Dracula
Who was Dracula ?
Difficult question ! Legends, truth, literature, history, movies, local tales. Where is the truth? And where begins the legend ?
Here you will find both historical truth and legends, names, real places to visit. Dracula is no more a local historical figure: Dracula belongs to the whole world!
Dracula strikes terror deep in the heart like few stories can. Bram Stoker's novel, like Dracula himself, is immortal. Count Dracula swoops into the deep shadows of our psyche to feast upon our inner fears.
Meet the myth, travel the legend.
Dracula history
Dracula history ?
Dracula was Prince Vlad III Dracula, also known as Vlad Tepes, meaning "Vlad the Impaler." The Turks called him Kaziglu Bey, or "the Impaler Prince. He was the prince of Walachia, but, as legend suggests, he was born in Transylvania, which at that time was ruled by Hungary.
Walachia was founded in 1290 by Radu Negru, or Rudolph the Black. It was dominated by Hungary until 1330, when it became independent. The first ruler of the new country was Prince Basarab the Great (1310-1352).
Mircea had an illegitimate son, Vlad, born around 1390, who was educated in Hungary and Germany. Vlad served as a page for King Sigismund of Hungary, who became the Holy Roman Emperor in 1410. Sigismund founded a secret fraternal order of knights called the Order of the Dragon to uphold Christianity and defend the empire against Turkey. Because of his bravery fighting Turks, Vlad was admitted to the Order, probably in 1431. The boyars started to call him Dracul, meaning "dragon." Vlad's second son would be known as Dracula, or "son of the dragon." Dracul also meant "devil." So Dracula's enemies, especially German Saxons, called him "son of the devil."
Interesting fact: members of the Order of the Dragon had a special costume to wear on Sundays. It was a red garment with a black cape over it . . . that's why the fictional Dracula wears a cape!
The Youth of Dracula
The Youth of Dracula
Dracula was born in November or December of 1390. His given name was Vlad. He had an older brother, Mircea, and a younger brother, Radu the Handsome. Their mother may have been a Moldavian princess or a Tranyslvanian noble. It is said that she educated Dracula in his early years. Later he was trained for knighthood by an old boyar who had fought the Turks.
In late 1436 Vlad Dracul killed a rival prince named Alexandru and became Prince Vlad II.
Mircea II ascended to the throne in 1442, as Vlad Dracul was in the Ottoman court negotiating for support from the Ottomans in an effort to better defend his rule against the John Hunyadi, the voivode of Transylvania. In 1443, Mircea II was ousted from the throne by an invading army led by Hunyadi, and was forced to flee. Hunyadi placed Basarab II, son to Dan II, on the throne. However, Basarab II held the throne for only a short time, losing it within a year to Vlad Dracul, supported by armies of the Ottoman Empire. Vlad Dracul had made a treaty with the Ottomans insuring that he would give them annual tribute, as well as sending Wallachian boys to them yearly to be trained for service in their armies.
In 1447, Vlad Dracul and his brother Mircea were murdered. Hungarians put a member of the rival Danesti clan, Vladislav II, on the Walachian throne. Mircea was killed by the boyars and merchants of the Walachian city Tirgoviste. There are different stories about how he died - he may have been tortured and burned, or buried alive. Apparently Dracula's father died at the same time. Some say that the assassinations were organized by Hunyadi, a Hungarian general who may have been the illegitimate son of Emperor Sigismund
It seems that Dracula's little brother Radu chose to remain in Turkey.
The Reign of Dracula
The Reign of Dracula
The ruins of Dracula's palace (the Ancient Court).
With the help of his Turkish army, Dracula seized the Walachian throne. After two months, Hunyadi forced him into exile in Moldavia. Again Vladislav II became Walachia's prince.
In 1456 Dracula invaded Walachia and took back his throne.
He established his capital at Tirgoviste - you can still see the ruins of his palace there. He is considered an important figure in Romanian history because he unified Walachia and resisted the influence of foreigners.
Dracula's subjects respected him for fighting the Turks and being a strong ruler. He's remembered today as a patriotic hero who stood up to Turkey and Hungary. He was the last Walachian prince to remain independent from the Ottoman Empire.
Dracula created a very severe moral code for the citizens of Walachia. You can guess what happened to anyone who broke the code. Thieves were impaled, even liars were impaled. Naturally there wasn't a lot of crime in Walachia during his reign.
