Vlad III the Impaler (DRACULA)

Vlad III, Prince of Wallachia (c. 1431 – December 1476), more commonly known as the Impaler (Romanian: Vlad Ţepeş ) or Dracula, was a three-time voivode of Wallachia, ruling mainly from 1456 to 1462.


Historically, Vlad is best known for his resistance against the Ottoman Empire and its expansion[ and for the cruel punishments he imposed on his enemies.

In the English-speaking world, Vlad III is perhaps most commonly known for inspiring the name of the vampire in Bram Stoker's 1897 novel Dracula.

Names

His Romanian surname Dracula (also spelled "Draculea", "Drakulya,"drackuliea"), which Vlad was referred to in several documents, means "Son of the dragon" and points to his father, Vlad Dracul, who received that moniker from his subjects because he had joined the Order of the Dragon. Dracul, derived from the Latin word Draco meant "dragon", derived from the Greek word Δράκων (Dracon), though in modern Romanian it means "devil".

His post-mortem moniker of "Ţepeş" ("Impaler") originated in his killing opponents by impalement, a practice popularized by medieval Transylvanian pamphlets. In Turkish, he was known as "Kazıklı Voyvoda" which means "Impaler Prince".

Early life

Vlad was born in Sighişoara, Transylvania in the winter of 1431 to Vlad II Dracul, future voivode of Wallachia, and his wife, Princess Cneajna of Moldavia, daughter of Alexandru cel Bun. He had two older half-brothers, Mircea II and Vlad Călugărul, from his father's first marriage, and a younger brother, Radu cel Frumos.


In the year of his birth Vlad's father, known under the nickname the Dragon (Romanian: Dracul) had traveled to Nuremberg, today located in Germany, where he had been vested into the Order of the Dragon. At the age of five, young Vlad was also initiated into the Order.

Like his father, who was the son of the Wallachian voivode Mircea the Elder, in the early years of childhood, the future ruling prince Vlad the Impaler got a distinguished education, and mastered German and Latin. During the first reign of Vlad II, Vlad the Impaler accompanied his father to Targoviste - capital of Wallachia at that time.

The Byzantine chancellor Mikhail Doukas showed that, at Targoviste, the sons of boyars and ruling princes got a distinguished education from either Romanian or Greek scholars, coming from Constantinople. The young prince learned for sure; combat skills, geography, mathematics, science, language; Romanian, Latin, Bulgarian (church Slavic) and the classical arts and philosophy.

Life in Edirne

In 1436, Dracul ascended the throne of Wallachia. He was ousted in 1442 by rival factions in league with Hungary, but secured Ottoman support for his return agreeing to pay tribute to the Sultan and also send his two younger sons, Vlad and Radu the Handsome, to the Ottoman court, to serve as hostages of his loyalty.


Vlad was locked up in prison and often whipped and beaten because of his verbal abuse towards his captors and his stubborn behavior, while his younger brother Radu the Handsome was much easier to control. Radu converted to Islam, entered the service of Sultan Murad II's son, Mehmed II (later known as the Conqueror), and was allowed into the Ottoman royal court.

These years had a great influence on Vlad's character and led to Vlad's well-known hatred for the Ottoman Turks, the Janissary, his brother Radu the Handsome for becoming an Ottoman, and the young Ottoman prince Mehmed II (even after he became sultan). According to McNally and Florescu, he was jealous of his fathers preference for his elder half-brothers Mircea II and Vlad Călugărul, he also distrusted his own father for trading him to the Turks and betraying the Order of the Dragon's oath to fight them. It was in Turkey where Vlad first witnessed the act of impalement (the Ottomans often beheaded traitors and deserters).

Vlad was later released, corrected and taken to be educated in logic, the Quran and the Turkish and Persian language and literature. He would speak these languages fluently in his later years . He and his brother were also trained in warfare and riding horses. The boys' father, Vlad Dracul, was released quickly, in 1443, and with the support of the Ottomans he returned to Wallachia and took back his throne from Basarab II.

