"The power of vampires lies in the fact that no one believes in their existence."
Bram Stoker
In 1729, a learned Jesuit monk accidentally stumbled upon a strange document in the Budapest archives, which, due to its terrible content, lay buried under other papers for a whole century. Those were the court materials on the case of Countess Erzsebet Bathory, who believed that the blood of the young girls she killed would preserve her youth and beauty! The monster from Cheite - as the locals called her - became the female version of the rapist and sadist Gilles de Rais, Bluebeard, before whom, by the way, she worshiped. What was the reason for this bloody orgies! women? Was it one of the manifestations of vampirism or sadism?
Or maybe a whole complex of pathological properties of her nature? Experts have yet to answer these questions, because so far about; Little was known about the Blood Countess's deeds.
In the old days, when Slovakia belonged to Hungary, the Chahtice castle bore the Magyar name Cheyt and belonged to the ancient Bathory family. No one was braver than Bathory in battles with enemies, no one could compare with them in cruelty and willfulness. In the 16th century, after the Battle of Mohacs, which gave Hungary to the Turks, Bathory split into two branches - Eched and Shomlyo. The first took refuge in the mountainous Slovakia, the second took possession of Transylvania. In 1576, Stefan Bathory of the Shomlio branch became king of Poland. He and his army saved Vienna from the Turks, earning the gratitude of the Austrian Habsburgs, who by that time had declared themselves kings of Hungary.
The wandering artist had a chance to capture Erzsebet Bathory, Countess of Nadashdi, in the prime of her beauty. Who was this nameless painter? Italian? Fleming? In whose workshops did he learn before wandering from castle to castle and painting his crude portraits? Only a canvas with a large letter "E" in the upper right corner remained of it. This is the initial of the woman depicted in the painting - Erzsebet, made up of three wolf fangs attached to an upright jawbone. And a little higher - eagle's wings, rather heavily drooping, rather than soaring. Around the monogram, a dragon coiled into a ring - a symbol of the ancient Dacian family of Bathory.
She was blonde, but only thanks to the fashionable Italian invention of her time - frequent washing her hair with ash and a decoction of fennel and chamomile, and then rinsing her hair in an infusion of Hungarian saffron. That's right: both the long dark curls that the servants kept for hours in front of burning candles in winter and by the sun-drenched window in summer, and Erzsebet's face, covered with a layer of creams and ointments, became light.
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In keeping with a fashion that was by then already outdated in France, her trimmed hair is barely visible in the portrait: it is hidden under a pearl tiara. The Venetians brought these pearls on their ships from the very Turkey that occupied the eastern and central part of Hungary. All of Europe at that time lived under the sign of pearls: the Valois court in Paris and numerous castles in the provinces, the austere court of the English Queen Elizabeth, whose collars, sleeves and gloves were humiliated by him, and even the court of Ivan the Terrible.
The Bathory family has been known since ancient times for both good and evil. Two of its oldest representatives who lived at a time when the family had not yet received their name (Bathor means "brave"), the brothers Gut Keled, who were born in Staufen castle in Swabia, united the Dacian tribes, galloping on their fast horses with spears adorned with dragon heads fluttering in the wind with ribbons, and blowing horns made from the beak of a stork or an eagle. According to the Vienna Chronicles, in 1036, Emperor Henry III sent and at the head of his troops to help the Hungarian king Peter. The family, whose ancestral nest was the village of Gut, became famous during the reign of King Shalomosh (XI century) and Duke of Geza (XI century). In subsequent years, royal patronage did not leave her.
Later, the Bathory family split into two branches: one part settled in the east of Hungary - in Transylvania, the other - in the west of the country.
Peter Bathory was a canon in Satmara, in the north-east of Hungary, but he was never ordained and left the church. He became the founder of the Bathory-Eched sema. On the slopes of the Carpathian Mountains, you can still see the ruins of the ancient castle Bathory. For a long time, it kept the Hungarian crown - the crown of St. Stephen with a tilted cross. The founder of the western branch of Bathory-Shomlyo, whose lands were located at Lake Balaton, was Johann Bathory. Glory and fortune continued to accompany both families: Stefan III, Stefan IV Bigfoot were the rulers of Hungary, Bohemia (in 1526-1562) from the Habsburg dynasty.
Erzsebet Bathory belonged to the Eched branch: her cousins Shomlio were kings of Poland and Transylvania. All of them, without exception, were spoiled, cruel, dissolute, temperamental and courageous people.