In 1462 Dracula attacked the Turks to drive them out of the Danube River valley. Sultan Mehmed II retaliated by invading Walachia with an army three times larger than Dracula's. Dracula was forced to retreat to his capital, Tirgoviste. He burned his own villages and poisoned wells on the way so that the Turkish army wouldn't have any food or water.
When the sultan reached Tirgoviste, he saw a terrifying scene, remembered in history as "the Forest of the Impaled." There, outside the city, were 20,000 Turkish prisoners, all impaled. The sultan's officers were too scared to go on - Dracula had won again.
The Turks and boyars helped Dracula's little brother Radu fight against Dracula. Dracula's wife was so frightened that she threw herself from the upper battlements. The Turks seized the castle, but Dracula managed to escape through a secret tunnel and flee from Walachia.
The new king of Hungary, Matthias Corvinus imprisoned him in a tower. Dracula remained in Hungary for twelve years.
But he was still the same old Dracula. He impaled rats and birds for fun. Once a thief broke into his house and a Hungarian captain followed him to arrest him. Dracula didn't kill the thief - he killed the officer. Why? Because the officer was a gentleman, and should have known not to enter a house uninvited.
The Death of Dracula
The Death of Dracula
According to some accounts, Dracula's brother Radu died in 1474. The sultan put one of the Danesti clan, Basarab the Old, on the Walachian throne. In 1476 Dracula invaded Walachia with the help of Moldavia and Transylvania. They drove Basarab out of the country, and Dracula again became Walachia's prince. Most of Dracula's army then went home to Transylvania.
The Turks attacked a few months later. Dracula was killed while fighting near Bucharest. Some say he was assassinated on the battlefield by his own boyars, or was accidentally killed by one of his men. The sultan displayed Dracula's head on a pike in Constantinople to prove that he was dead. His body was buried at the island monastery of Snagov, which he had patronized. But excavations in 1931 failed to turn up any sign of his coffin!
Dracula's Castle
Dracula's Castle
Everyone in the modern World knows about the famous Count Dracula. Here is a picture of the infamous Bran Castle which is considered in folklore to have been his castle. Bran Castle is standing today as seen in the picture.
Dracula`s Castle is located in the eastern side of Europe, in Romania.
It is placed in the middle of the Carpathians Mountains, on the border between Transylvania and Wallachia, two of the three historical regions composing Romania.
Its exact position is in the village of Bran, at 30 km / 20 miles from Brasov, the second big city of Romania after Bucharest - the capital.
During the six centuries of its life Bran Castle changed its destination several times: at the beginning it was a fortress, after that - a customs house and local administration office and later, in the first half of the 20-th century, a royal residence. This is why the castle's architecture and functionality changed in several points during the rehabilitation / improvement works.
The castle is built on a rock in the narrowest point of the Turcu river valley. The castle was connected to the side slope of the mountain by a bridge / viaduct, so obtaining a defense gallery. From this position the visibility was very good and even increased when the forest was cut down.
The castle has four towers and the oldest is the Powder house tower, the only one built from the beginning.
In 1622 the Gate's tower was attached; in the meantime, the south wall was strengthened to a thickness of 3.5 m / 11 ft, so it can resist to a cannons attack.
A radical change in the functionality and the decoration took place in 1921 when queen Maria of Romania established her summer residence in Dracula's castle. The royal court architect Mr. Carel Liman changed the destination of a lot of spaces; for example: the gunner's room become the royal chapel, the defense gallery of the tower was transformed into apartments for the ladies of the queen's suite. It was also then that he created the fourth floor which was destined to the queen's secretary. But the most spectacular modification was to install an elevator in the fountain from the interior court; with the elevator and throw a tunnel queen Maria could reach the beautiful park down in the valley.
Dracula, a Chronology
Dracula, a Chronology
1428 - Vlad Tepes, the son of Vlad Dracul, is born.
1463 - Vlad Tepes becomes Prince of Wallachia and moves to Tirgoviste.
1442 - Vlad Tepes is imprisoned with his father by the Turks.
1443 - Vlad Tepes becomes a hostage by the Turks.
1447 - Vlad Dracul is beheaded.
1448 - Vlad briefly attains the Wallachian throne. Dethroned, he goes to Moldavia and befriends Prince Stefan.
