Encyclopedia of the unde.., p.3
Encyclopedia of the Undead, page 3
The previous story was at one time extremely well known throughout Ireland. Although most probably a folk legend, it was written down as actual history in Dr. Geoffrey Keating’s Foras Feasa ar Eireann (A General History of Ireland) between 1620 and 1631, perhaps making it the oldest written vampire story in Western Europe. It was later reprinted in 1880 in A History of Ireland by Patrick Weston Joyce and, it has been suggested, the Celtic chieftain Abhartach may have been the prototype for Bram Stoker’s classic vampire figure, Dracula. It should be borne in mind that the two most famous vampire stories—Dracula and Carmilla, were both written by Irishmen, Bram Stoker and Sheridan Le Fanu respectively.
Glestigs
Tales of blood-drinking fairies and cadaverous Celtic chieftains have made their way into Scottish folklore as well. Stories from the Western Isles of the Hebrides spoke of fairies that drank both the milk and the blood of cattle. These ancient sprites were often attached to ancient tumuli—the graves of prehistoric peoples with whom they were often associated. Creatures known as glestigs often inhabited such places or the ruins of former castles and abbeys, luring in passers-by by calling out to them and then attacking them. In some cases they were also known to drink the blood of passing wayfarers.
Banshee
Also in the Highlands, beings known as the Baobhan Sith annoyed, tormented, and sometimes killed shepherds and herders as they tended their flocks in their shielings (shelters) on the high moors. The name simply means “spirit woman” and refers to a type of fairy whose roots go back into the mists of antiquity. She (and the fairy always appeared to be female) was the last representative of a goat-footed race that had lived in the Highlands before the time of true men and she had a passion for human blood. The Baobhan Sith was also a shapeshifter and could approach her victims, usually lonely herders, in the guise of their wives or sweethearts whom they had left behind. When alone, the creature revealed its true nature and drank their blood. In her book, The Supernatural Highlands, Francis Thompson recounts a tale of three hunters who were beset by these vampires in the hills around Kintail. Having had a disappointing day during which they had caught nothing, they passed the night in a lonely hut, high up in a glen. Whilst one of them played on a trump (Jews harp) to pass the time, another languidly wished aloud that their wives and sweethearts could be with them in these desolate hills. Almost at once, the door of the hut opened and three women came in who, in the dim light, resembled those women, and who sat down with two of them beside the fire. The musician, very uncertain, kept to his own side of the blaze. The other two sat with the women, talking softly with their sweethearts whispering into their ears. In the uncertain light, the musician saw to his horror a stream of blood snaking across the floor. And as he squinted more closely in the murky light, he saw that the feet of the women on the other side of the fire resembled those of a goat or deer. With a cry, he leapt to his feet and dashed from the hut. Running across the hills, he heard the women pursue him. One said: “Dhith sibha’ur curhaich fain ach dh’thag mo curhaich fein mise” (“You ate your own victims, but mine escaped from me”). At last he made it to the door of a mountain cottage and was taken in. The following morning, he returned with some other men to the hut where he found the bodies of his two companions, strangled, broken, and drained of blood. It was well-known, he was told, that the gloomy glens of Kintail were home to vampires and blood-drinking fairies.
Fairies, it was believed in many parts of the Celtic world, could also sometimes reanimate dead bodies and use them for their own purposes—often to torment the living. For this reason, the bier upon which a body was borne to the graveyard was sometimes ritually smashed before the mourners left the churchyard. In this way, it was thought malefic spirits were prevented from taking over the corpse of the recently interred. There are stories of this being done, right up until the early 20th century, in places such as Islay in the Western Isles of Scotland and in Counties Roscommon and Carlow in Ireland.
Italy
It was not only in the Celtic world that tales of animated corpses were told. In Italy, there were, in some areas, legends of people who quite simply, “refused to die,” although their bodily functions were deemed to have stopped. A popular Roman tale tells that in 1583, the fourteen-year-old son of a prince of the city, Fabrizio Massimo, died of an unexplained fever. However, after he’d been buried, the boy was seen again but his appearance seemed to be accompanied by a bout of sickness or plague that swept through certain sectors of the city. Although the apparition did not drink blood, death accompanied each of its visitations. The Roman people became seriously alarmed and the boy’s family summoned a holy man, St. Philip Neri, to investigate the appearance. The holy man went straight to the boy’s tomb and opened it, finding the child’s corpse in a perfect state of preservation although he had been dead for some time. St. Philip, laid a hand on the cadaver’s forehead, and immediately the boy sat up and opened his eyes. “Are you unwilling to die?” asked the saint. “No,” replied the youth. “Are you resigned to yield up your soul?” continued the holy man. “I am,” came the answer. “Then go!” commanded St. Philip and he blessed the body whereupon the youth fell back with a serene look upon his face and expired for a second time. The city was troubled no more, either by the apparition or by the plague.