Ferenc (Franz) Nadashdi
In the ancient land of the Dacians, a pagan religion still reigned. This land lagged behind the rest of Europe in its development by at least two centuries. While in western Hungary only the Nadash Mountains remained uninhabited, here, in the rest of the country, the mysterious goddess of dense forests, Mneliki, ruled. The descendants of the Dacians recognized only one god Isten and his three sons: Isten's tree, Isten's grass and Isten's bird. It was to Ishten that Erzhebet, who conjured the clouds, called out. The superstitious inhabitants of the Carpathians also had their own devil - Erdeg, who was served by witches, dogs and black cats. And everything that happened was explained by the actions of the spirits of nature and the fairies of natural elements: Delibab - the midday fairy and mother of visions, beloved wind; the wonderful Tunder sisters and the waterfall fairies combing their watery hair. Among the sacred treesthe ancient rituals of worship of the sun and the moon, the dawn and the "black mare" of the night were still performed in oak and chestnuts.
Her portrait says little about her. While usually female figures, the canvas strives forward in order to show herself in all her glory to the one who looks at her, and telling her story, hidden in the darkness, Erzsebet in the portrait is completely closed in herself - a flower that has grown on mystical soil. The skin on her delicate hands is exaggeratedly white. Her arms are almost invisible, but it is clear that they are very long. On her wrists there are gold bracelets, slightly above which there are wide sleeves in the Hungarian fashion. She is pulled into a high corset embroidered with threads of pearls, dressed in a garnet-colored velvet shirt, against which a white apron looks even more contrasting - a sign of a noble woman in her country.
Long before that, Stephen's sister Anna had married Gyorgy Bathory of the Eched branch. Representatives of the family had previously entered into family marriages, which quickly led them to degeneration. Bathory suffered from epilepsy (it was she who led to the early death of King Stephen), insanity, unrestrained drunkenness. In the damp castle walls they were plagued by gout and rheumatism. Erzhebet (Elizabeth) Bathory, daughter of Gyorgy and Anna, who was born in 1560, was also ill with them. Perhaps this was the reason for the fits of wild rage that had gripped her since childhood. But, most likely, the point here is in Bathory's family genes and the cruelty of that time in general. On the plains of Hungary and in the Carpathian mountains, Turks, Hungarians and Austrians tirelessly slaughtered each other. The captured enemy generals were boiled alive in cauldrons or impaled. Erzhebet's uncle, Andras Bathory, was hacked to death with an ax on a mountain pass. Her aunt Klara was raped by a Turkish detachment, after which the poor woman's throat was cut. However, she herself had taken the lives of two husbands before.
The fate of noble girls in this harsh world was determined once and for all: early marriage, children, household. The same awaited Erzhebet, who was betrothed to the count's son Ferenc Nadashdi as a child. Her father died early, her mother went to live in another castle, and the precocious girl was left on her own. Nothing good came of it. At the age of 14, Erzhebet gave birth to a son from a footman. The culprit disappeared without a trace, like the child, and they rushed to marry her. The couple settled in Cheyte - one of the 17 castles of the Bathory family. The dowry was so rich that Ferenc did not raise the issue of the newlywed's innocence. However, he was not too interested in this: soon after the wedding, he went on a campaign against the Turks and since then appeared at home infrequently. And nevertheless Erzhebet gave birth to daughters Anna, Orshola (Ursula), Katarina and son Pal. According to the custom of those yearsthe children were first taken care of by nurses and maids, and then they were sent to be raised in other noble families.
Left alone, Erzhebet was desperately bored. She dreamed of breaking free from the mountain wilderness and going to a ball in Vienna or Pressburg, where everyone would see her beauty. She was tall, slender, surprisingly white-skinned. Her thick curls, which she bleached with saffron infusion, were also light. In addition, she washed herself with cold water every morning and loved horseback riding. More than once the Cheyt mistress was greeted at night madly galloping around on her pitch-black horse Vinara. They also said that she herself punishes the maids - she pinches them or drags them by the hair, and at the sight of blood she becomes simply obsessed. During one of his visits, Ferencz found a naked girl in the garden, tied to a tree and covered with flies and ants. To his surprised question Erzhebet replied carelessly: “She was carrying pears. I coated her with honey to teach her a good lesson."
At that time, the Countess had not yet killed anyone. Although she was not sinless: in the absence of her husband, she had a lover, a neighbor's landowner Ladislav Bendé. Once they two of them raced on horses along the road and threw mud at some ugly old woman. “Hurry, hurry, beauty! - she shouted after. - Soon you will become the same as me! At home, Erzsebet gazed into the Venetian mirror for a long time. Did the witch tell the truth? Yes, she is already over forty, but her shape is also flawless, and her skin is elastic. Although … there is a treacherous wrinkle in the corner of his mouth. A little more, and old age will sneak up and no one will admire its beauty. In a spoiled mood, Chait's mistress went to bed …
In early 1604, her husband died after contracting a fever on one of the campaigns. The neighbors felt sorry for the widow, and no one knew what awaited her subjects in the quiet town at the foot of the castle.