1451 - Vlad and Stephan flee to Transylvania.
1455 - Constantinople falls.
1456 - John Hunyadi assists Vlad Tepes to attain Wallachian throne. Vladislav Dan is executed.
1458 - Matthias Corvinu succeeds John Hunyadi as King of Hungary.
1459 - Easter massacre of boyers and rebuilding of Dracula's castle. Bucharest is established as the second governmental center.
1460 - Attack upon Brasov, Romania
1461 - Successful campaign against Turkish settlements along the Danube, Summer retreat to Tirgoviste.
1462 - Following the battle at Dracula's castle, Vlad flees to Transylvania. Vlad begins 13 years of imprisonment.
1475 - Summer wars in Serbia against Turks take place. November: Vlad resumes throne of Wallachia.
1476 - Vlad is assassinated.
The Myth of Dracula
The Myth of Dracula
Most non-Romanians remember of Dracula's cruelty. After becoming prince, Dracula supposedly invited many beggars and other old, sick and poor people to a banquet at his castle. When his guests had finished eating their meal and drinking a toast to him, Dracula asked them, "Would you like to be without cares, lacking nothing in this world?"
Yes, they said enthusiastically.
So Dracula had the castle boarded up and set it on fire. Nobody made it out alive - and that was the end of their problems, as he had promised. "I did this so that no one will be poor in my realm," he said.
According to another story, he invited 500 boyars to a banquet and asked them how many princes had ruled in their lifetimes. They said they had lived through many reigns. Shouting that this was their fault because of their plotting, Dracula had them all arrested on the spot. The older ones were impaled; the others were marched 50 miles to Walachia's capital, Poenari, where they were forced to build a mountaintop fortress. They worked a long time; when their clothes fell off, they worked naked. Most of them died, of course. And of course Dracula seized the boyars' property and passed it out to his supporters. In that way he created a new nobility, loyal to him.
Dracula liked to set up a banquet table and dine while he watched people die. His favorite form of execution was impalement. It was slow; people could take days to die. He liked to impale many people at once, arranging the stakes in fancy designs. Nothing was too brutal for Dracula - he enjoyed having people skinned, boiled alive, etc. He prided himself on making the punishment (supposedly) fit the crime.
By 1462, when he was deposed, he had killed between 40,000 and 100,000 people, possibly more. He always thought up some excuse for these executions. He killed merchants who cheated their customers. He killed women who had affairs. Supposedly he had one woman impaled because her husband's shirt was too short. He didn't mind impaling children, either. Afterwards he would display the corpses in public so everyone would learn a lesson. It's said that there were over 20,000 bodies hanging outside his capital city. Of course, the stories about Dracula's cruelty might have been exaggerated by his enemies.
Dracula was so scornful of other nations that when two foreign ambassadors refused to doff their hats to him, he had the hats nailed to their heads. He was opposed to the Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches because he thought foreigners, operating through the churches, had too much power in Walachia. He tried to prevent foreign merchants from taking business away from his citizens. If merchants disobeyed his trade laws, they were, of course, impaled.
To prove how well his laws worked, Dracula had a gold cup placed in a public square. Anyone who wanted to could drink from the cup, but no one was allowed to take it out of the square. No one did.
A visiting merchant once left his money outside all night, thinking that it would be safe because of Dracula's strict policies. To his surprise, some of his coins were stolen. He complained to Dracula, who promptly issued a proclamation that the money must be returned or the city would be destroyed. That night Dracula secretly had the missing money, plus one extra coin, returned to the merchant. The next morning the merchant counted the money and found it had been returned. He told Dracula about this, and mentioned the extra coin. Dracula replied that the thief had been caught and would be impaled. And if the merchant hadn't mentioned the extra coin, he would have been impaled, too.
The Vampires
The Vampires
The legend of the vampire was and still is deeply rooted in Romania. There have always been vampire-like creatures in the mythologies of many cultures. However, the vampire, as he became known in Europe and hence America, largely originated in the lands of eastern Europe. A veritable epidemic of vampirism swept through eastern Europe beginning in the late seventeenth century and continuing through the Balkans. From the Balkans the plague spread westward into Germany, Italy, France, England and Spain. Travelers returning from the Balkans brought with them tales of the undead, igniting an interest in the vampire that has continued to this day. Philosophers in the West began to study the phenomenon. It was during this period that Dom Augustin Calmet wrote his famous treatise on vampirism in Hungary. Stoker's novel was merely the culminating work of a long series of works that were inspired by the reports coming from the Balkans and Hungary.
