16 Things You Didn't Know About Vampires

Article by Ty Hulse

1-December is the time of vampires, for there were a series of Holidays starting in November and ending in early January in which they were most likely to come out, sometimes in the form of owls, or mice, or many other animals. In Romania they would all go to the cross-roads and battle each other in a huge night long fight.

2-Vampires might also fight each other over hunting territory like any territorial animal, though they could work in groups as well.

3-Romanian vampires would often cut their victims faces into a permanent smile, putting them on stakes, and positioning in such a way that they were most likely to scare the living.

4-In many places there were people who were born as vampires. Really anyone who looked odd, was born under weird circumstances could be a vampire. In 19th Century Greece if the elder child began to grow sickly a mother might suspect that their youngest was a vampire. They would send their souls from their bodies in the form of a bluish flame, an animal, or person, to search for blood. They would also drain cows of their milk and blight fields, just as any undead vampire would.

While they were outside their body they were vulnerable, for if anyone moved their body they would die.

In one story from Transylvania a women fed some poor soldiers some porridge. When they'd finished they went to find and thank their hostess, and in the attic they found her with seven other bodies laying down. Afraid they fled. Looking back they saw seven lights descending on the house. THese were teh souls of the vampires, the witches they'd just left.

5-People were more likely to accuse those they knew of being vampires than to accuse strangers. This is because vampires were most likely to attack family members and friends. They did this as a subversion of Christian covenants (evil starts at home).

6-If a vampire could kill his whole family, then the entire village within seven years they would be able to move to a new country, become human, and have another family which would become vampires on their deaths.


Original Nine Things You Didn't Know about Vampires

1-Vampires are most likely to take the form of owls, not bats. Though they would also take the form of dragons, rats, cats, wolves, and even trees or pieces of straw.

2-Vampires could and often did get married, or returned to their mortal spouse. They would often have children with these mortals who were half vampire and half human.

These half-vampires had the power to see through the vampires illusions and kill them more easily than a regular mortal could.

In one tale a vampire was married to a woman for many years, and had a son with her. For some reason the tale doesn't make clear the woman decides she wants her vampire husband dead and so gets her son to kill him.

3-There were many types of vampires, one of the most commonly believed in occurred because people were believed to have multiple souls, one of which remained in a persons corpse for a number of days or even centuries after they'd died. (Depending on the person and the regional beliefs). Sometimes this soul would learn to leave the body, and could gain power by drinking blood and or milk. This soul was very much like a ghost. They had a solid form, but could slip through the tiniest cracks like water.

4-Vampires didn't leave bite marks as their magic allowed them to close up any wounds they made, that way they could kill their victims without leaving a trace.

5-Vampires could gain control over people's souls by making them sneeze three times in a row.

6-Sunlight almost never hurt vampires, rather the sound of the cock crowing in the morning (a sacred time and sound) or the day time in general caused them to loose the ability to move, or forced them to return to their bodies).

7-Blood held one of a persons souls. Thus it had magical powers, and taking a bit of it was like taking a bit of someones soul. That's why familiar spirits would drink the blood of the witches they were partnered with. In fairy tales people could also leave behind their life force inside blood so that they could live on in dolls, rags, or other objects.

Drinking blood allowed the vampire to steal a persons magical power, but it also not only killed the person but trapped or destroyed one of their souls.

8-Any soul which remained on earth would go crazy and become a vampire. Thus The Grim Reaper, Hermes and other psychopomps who lead souls into the land of the dead were actually protectors of mortal life. They didn't kill people, they took potential vampires to the after life in order to prevent vampires.

9-Vampires are related to fairies.
Vampires and fairies are very similar, and in fact vampires could be said to be a form of fairy.