Re: Dear Vlad, was Re: a little history lesson

[Heather Swann <heather@pop.net>]

Poster: Heather Swann <heather@pop.net>

> > For a good work on vampires, check out 'Vampires of the Slavs' by
> > Perkowski.  It has historical notes as well as the author's notes on his
> > research among Slavic peoples on vampires and local stories.  One woman
> > he talked to told him the man a few farms down was a vampire.  A vampire
> > hunter he spoke to told him to 'take an iron spike and nail those
> > suckers to the ground!'.  Interesting stuff.
> 
> Yes, but how much of that material is mediaeval?  

As I say, just some of it, but it IS in there.  The author comes from an
Eastern background.  I recall in his class it was like listening to Bela
Lugosi's natural voice....

My own experience is
> with western Europe not eastern (although I could plug pretty hard for
> renewed study of mediaeval Bulgaria, which, from the little I know about
> it, is fascinating).  The western sources I've encountered emphatically do
> not express belief in anything like the modern idea of a vampire. 

I suppose it depends on how you're defining the modern idea.  If you
mean the slicko 'goth-dressed-in-black-and-looking-cool' stereotype,
well no.  I don't know any source that does. I recall some descriptions
of blood-sucking humans/corpses who were also said to be shape-shifters,
but they didn't have the cool cachet that vampires do now.  They were
cold, pale, and smelled of death.  They could, however, be living people
who had turned to evil.

Just
> the typical reanimate corpse/ghoul/wight.  People with evidence for belief
> in vampires (modern sense) from western Europe in the Middle Ages are
> cordially invited to mention it.  :-)
> 
> Alianora

I haven't seen any descriptions that would fit a wight, per say, and the
ones that fit a ghoul aren't uniformly vampiric- they tend to fall into
the shape-shifter/lycanthrope category as far as I know.....at least for
Eastern Europe.  If someone's got some source material, I'd love to have
more things to dig through!  :)

Miri
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