The Vampires Myths
The Vampires Myths
The vampire legend has been around since at least Roman times, with the specifics changing somewhat with each culture. Because of this, various vampire lore and legends can be contradictory. Ancient Roman "striges" could change into owls and drink the blood of babies. In medieval Eastern European countries, folklore of vampires as well as vampire slayers was common. The vampire legend was strengthened in 14th century Europe with the brutal deeds of Vlad Tepes Dracula. Bram Soker's 1897 novel Dracula reinforced some vampire lore by putting it into mass print.
Vampire Lore & Legend
Becoming a vampire
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Vampires are dead beings that come back to life.
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In some legends the vampire becomes a vampire only after death.
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In other legends the vampire is born a vampire.
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To be born a vampire the child may be the child or grandchild of a vampire.
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A child may be born a vampire if it has a caul or alternately a dark caul.
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People usually become vampires by being bitten, but not killed, by a vampire.
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Some legends have corpses becoming vampires when a cat or dog jumps over it.
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Other legends say that a Witch becomes a vampire when s/he dies.
The blood
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Vampires usually need or crave blood, frequently human.
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Vampires usually obtain blood by biting a victim's neck and drinking the blood.
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In some legends they suck the blood through long, hollow front incisors.
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In other legends the incisors are not hollow, but long and sharp to pierce the victim.
Fending off and destroying a vampire
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Legend usually states that a wooden stake through a vampire's heart will kill it.
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In some versions the vampire needs to be dormant for this to work.
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The stake may need to be a certain type of wood, such as hawthorn.
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Vampires usually can not tolerate sunlight or fire.
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Some legends have vampires warded off by crucifixes, holy water, or garlic.
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Vampires may not be able to cross moving water.
Some legends say that a vampire can not enter a building or a room without first being asked. -
Some legends say that vampires dislike the sound of bells ringing, especially church bells.
Vampire dormancy
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Vampires usually sleep during the day and come out only at night.
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Vampires may also come out right at 12 noon for a brief period.
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Vampires usually spend the day in a coffin or buried in the ground.
Etceteras
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Some legends state that vampires can turn themselves into bats or wolves.
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Some legends state that mirrors will not reflect vampires.
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Vampires are usually said to be very charming.
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Vampires may be compulsive liars.
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Some legends state that a vampire's fingernails have a glass-like appearance.
Three medical conditions may have led to people being inaccurately identified as vampires:
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Anemia causes a pale skin complexion. This may have looked like vampirism.
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Catalepsy can cause a death-like state for a short time to several days. A person coming out of this state will appear to be rising from the dead.
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Porphyia is a rare genetic blood disease. It causes pale skin, sensitivity to light, and makes the incisors look bigger. Porphyia almost certainly influenced the vampire legend.
Video: The Thirst - Various Vampires
Vampires - A Chronology
Vampires - A Chronology
The 1000's
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1047 First appearance of the word "upir" (an early form of the word later to become "vampire") in a document referring to a Russian prince as "Upir Lichy", or wicked vampire.
The 1100's
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1190 Walter Map's "De Nagis Curialium" includes accounts of vampire like beings in England.
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1196 William of Newburgh's "Chronicles" records several stories of vampire like revenants in England.
The 1400's
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1428/29 Vlad Tepes, the son of Vlad Dracul, is born.
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1463 Vlad Tepes becomes Prince of Wallachia and moves to Tirgoviste.
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1442 Vlad Tepes is imprisoned with his father by the Turks.
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1443 Vlad Tepes becomes a hostage by the Turks.
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1447 Vlad Dracul is beheaded.
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1448 Vlad briefly attains the Wallachian throne. Dethroned, he goes to Moldavia and befriends Prince Stefan.
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1451 Vlad and Stephan flee to Transylvania.
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1455 Constantinople falls.
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1456 John Hunyadi assists Vlad Tepes to attain Wallachian throne. Vladislav Dan is executed.
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1458 Matthias Corvinu succeeds John Hunyadi as King of Hungary.