Erzhebet Bathory tirelessly searched for a means to return the outgoing beauty: either rummaging through old grimoires (collections of magical rituals and spells), or turning to healers. Once, the witch Darwula, who lives not far from Chate, was brought to her. Looking at her, the old woman confidently said: “Blood is needed, lady. Bathe in the blood of girls who did not know a man, and youth will always be with you. At first Erzhebet was taken aback. But then she remembered the joyful excitement that overcame her every time at the sight of blood. It is not known when exactly she crossed the border separating man from the beast. But soon the girls sent to the castle to serve the countess began to disappear to no one knew where, and fresh graves began to appear at the edge of the forest.
They buried them in three and twelve at a time, explaining death by a sudden pestilence. Peasant women were brought from afar to replace those who had passed away, but after a week they disappeared somewhere. The housekeeper Dora Szentesh, a masculine woman who enjoyed the special favor of the countess, explained to the curious inhabitants of Chakhtitsa: they say that the peasant women turned out to be complete clumsy and were sent home. Or: these newcomers angered the mistress with insolence, she threatened them with punishment, so they ran away …
At the beginning of the 17th century (and all this happened in 1610, when Erzbet Bathory turned fifty) in the circles of the nobility it was considered indecent to interfere in the private life of his peers, and therefore rumors flared up and died out, leaving no trace on the reputation of the splendid lady. True, a timid assumption arose that Countess Nadashdi secretly trades in living goods - she supplies pink-cheeked and stately Christian women to the Turkish pasha, their great adorer. And since many glorious representatives of high society were secretly engaged in such a craft, was it worth it to rack your brains, figuring out where the girls go?
For ten years, when terror reigned in Cheyt, the mechanism of murders turned out to be worked out to the smallest detail. It was the same as the one and a half century before Erzhebet with the French baron Gilles de Re, and the same as the Russian landowner Saltychikha (Daria Saltykova) a century and a half later. In all cases, the victims were girls, and the baron also had children. Perhaps they seemed especially defenseless, which inflamed the ardor of the sadists. Or maybe the main thing here was the envy of aging people for youth and beauty. The hereditary defects of the Bathory family and the superstitions of Erzhebet herself played a role. She did not do evil alone: she was helped by assistants. The main one was the ugly hunchback Janos Uyvari, nicknamed Fitzko. Living in the castle in the position of a jester, he had heard plenty of ridicule and mortally hated all who were healthy and handsome. Prowling around, he looked for houses where his daughters were growing up. Then the maids Ilona Yo and Dorka entered the business: they came to the girls' parents and persuaded them to give their daughters into the service of the countess for good money. They also helped Erzsebet beat the unfortunate, and then buried their bodies. Later, local peasants, sensing something was wrong, stopped responding to the promises of the castle mistress. She had to hire new barkers who looked for her victims in distant villages.
When the girls were brought to Chait, the Countess herself came out to them. After examining them, she chose the most beautiful, and sent the rest to work. Those selected were taken to the basement, where Ilona and Dorka immediately began to beat them, prick them with needles and tear their skin with forceps. Hearing the screams of the victims, Erzhebet became infuriated and herself undertook torture. It happened that with her teeth she pulled out pieces of meat from the bodies of her victims. Although the blood did not drink, so it is considered a vampire in vain, however, is there a big difference? In the end, when the girls could no longer stand, their arteries were cut and the blood was drained into basins, filling the bath in which the Countess was immersed. Later, she ordered a miracle of torture technique in Pressburg - the "iron maiden". It was a hollow figure, made up of two parts and studded with long spikes. In the secret room of the castle, the next victim was locked inside the "maiden" and lifted up,so that the blood flows directly into the bath.
Time passed, and bloody ablutions did not bring results: the Countess continued to grow old. In anger, she summoned Darwula and threatened to do to her what she did to the girls on her advice. “You are wrong, lady! the old woman lamented. “What is needed is not the blood of servants, but of noble maidens. Get them, and things will go smoothly. No sooner said than done. Erzsebet's agents persuaded twenty daughters of poor nobles to settle in Cheyte in order to entertain the countess and read to her at night. Within two weeks, none of the girls were alive. This hardly helped their killer to rejuvenate, but Darvula didn't care - she died of fear. But Erzsebet's crazy fantasies were no longer inhibited. She poured boiling oil on the peasant women, broke their bones, cut off their lips and ears and forced them to eat. In the summer, her favorite pastime was to undress the girls and to plant them on the anthill. In winter, pour water over them in the cold until they turn into ice statues.
