Twilight born facts… One of our visitors forwarded a question to our investigating mythology team inquiring about Vampires, and since I personally found this myth fascinating due to the attention it managed to capture across centuries of legends and tales throughout human culture ancient and current in all languages and tongues and last magnified by Hollywood in the manner that revived and perpetuated it while exaggerating its suspense for commercial purposes…
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Vampirism in origin is very ancient, the first record of this myth goes back as far as ancient Egypt, but before we start detailing vampirism let us begin with separating the Dracula myth from the original vampire’s legend so that we do not confuse facts from fiction.
Dracula myth is based upon Romanian history dating back to the actual historical tyrant character whose nick name was Dracul (in Romanian Dracul stands for Devil) due to his harsh treatment of the local peasants of the region he bloodily governed with his family for a considerable time.
His true name was Vlad II, later Vlad Dracul his reign began on his come back from Transylvania in the Carpathian Valley to Wallachia in 1430s. Local lore spoke of his tyranny and his impaling methods as a punishment for those who dare in any way to oppose him, there also was a legend circling around one of his siblings who according to local myth used to bath in blood and drink it to preserve her youth. But since Dracula is not our main topic we will settle for that much on him and go back to Vampires myth in history and origin.
I will start with its mentioning in the Emerald Tablets since I regard it to be more pure reference and more ancient then the rest of ancient folklore.
Blood drinking creatures of shadows in the Emerald Tablets, later known to be as Demons in all known human mythology, theology and culture.
Having began with that I would want to add up that blood drinking was also exercised by many ancient tribes all over the ancient world starting with Middle East where culture all began spreading through till the dark and middle Ages of pagan practice in medieval Europe.
The Rising: vampirism began with the ancient Egyptian Order of Aset Ka, its members were believed to be the first vampires born of an ancient immortal kinship, granted life out of the Dark kiss as an act of creation, Ka in ancient Egypt stood for the Dark, the Anti and the negative forces.
The warrior Goddess of ancient Upper Egypt Sekhmet was first known to drink that red nectar of life, Blood. She was the ultimate hunter who guided the pharohs in their battles and led them to victory, the protector of Upper Egypt highly revered with her own cult and temple and her color was red, a symbol for blood.
A Middle Eastern belief still exists till today that every human has a Ka, or a negative companion. In Arabic it is called the Qarrin. Though this Ka or Qarrin still holds a hidden mystery in its substance, nevertheless it is regarded as of nonhuman origin being mainly of Jinn assigned to tempt and lure mankind away from the path of enlightenment.
In ancient India Sekhmet had an equal whose name was Kali, a revered Goddess of destruction, negative powers and presence, portrait in one of Indiana Jones movies as Kali ma.
Vampire tales are also recognized by ancient Mesopotamia, ancient Greece and Rome they were the Empusae described as the Lamia and Striges and later it stood for witches and demons, there is also a trace of it found with Hebrew culture as Lilitu, though identified as demons subsisting on babies blood in those days and not what Hollywood portray, those were the days of Magik and mysticism, (note that the word Magik with a K stands for the real art of black Magic no trick involved.
In ancient Persia pottery with the blood sucking creatures were found, in Babylonia and Assyria they were known by the name Lillitu, Note that the word Lillitu is a reference to darkness and night, for even in modern Arabic language of today the night means Layl.
In medieval Europe history records mentioned investigation of vampirism cases and even public execution of suspect vampires.
According to European legends vampires were described as: ruddy and bloated with purplish skin, though, in ancient Indian Kali ma had fangs in European lore vampires lost their fang to ancient history somehow.
As I earlier mentioned Europe on several occasions I need to specify that the whole of Europe, for in Russia the earliest record of Vampirism dates as far back as 100 AD, and similar folklore spread amongst all of the Slovak , Turks/Tatar and other contemporary races of that time…
According to Oxford English Dictionary it was first referred to in England in the 1730s, were as in Germany in the 1720s, in fact, some relate the word Vampires to be a derivative of German Vampir.
The most common ritual to identify a vampire grave was to lead a virgin young boy through a graveyard on a virgin white stallion believing the horse would baulk at the suspected grave.
In Africa; the Ashanti, the Ewe and in the Eastern Cape region also have a folkloric tales of all sorts of vampires who can take an insect form or other animal forms and bring havoc on specially wandering children.
Actually it is not an exaggeration to say that one will find a trace of vampires in every single known ancient and contemporary culture around our world.
Modern belief in vampirism is mainly gothic and fictional influenced by the Hollywood syndrome.
When the church split in 1054 AD the Roman Catholic Church disputed that the corpse which appeared to be living was of a saint, where as the Orthodox argued it belonged to a vampire. Many incidents of staking corpse suspect of vampirism were also recorded in the whole of Eastern and Western Europe in the medieval era…
Indeed, thanks to Bram Stalker for his novel reviving vampirism and the infamous Dracula.
Hoping you will find the answers that quenches your thirst for knowledge I bid you all a safe and peaceful night, and just for precautions I suggest you place beside your pillow some garlic and a fine sharp stake just in case, one never knows what lurks in the darkness of nights.
Enjoy
Adam El Masri