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1459 Easter massacre of boyers and rebuilding of Dracula's castle. Bucharest is established as the second governmental center.
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1460 Attack upon Brasov, Romania
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1461 Successful campaign against Turkish settlements along the Danube, Summer retreat to Tirgoviste.
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1462 Following the battle at Dracula's castle, Vlad flees to Transylvania. Vlad begins 13 years of imprisonment.
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1475 Summer wars in Serbia against Turks take place. November: Vlad resumes throne of Wallachia.
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1476/77 Vlad is assassinated.
The 1500's
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1560 Elizabeth Bathory is born.
The 1600's
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1610 Bathory is arrested for killing several hundred people and bathing in their blood. Tried and convicted, she is sentenced to life imprisonment, being bricked into a room in her castle.
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1614 Elizabeth Bathory dies.
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1610 Leo Allatius finishes writing the first modern treatment of vampires, "De Graecorum hodie quirundam opinationabus".
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1657 Fr. Francoise Richard's "Relation de ce qui s'est passé a Sant-Erini Isle de l'Archipel" links vampirism and witchcraft.
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1672 Wave of vampire hysteria sweeps through Istra.
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1679 A German vampire text, "De Masticatione Mortuorum", by Phillip Rohr is written.
The 1700's
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1710 Vampire hysteria sweeps through East Prussia.
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1725 Vampire hysteria returns to East Prussia.
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1725-30 Vampire hysteria lingers in Hungary.
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1725-32 The wave of vampire hysteria in Austrian Serbia produces the famous cases of Peter Plogojowitz and Arnold Paul (Paole).
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1734 The word "vampyre" enters the English language in translations of German accounts of European waves of vampire hysteria.
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1744 Cardinal Giuseppe Davanzati publishes his treatise, "Dissertazione sopre I Vampiri."
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1746 Dom Augustin Calmet publishes his treatise on vampires, "Dissertations sur les Apparitions des Anges des Demons et des Espits, et sur les revenants, et Vampires de Hundrie, de boheme, de Moravic, et de Silesie."
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1748 The first modern vampire poem, "Der Vampir," is published by Heinrich August Ossenfelder.
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1750 Another wave of vampire hysteria occurs in East Prussia.
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1756 Vampire hysteria peaks in Wallachia.
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1772 Vampire hysteria occurs in Russia.
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1797 Goethe's "Bride of Corinth" (a poem concerning a vampire) is published.
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1798-1800 Samuel Taylor Coleridge writes "Christabel," now conceded to be the first vampire poem in English.
The 1800's
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1800 "I Vampiri," an opera by Silvestro de Palma, opens in Milan, Italy.
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1801 "Thalaba" by Robert Southey is the first poem to mention the vampire in English.
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1810 Reports of sheep being killed by having their jugular veins cut and their blood drained circulated through northern England. "The Vampyre," an early vampire poem, by John Stagg is published.
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1813 Lord Byron's poem "The Giaour" includes the hero's encounter with a vampire.
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1819 John Polidori's "The Vampyre," the first vampire story in English, is published in the April issue of "New Monthly Magazine." John Keats composes "The Lamia," a poem built on ancient Greek legends.
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1820 "Lord Ruthwen ou Les Vampires" by Cyprien Berard is published anonymously in Paris. June 13: "Le Vampire," the play by Charles Nodier, opens at the Theatre de la Porte Saint-Martin in Paris. August: "The Vampire; or, The Bride of the Isles," a translation of Nodier's play by James R. Planche, opens in London.
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1829 March: Heinrich Marschner's opera, "Der Vampyr," based on Nodier's story, opens in Liepzig.
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1841 Alexey Tolstoy publishes his short story, "Upyr," while living in Paris. It is the first modern vampire story by a Russian.
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1847 Bram Stoker is born. "Varney the Vampire" begins lengthy serialization.
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1851 Alexandre Dumas' last dramatic work, "Le Vampire," opens in Paris.
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1854 The case of vampirism in the Ray family of Jewell, Connecticut, is published in local newspapers.
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1872 "Carmilla" is written by Sheridan Le Fanu. In Italy, Vincenzo Verzeni is convicted of murdering two people and drinking their blood.
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1874 Reports from Ceven, Ireland, tell of sheep having their throats cut and their blood drained.
