| Vampyres Myth & Reality |
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Bran Castle (Right) The brooding turrets and battlements of Bran Castle seem to come straight from the novel 'Dracula', but Stoker put his Dracula's home in Burgo Pass where no castle exists. Bran Castle however, attracts tourists from all over the world interested in vampiric legend. |
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(Left) This skeleton of a person buried approximately 400 years ago had been fastened to the coffin with rivets at the joints of the body. The burial took place in England in the days when people believed that the undead could rise from their graves. This body was probably that of someone said to be a vampire, and so nailed down when buried to keep its unquiet spirit from haunting everyone in the village. |
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(Left) A young Pakistani boy dances in ecstasy as he is possessed by spirits, and drinks the blood of a goat. Eventually his state of high excitement gives way to a deep trance, from which he awakens restored to his normal self. |
| Unfortunately, during these medieval times, medical knowledge was virtually prehistoric compared to what we know today. What we know of Catalepsy today, a state very similiar to a coma in which even breathing may stop, can occur from hypnotism or even from hysteria. Edgar Allan Poe was fascinated by the danger of burial alive while in the cataleptic state, and used variations on the theme in his spine chilling stories. Imagine the shock of onlookers when a dead woman suddenly sits up in her coffin, after coming out of her coma like cataleptic state. Or imagine the horror of waking from your own cataleptic state, only to find that you have been buried alive and there is no way out. Its no wonder, villagers were obsessed with the undead rising from the grave, without the medical knowledge of today. |
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| (Above) Bela Lugosi, is shown attacking the Actress Helen Chandler in the 1931 Movie Dracula. Lugosi grew so fond of the role that he arranged to be buried in his black Dracula cloak lined with scarlet, the colour of blood. |
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