Vlad the Impaler as Aegeas, the Roman proconsul in Patras, crucifying Saint Andrew. Approximately 1470–1480, Belvedere Galleries, Vienna

In later accounts of these stories, Vlad's atrocities against the people of Wallachia have sometimes been interpreted as attempts to enforce his own moral code upon his country. According to the pamphlets, he appears to have been particularly concerned with female chastity. Maidens who lost their virginity, adulterous wives, and unchaste widows were all targets of Vlad's cruelty. Vlad also insisted that his people be honest and hard-working. Merchants who cheated their customers were likely to find themselves mounted on a stake beside common thieves.















Russian stories about Vlad the Impaler


The Russian or the Slavic version of the stories about Vlad the Impaler called "Skazanie o Drakule voevode" ("The Tale of Warlord Dracula") is thought to have been written sometime between 1481 and 1486. Copies were made from the 15th century to the 18th century, of which some twenty-two extant manuscripts survive in Russian archives. The oldest one, from 1490, ends as follows: "First written in the year Byzantine calendar (1486), on 13 February; then transcribed by me, the sinner Elfrosin, in the year 6998 (1490), on 28 January". The Tales of Prince Dracula is neither chronological nor consistent, but mostly a collection of anecdotes of literary and historical value concerning Vlad Ţepeş.

There are 19 anecdotes in The Tales of Prince Dracula which are longer and more constructed than the German stories. It can be divided into two sections: The first 13 episodes are non-chronological events most likely closer to the original folkloric oral tradition about Vlad. The last six episodes are thought to have been written by a scholar who collected them, because they are chronological and seem to be more structured. The stories begin with a short introduction and the anecdote about the nailing of hats to ambassadors heads. They end with Vlad's death and information about his family.

Of the 19 anecdotes there are ten that have similarities to the German stories. Although there are similarities between the Russian and the German stories about Vlad, there is a clear distinction with the attitude towards him. The Russian stories tend to give him a more positive File: he is depicted as a great ruler, a brave soldier and a just sovereign. Stories of atrocities tend to seem to be justified as the actions of a strong ruler. Of the 19 anecdotes, only four seem to have exaggerated violence. Some elements of the anecdotes were later added to Russian stories about Ivan the Terrible of Russia.

The nationality and identity of the original writer of the anecdotes Dracula is disputed. The two most plausible explanations are that the writer was either a Romanian priest or a monk from Transylvania, or a Romanian or Moldavian from the court of Stephen the Great in Moldova. One theory claims the writer was a Russian diplomat named Fyodor Kuritsyn.

Vampire legend

See also: Dracula#Historical and geographical references

It is most likely that Bram Stoker found the name for his vampire from William Wilkinson's book, An Account of the Principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia: with various Political Observations Relating to Them. It is known that Stoker made notes about this book. It is also suggested by some that because Stoker was a friend of a Hungarian professor (Ármin Vámbéry) from Budapest, Vlad's name might have been mentioned by this friend. Regardless of how the name came to Stoker's attention, the cruel history of the Impaler would have readily lent itself to Stoker's purposes. However, recent research suggests that Stoker actually knew little about the Prince of Wallachia.

The legend of the vampire was and still is deeply rooted in that region. There have always been vampire-like creatures in various stories from across the world. However, the vampire, as he became known in Europe, largely originated in Southern Slavic folklore – although the tale is absent in Romanian culture. A veritable epidemic of vampirism swept through Eastern Europe beginning in the late 17th century and continuing through the 1700s. The number of reported cases rose dramatically in Hungary and 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 Ludovico Fatinelli wrote his famous treatise on vampirism in Hungary. It was also during this period that authors and playwrights first began to explore the vampire legend. 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.

Given the history of the vampire legend in Europe, it is perhaps natural that Stoker should place his great vampire in the heart of the region that gave birth to the story. Once Stoker had determined on a locality, Vlad Dracula would stand out as one of the most notorious rulers of the selected region. He was obscure enough that few would recognize the name and those who did would know him for his acts of brutal cruelty; Dracula was a natural candidate for vampirism.