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1888 Emily Gerard's "Land Beyond the Forest" is published. It will become a major source of information about Transylvania for Bram Stoker's "Dracula."
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1894 H.G. Wells' short story, "The Flowering of the Strange Orchid," is a precursor to science fiction vampire stories.
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1897 "Dracula" by Bram Stoker is published in England. "The Vampire" by Rudyard Kipling becomes the inspiration for the creation of the vamp as a stereotypical character on stage and screen
The 1900's
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1912 "The Secrets of House No. 5," possibly the first vampire movie, is produced in Great Britain.
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1913 "Dracula's Guest" by Bram Stoker is published.
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1920 "Dracula," the first film based on the novel, is made in Russia. No copy has survived.
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1921 Hungarian filmmakers produce a version of "Dracula."
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1922 "Nosferatu," a German-made silent film produced by Prana Films, is the third attempt to film "Dracula."
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1924 Hamilton Dean's stage version of "Dracula" opens in Derby. Fritz Harmann of Hanover, Germany, is arrested, tried and convicted of killing more than 20 people in a vampiric crime spree. Sherlock Holmes has his only encounter with a vampire in "The Case of the Sussex Vampire."
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1927 February 14: Stage version of "Dracula" debuts at the Little Theatre in London. October: American version of "Dracula" starring Bela Lugosi, opens at Fulton Theatre in New York City. Tod Browning directs Lon Chaney in "London After Midnight," the first full-length feature film.
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1928 The first edition of Montague Summers's influential work "The Vampire: His Kith and Kin" appears in England.
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1929 Montague Summers's second vampire book, "The Vampire in Europe," is published.
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1931 January: Spanish film version of "Dracula" is previewed. February: American film version of "Dracula" with Bela Lugosi premiers at the Roxy Theatre in New York City. Peter Kurten of Dusseldorf, Germany, is executed after being found guilty of murdering a number of people in a vampiric killing spree.
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1932 The highly acclaimed movie "Vampyr," directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer, is released.
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1936 "Dracula's Daughter" is released by Universal Pictures.
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1942 A. E. Van Vought's "Asylum" is the first story about an alien vampire.
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1943 "Son of Dracula (Universal Pictures) stars Lon Chaney, Jr., as Dracula.
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1944 John Carradine plays Dracula for the first time in "Horror of Dracula."
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1953 "Drakula Istanbula," a Turkish film adaptation of "Dracula," is released. "Eerie" No. 8 includes the first comic book adaptation of "Dracula."
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1954 The Comics Code banishes vampires from comic books. "I am Legend" by Richard Matheson presents vampirism as a disease that alters the body.
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1956 John Carradine plays Dracula in the first television adaptation of the play for "Matinee Theatre." "Kyuketsuki Ga," the first Japanese vampire film, is released.
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1957 The first Italian vampire movie, "I Vampiri," is released. American producer Roger Corman makes the first science fiction vampire movie, "Not of This Earth." "El Vampiro" with German Robles is the first of a new wave of Mexican vampire films.
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1958 Hammer Films in Great Britain initiates a new wave of interest in vampires with the first of it's "Dracula" films, released in the United States as the "Horror of Dracula." First issue of "Famous Monsters of Filmland" signals a new interest in horror films in the Untied States.
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1959 "Plan 9 From Outer Space is Bela Lugosi's last film.
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1961 "The Bad Flower" is the first Korean film adaptation of "Dracula."
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1962 The Count Dracula Society is founded in the United States by Donald Reed.
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1964 "Parque de Juelos (Park of Games)" is the first Spanish made vampire movie.
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1964 "The Munsters" and "The Addams Family"; two horror comedies with vampire characters, open in the fall television season.
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1965 Jeanne Youngson founds The Count Dracula Fan Club. "The Munsters," based on the television show of the same name, is the first comic book series featuring a vampire character.
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1966 "Dark Shadows" debuts on television.
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1967 April: In episode 210 of "Dark Shadows", vampire Barnabas Collins makes his first appearance.
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1969 First issue of "Vampirella," the longest running vampire comic book to date, is released. Denholm Elliot plays the title role in a BBC television production of "Dracula, Does Dracula Really Suck? (aka Dracula and the Boys)" is released as the first gay vampire movie.
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1970 Christopher Lee stars in "El Conde Dracula," the Spanish film adaptation of "Dracula." Sean Manchester founds The Vampire Research Society.