A similar, earlier story is told regarding the 6th century Byzantine saint, Theodosius the Cenobite, as recounted by Theodore of Petra. One of the Brethren at Theodosius’s monastery, a monk named Basil, died and was laid in his tomb. But from time to time, several of the other Brothers saw him at prayer in the chapel. Some even heard the sound of his voice as he prayed, whilst others saw him in his accustomed place among the choir stalls. Coupled with these visions, periodic sicknesses swept through the holy house. The monks consulted with St. Theodosius, who suggested prayer and fasting. He himself prayed earnestly and continually that the apparition might be relieved and, according to the legend, on one evening during a service, all the monks saw the vision of Basil. The phantom advised them that, because of their prayers (especially those of the saint himself), that it would now depart from them to the Afterlife and that forthwith, the illnesses that had raged amongst them would cease. He offered them the blessing “God be with, my father and my Brethren” and he vanished from their sight. Shortly afterwards the sicknesses passed and the monastery was not troubled again.
Eastern Europe
It is, perhaps, amongst the Slavic and East European peoples that the notion of the vampire seems to have gained hold. Indeed, the word itself may come from an ancient Turkish word, oubir, that meant “a witch or malignant sorcerer.” Others have argued that it comes from an obscure Greek word meaning “to drink.”
It is thought that belief in the walking dead—cadavers who did not necessarily drink blood but may have done so—was fairly widespread. There was also a belief that for every vampire that was created, there was also someone born who could slay it. Thus in the late 13th century, vampire hunters flourished in various parts of central and Eastern Europe adding to the myth. In fact, the situation grew so bad that during the reign of Wenceslaus III, King of Hungary (1301–1305) and King of Bohemia (1305–1306), an edict was issued forbidding the digging up of graveyards in order to “slay” malefic corpses. Bohemia was a country that occupied most of what is now the Central and Western Czech Republic.
The Shoemaker of Silesia
One of the earliest tales from the region concerns “The Shoemaker of Silesia” and is dated from around the year 1591. Silesia is now to be found within the borders of present-day Poland and was inhabited by Slavic peoples. The shoemaker dwelt in one of its major towns and sometime in September 1591, he committed suicide in a neighbour’s garden by cutting his throat with his shoemaker’s knife. Because the sin was so grievous, his wife and family put it about the locality that he had died from some unknown disease. All the same, a number of busybodies put it about that there was more to the shoemaker’s death than first appeared and the authorities decided to investigate.
Spectrum
Whilst these deliberations were going on, the shoemaker himself appeared, or at least some shape, (called a “Spectrum” in the account) resembling him did. And it did not only appear at night but in the middle of the day as well. It wandered about the town, visiting houses when it pleased. Those who were sleeping were tormented by terrible dreams in which the figure of the shoemaker was featured prominently and those who were waking did so to find what seemed to be a heavy weight upon them, which was taken to be the shoemaker, albeit in an invisible state. There were perpetual complaints resonating all through the town. Of course, these appearances and experiences highlighted the memory of the shoemaker and raised further questions about his death, which his widow, family, and friends sought to suppress. So great did the horror become that the town officials considered digging up the shoemaker’s corpse in order to inspect it. Terrified that it would now be disclosed as to how he met his end, his widow and sons begged the Council not to proceed, adding that they intended to apply to the Emperor’s court for a ruling on the matter. However, the apparition became bolder—appearing by people’s bedsides as soon as they lay down, or else lying down beside them and seeking to suffocate them with its attentions. It also struck them and pinched at their skin, drawing blood on some occasions. In the morning, the bruises and cuts and sometimes the marks of fingers about their throats were plain to see. The authorities could no longer ignore this situation and the Magistrate gave instructions that the body should be exhumed.
By this time, he had been in the ground for about eight months—from 22nd September 1591 to 18th April 1592. Yet when he was exhumed, his body was found to be “uncorrupted and not at all putrid” even though his burial clothes had already rotted. Not only this, but his hair, fingernails, and toenails had continued to grow whilst in the grave. Examining the body, a local Magistrate found what appeared to be a magical mark on the big toe of his right foot in the shape of a rose. The wound on his throat still gaped but had not become infected and his limbs and joints were as supple as the day he was buried.
His body was not reburied but was kept lying in the open from the 18th to the 24th of April and was inspected daily by the townspeople. His nightly wanderings did not cease, however, and many were still troubled by his nightly visitations. Nor did the corpse appear to decay in any way. In consternation, the people of the town buried him once more, this time under the local gallows in the hope that this would in some way restrain him, but it didn’t. Neighbours were even more disturbed by the visitations of the Spectrum, which pinched them and tried to crush them, leaving them with blue and black marks all over their bodies. In the end, the shoemaker’s wife went to a local magistrate and told him to do whatever was necessary to lay her husband’s unquiet spirit to rest. The body was once again dug up from beneath the gallows and its head and legs were struck off with the blade of a spade (it was noted that it had grown even fleshier and seemed to have put on a little weight), its back was ripped open, and its heart was pulled out. To the horror of those around, the heart seemed very fresh and full of blood and appeared to pulse slightly, similar to the heart of a living man. All this, together with the rest of the body was placed on a pile of wood and was burned to ashes, which were then placed in a sack and dumped in a nearby river. This, the local people hoped, would be the end of the matter. But there were still more horrors to come.