Romanian attitudes

Romanian folklore and literature, on the other hand, paints Vlad Ţepeş as a hero. His reputation in his native country as a man who stood up to both foreign and domestic enemies gives him the virtual opposite symbolism of Stoker's vampire. In Romania he is considered one of the greatest leaders in the country's history, and was voted one of "100 Greatest Romanians" in the "Mari Români" television series aired in 2006.

A contemporary portrait of Vlad III, rediscovered by Romanian historians in the late 19th century, had been featured in the gallery of horrors at Innsbruck's Ambras Castle. This original has been lost to history, but a larger copy, painted anonymously in the latter half of the sixteenth century, now hangs in the same gallery. This copy, unlike the all the cryptoportraits contemporary with Vlad III, seems to have given him a Habsburg lip, although he was not a member of the Habsburg lineage.

His image in modern Romanian culture clashes with foreign perceptions. It is the last part of a rather popular 19th century poem by Mihai Eminescu, "Scrisoarea a III-a", that helped turn Vlad's image into modern legend, by having him stand as a figure to contrast with presumed social decay under the Phanariotes and the political scene of the 19th century (even suggesting that Vlad's violent methods be applied as a cure). Notably though, the first author to depict Vlad as a Romanian heroic character was a Transylvanian who probably never travelled to Wallachia, Ioan Budai-Deleanu. Around 1800 he wrote a Romanian epic heroicomic poem, "Ţiganiada", in which prince Vlad Ţepeş stars as a fierce warrior fighting the Ottomans. Well in advance of Romanian literature at that time, this work, unlike Eminescu's, remained unpublished and ignored for a century, and did not exert any influence.

All accounts of his life describe him as ruthless, but only the ones originating from his Saxon detractors paint him as sadistic or insane. These pamphlets continued to be published long after his death, though usually for lurid entertainment rather than propaganda purposes. It has largely been forgotten until recently that his tenacious efforts against the Ottoman Empire won him many staunch supporters in his lifetime, not just in modern day Romania but in the Kingdom of Hungary, Poland, the Republic of Venice, the Holy See, and the Balkans. A Hungarian court chronicler reported that King Matthias "had acted in opposition to general opinion" in Hungary when he had Dracula imprisoned, and this played a considerable part in Matthias reversing his unpopular decision. During his time as a "distinguished prisoner" before being fully pardoned and allowed to reconquer Wallachia, Vlad was hailed as a Christian hero by visitors from all over Europe.

Film adaptations


Unlike the fictional Dracula films, there have been comparatively few movies about the man who inspired the vampire. The 1975 documentary In Search of Dracula explores the legend of Vlad the Impaler. He is played in the film by Christopher Lee, known for his numerous portrayals of the fictional Dracula in films ranging from the 1950s to the 1970s.

In 1979, a Romanian film called Vlad Ţepeş (sometimes known, in other countries, as The True Story of Vlad the Impaler) was released, based on his six-year reign and brief return to power in late 1476. The character is portrayed in a mostly positive perspective though the film also mentions the excesses of his regime and his practice of impalement. The lead character is played by Ştefan Sileanu.




Dark Prince: The True Story of Dracula, a film released in 2000, tells the life story of Vlad the Impaler mostly accurately while ending fictionally with Vlad rising from the grave and gaining eternal worldly life as well as supernatural abilities, implying that he has now become the fictional Dracula. Vlad is played in the film by Rudolf Martin.

Numerous film adaptations of Bram Stoker's novel Dracula and original works derived from it have incorporated Vlad the Impaler's history into the fictional Count Dracula's past, depicting them as the same person, including, among others: the 1972–1979 comic book series The Tomb of Dracula from Marvel Comics, the 1973 film Dracula, starring Jack Palance, and the 1992 film Bram Stoker's Dracula, starring Gary Oldman as Dracula, apparently making a likeness to Vlad the Impaler