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1971 Marvel Comics releases the first copy of a post-Comics Code vampire comic book, "The Tomb of Dracula." Morbius, the Living Vampire, is the first new vampire character introduced after the revision of the Comics code allowed vampires to reappear in comic books.
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1972 "The Night Stalker" with Darrin McGavin becomes the most watched television movie to that point in time. "Vampire Kung-Fu" is released in Hong Kong as the first of a string of vampire martial arts films. "In Search of Dracula" by Raymond T. McNally and Radu Florescu introduces Vlad the Impaler, the historical Dracula, to the world of contemporary vampire fans. "A Dream of Dracula" by Leonard Wolf complements McNally's and Florescu's effort in calling attention to vampire lore. "True Vampires of History" by Donald Glut is the first attempt to assemble the stories of all the historical vampire figures. Stephan Kaplan founds The Vampire Research Centre.
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1973 Dan Curtis Productions' version of "Dracula" (1973) stars Jack Palance in a made-for-television movie. Nancy Garden's "Vampires" launches a wave of juvenile literature for children and youth.
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1975 Fred Saberhagen proposes viewing Dracula as a hero rather than a village in "The Dracula Tape." "The World of Dark Shadows" is founded as the first "Dark Shadows" fanzine.
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1976 "Interview with the Vampire" by Anne Rice is published. Stephen King is nominated for the World Fantasy Award for his vampire novel, "'Salem's Lot." Shadowcon, the first national "Dark Shadows convention, is organized by Dark Shadows fans."
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1977 A new dramatic version of "Dracula" opens on Broadway starring Frank Langella. Louis Jordan stars in the title role in "Count Dracula," a three-hour version of Bram Stoker's book on BBC television. Martin V. Riccardo founds the Vampire Studies Society.
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1978 Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's book "hotel Transylvania" joins the volumes of Fred Saberhagen and Anne Rice as the third major effort to begin a reappraisal of the vampire myth during the decade. Eric Held and Dorothy Nixon found the Vampire Information Exchange.
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1979 Based on the success of the new Broadway production, Universal Pictures remakes "Dracula" (1979), starring Frank Langella. The band Bauhaus's recording of "Bela Lugosi's Dead" becomes the first hit of the new gothic rock music movement. "Shadowgram" is founded as a "Dark Shadows" fanzine.
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1980 The Bram Stoker Society is founded in Dublin, Ireland. Richard Chase, the so-called Dracula Killer of Sacramento, California, commits suicide in prison. The World Federation of Dark Shadows Clubs (now Dark Shadows Official Fan Club) is founded.
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1983 In the December issue of "Dr. Strange," Marvel Comics' ace occultist kills all of the vampires in the world, thus banishing them from Marvel Comics for the next six years. Dark Shadows Festival is founded to host an annual "Dark Shadows" convention.
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1985 "The Vampire Lestat" by Anne Rice is published and reaches the best seller list.
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1989 Overthrow of Romanian dictator Nikolai Ceaucescu opens Transylvania to Dracula enthusiasts. Nancy Collins wins a Bram Stoker Award for her vampire novel "Sunglasses After Dark."
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1991 Vampire: The Masquerade," the most successful of the vampire role-playing games, is released by White Wolf.
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1992 "Bram Stoker's Dracula" directed by Francis Ford Coppola opens. Andrei Chikatilo of Rostov, Russia, is sentenced to death after killing and vampirizing some 55 people.
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1994 Interview With The Vampire comes to the big screen. Oprah Winfrey forms "prayer circle" outside premiere to work against the forces of darkness she believes the film is calling down. Others also are appalled by the casting of Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt.
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1995 Pam Keesey edits Dark Angels, an anthology of lesbian vampire fiction.
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1996 The series Kindred: the Embraced airs for a whole 8 episodes. Director Quentin Tarantino makes From Dusk Till Dawn.
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1997 TV version of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, starring Sarah Michelle Geller, debuts. Teen lockers get new poster girl.
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1998 Blade is released, with Wesley Snipes as a vampire slayer. Pandora and The Vampire Armand by Anne Rice are published.
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1999 Vittorio the Vampire by Anne Rice is published.
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2002 Blade II and Queen of the Damned are released.
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2004 Blade: Trinity
(Inspired from the book of J. Gordon Melton)