slovak village of Kislovo from … the invasion of vampires.
In the message he sent to Belgrade, the murders of 9 villagers were attributed to Petr Plogozovic, who died long before these tragic events, at the age of 62. All 9 victims were Plolgozovic's neighbors. The voivode in his message stated that Plogozhovich rose from the dead at night, dug into the throat of another victim and sucked out all the blood to the last drop.
They searched for the killer for a week and found no one. By order of the governor, they decided to open the grave of Peter Plogozhovich. Meanwhile, another murder was committed. The authorities rushed and opened the grave immediately, the next morning. The coffin was raised to the surface and the lid was removed. Horrified, the soldiers saw the body of Plogozhovich, splattered with blood from head to toe.
The corpse was swollen and oozed with blood. Streams of blood dripped from the mouth of the corpse. The eyes of the dead man shone like those of a living. And yet, the doctor present at the opening of the grave said that Plogozhovich was dead: the deceased turned out to be a "living dead". When, according to the old belief, an aspen stake was driven into the heart of the corpse, blood gushed from the wound. Plogozhovich's corpse was burned, and for greater confidence, his ashes were scattered in the wind"
And here is the second case:
“In 1732, a military surgeon and two senior officers filed a report. It was about Arnold Pasla, recently buried in the vicinity of Belgrade.
Shortly before his death, Pasle complained to his fiancée that while serving in Greece, he was bitten by a vampire. From then on, Arnold feared that his blood would be contaminated with vampire saliva (rabies? - ed.). After a while, Arnold Pasle died tragically. Almost immediately after his funeral, several residents in the area fell victim to the vampire.
Pasle's grave was opened and a corpse was found without any signs of decomposition. People marveled at the blooming appearance of the dead. Two thin streams of blood flowed down the corners of the mouth (possibly trying to get out of the grave, from stress - author's note) of the corpse - traces of the last night's Sabbath. When a hawthorn stake was stuck in his heart, the deceased uttered a chilling cry.
Subsequently, according to the same publication, a wave of similar rumors swept through Silesia, Ukraine, Belarus, up to the period of 1650-1750.