A girl from the same town had died shortly after the shoemaker, after allegedly being visited by the Spectrum. Eight days afterward, she appeared to a fellow servant as she lay in bed and lay across her in an attempt to crush her. She then attacked an infant lying in its cot, and would have made off with it had a nurse not arrived at an opportune moment and saved it by calling out in the Name of Jesus, whereupon the spectre vanished. However, she continued to appear in various guises, including that of a hen. When one of the other maids decided to follow her back to the grave and see if it was indeed their former colleague, the hen grew to a monstrous size and grabbed her by the throat. The dead girl continued to terrorize the town for a whole month in various shapes: a dog, a goat, a cat, and an old woman. It was assumed by the local magistrates that the scourge of the Undead had been passed on from her encounter with the shoemaker’s Spectrum. Her body was also dug up and burned and the spectral occurrences ceased.
The shoemaker of Silesia was only one of the alleged vampiric cases that began to manifest themselves into the culture of Central and Eastern Europe. As the 17th century wore on, there were a number of further instances scattered across the towns and villages of Hungary and what is now the Czech Republic. Wandering ghosts, sometimes in the shapes of animals, and those who had died without the Sacraments, or who had died having committed some sin, roamed abroad, tormenting their neighbours and attacking their livestock. And in the dawn of the Enlightened 18th century, men of learning began to turn their attention in the direction of vampires, considering whether or not they in fact existed, just as they did with the notion of witches.
Magia Posthuma
One of the first considered reports on these apparitions was the treatise Magia posthuma, written in 1706 by Charles Ferdinand de Shertz. It was published in the town of Olmutz in Moravia and was dedicated to Prince Charles Joseph of Lorraine, Bishop of Olmutz and Osnabruk. Shertz, who was an eminent lawyer of his day, argued his case from a legalistic point of view. Concentrating on a number of cases, he came to the conclusion that so many trustworthy people had suffered from vampiric attentions that it was reasonable to assume that such creatures actually existed. In one of these cases—that of a herdsman—he noted that the ghost of the dead herder seemed able to exhaust his neighbours simply by loudly calling their name, suggesting that even the voice of the vampire had energy-sapping qualities. He also considered whether the body should be burned, and how the injuries which they inflicted upon the living should be dealt with.
Dissertatio de Uamparis Seruiensibus
Perhaps in response to Shertz’s book (which was widely circulated), the number of instances of vampirism seemed to increase in Hungary and in surrounding districts. Indeed, during the early to mid-1700s, there was almost an epidemic, reminiscent of the days of Wenceslaus III. Such an epidemic appeared to reach its height in both Greater Serbia and in Hungary during the 1730s, prompting the thinker John Heinrich Zopfius to publish a further work on vampirism. The was in the form of a dissertation—Dissertatio de Uamparis Seruiensibus (published in 1733)—in which he painted lurid pictures of the dead rising from their graves to attack the living. Zopfus’s work was only one of a plethora of such works issued from Germany, Italy, and England, as men of education turned their thoughts to a supposed vampire menace in Central and Eastern Europe. Such learned works included John Christian Stock’s Dissetatio de cadaueribus sanguisgus (1732); Philip Rohr’s De masticatione mortuorum (published in Leipzig in 1679) and John Christian Harenberg’s Von Vampyren (1739). There were also many more. This corpus of vampire literature further included Cardinal Guieseppe Davenzatti, the Archbishop of Trani, whose work Dissertazione sopra I vampiri (1744) is regarded as the first major work by a churchman on the subject. The affairs and occurrences in Hungary and Moravia were now drawing the attention of the Vatican authorities, particularly that of Pope Benedict XIV. In 1746, the pontiff commissioned an enquiry into what was going on in Eastern Europe. The man he chose to conduct this investigation was a Frenchman by the name of Benedictine Dom Antoine Augustin Calmet (1672-1757). Calmet had a reputation both as a theologian and as a writer and his exegetical works had earned him a reputation far beyond the confines of the Catholic Church, although they have subsequently failed to stand the test of time. At the time of his appointment, he was a lecturer in theology at the abbey of Moyen-Moutier.
Calmet’s brief was to investigate a number of occurrences in Hungary, Serbia, Bohemia, and Moravia; test their validity; and write a report, which would be forwarded to the Vatican. This report, presented in the form a treatise—Dissertation sur les Apparitions, anges des demons et les Espirits, et sur les revenants et Vampires de Hungarie, de Boheme, de Moravia et de Silese was received and subsequently printed in 1746.