The murders were committed not only in Cheyte, but also in two other castles of Erzsebet, as well as on the waters in Pishtyan, where the Countess also tried to return the vanishing beauty. It got to the point that she could not spend even a few days without killing. Even in Vienna, where Erzsebet, by a grim coincidence, had a house on Bloody Street (Blutenstrasse), she lured and killed street beggars. It remains to be surprised that for so many years she got away with everything, especially since rumors about the crimes of the "Chait creature" were spreading in waves around the district. Perhaps those who speak of the murderer's high patrons are right. Thus, witnesses recalled a noble lady who came to the castle in an elegant man's suit and invariably participated in torture and murder, after which she left with the countess to the bedroom. We saw here a gloomy gentleman with a hood that hides his face. The servants were whisperingthat this is the resurrected Vlad Dracul, who once did his black deeds in neighboring Wallachia. The dominance of black cats in the castle and the Kabbalistic signs inscribed on the walls did not hide from the eyes. Rumors began about the relationship of the countess with the devil, which was considered worse than the murder of peasant women.
Erzsebet Bathory's crimes were ended by the most banal reason. Needing money for her experiments in rejuvenation, the Countess laid one of the castles for two thousand ducats. Her son's guardian, Imre Medieri, raised a scandal, accusing her of squandering the family's property. She was summoned to Pressburg, where all the nobles, including Emperor Matthias and her relative and patron Gyorgy Thurzo, gathered for the Diet. The latter had already received a letter from the priest, who had to perform the funeral service for nine girls killed by Erzhebet at once. At first, he was going to hush up the story in a family way, but then the countess sent him a cake. Sensing something was wrong, Thurzo fed the cake to the dog, and the dog died immediately. The enraged tycoon set the stage right. To begin with, he interrogated Erzsebet's relatives who were in the city, who told a lot of interesting things. For example, her son-in-law Miklos Zrinyi once visited his mother-in-law,and his dog dug a severed hand in the garden. The accused's daughters were pale and repeated one thing: "Forgive my mother, she is not herself."
Returning to Chait, the Countess composed a witchcraft spell, which Darwul taught her: "Little Cloud, protect Erzhebet, she is in danger … Send ninety black cats, let them tear to pieces the heart of Emperor Matthias and my cousin Thurzo, and the heart of red-haired Medieri …" And yet she could not resist the temptation when the young servant Doritsa, who had been caught stealing sugar, was brought to her. Erzsebet beat her with a whip until she was exhausted, while other maids struck with iron sticks. Not remembering herself, the Countess grabbed a red-hot iron and pushed it into Dorica's mouth up to her throat. The girl was dead, blood flooded the entire floor, and the anger of Chate's mistress was only growing. The henchmen brought two more maids, and after beating them half to death, Erzhebet calmed down.
And the next morning Thurzo came to the castle with soldiers. In one of the rooms, they found dead Doritsa and two other girls still showing signs of life. Other terrible finds awaited in the basements - basins with dried blood, cages for captives, broken parts of the "iron maiden". They also found irrefutable proof - the diary of the countess, where she recorded all her atrocities. True, she did not remember the names of most of the victims, or she simply did not know and wrote them down like this: “No. 169, short” or “No. 302, with black hair”. There were 610 names in total, but not all of the killed were included. It is believed that in total on the conscience of the "Chayt creature" is at least 650 lives. Erzhebet was caught literally on the doorstep - she was about to flee. It is worth noting that the instruments of torture, which she could no longer do without, were neatly packed into one of the traveling chests.
Thurzo, with his power, sentenced her to eternal imprisonment in his own castle. Her henchmen were taken to court, where witnesses were finally able to tell everything they knew about the crimes of their former mistress. Ilone and Dorke crushed their fingers and then burned them alive at the stake. The hunchback Fitzko was beheaded, and his body was also thrown into the fire. In April 1611, stonemasons arrived at Chait and blocked the windows and doors of the Countess's room with stones, leaving only a small slot for a bowl of food. In captivity, Erzhebet Bathory lived in eternal darkness, eating only bread and water, without complaining or asking for anything. She died on August 21, 1614 and was buried at the castle walls, next to the remains of her unnamed victims. They say that moans are still heard from the cursed castle at night, terrifying the area.