12 VAMPIRE PERSONALITIES WHO WILL LIVE FOREVER
Between 1725 and 1760, in remote villages of southeastern Europe, cases of corporeal ghosts were reported, also known as the living dead. People feared that the dead, though buried, could still harm the living. Stories spread of the “Vampyrus Serviensis,” the Serbian vampire. In response, Pope Benedict XIV declared that vampires were “fictions of human fantasy.”
But the fantasies lived on. In 1897 Bram Stoker published the novel Count Dracula, the aristocratic bloodsucker. Vampires mirror our fears, anxieties and desires, from unbridled sexuality to rampant capitalism. They’re the subjects of films, TV series, plays, ballets. The Vampires Collection celebrates one of the most popular folklore characters of all time. Credits
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Arnold Paole
88
Description
Does the suit make the man or the man make the suit? For the feared Sith Lord of Star Wars fame, it was definitely the former. His great powers, along with his air-compressor breathing and imposing baritone, were all thanks to the suit. Beneath it was a horribly mutilated man with charred skin and lungs.
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Vlad III
88
Description
A landowner in a Croatian village, he died suddenly in 1656. Villagers were terrorized by his nocturnal visits; a rap on a door would lead to a death in that house. His wife said his corpse raped her. Authorities dug up his grave and decapitated him. Peace returned.
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Shoemaker of Silesia
88
Description
As Facebook, now known as Meta, faces growing censure for prioritizing profit over its social impact, its CEO is peddling the metaverse, where you’re not just viewing content, you’re in it! The Zuck says you’ll be able to dance “with other people as if you were in other places” and be “engaged more naturally.”
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Camilla
88
Description
Famous figure of Hebrew folklore, known as the “night monster.” First wife of Adam, she refused to be subservient and fled, joining with fallen angel Samael. Said to have vampiric qualities, she preyed on human infants—the children of Eve (Adam’s second wife).
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Brunhilda
88
Description
The first reports of the buried dead harming the living came out of villages of southeastern Europe in the 18th century. In Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Count Dracula, an aristocratic bloodsucker added a compelling twist to those stories. The Vampires Collection celebrates one of the most popular folklore characters of all time.
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Elizabeth Bathory
88
Description
The first reports of the buried dead harming the living came out of villages of southeastern Europe in the 18th century. In Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Count Dracula, an aristocratic bloodsucker added a compelling twist to those stories. The Vampires Collection celebrates one of the most popular folklore characters of all time.
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Dracula
88
Description
A Filipino vampiric monster that detaches her torso from her lower half by night, sprouts wings and sucks out the blood and viscera of human victims with a long, tubular tongue. Normal by day, she dies if she doesn’t reconnect with her lower half before daylight.
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Nosferatu
88
Description
The first reports of the buried dead harming the living came out of villages of southeastern Europe in the 18th century. In Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Count Dracula, an aristocratic bloodsucker added a compelling twist to those stories. The Vampires Collection celebrates one of the most popular folklore characters of all time.
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Lord Ruthven
88
Description
In 1816, John Polidori, personal physician to poet Lord Byron, wrote this short novel based on a fragment written by his employer. It is the first vampire tale in English and the first to depict the vampire as a suave aristocrat, modeled on Byron himself.
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Varney the Vampire
88
Description
In 1892, tuberculosis ravaged the Browns of Rhode Island. With one dying son left, Mr. Brown agreed to dig up the family graves. Mercy’s corpse looked fresh. She was sucking the life out of her brother. She was burned; the son died two months later.
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Mercy Brown
88
Description
In a Serbian village in 1725, nine people died with a 24-hour illness. They all said the dead Plogojowitz tried to strangle them while sleeping. He was exhumed by authorities (no decomposition, long nails, fresh blood on his mouth), then staked and burned.
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The Vamp
88
Description
A soldier returns home in Serbia in 1727 haunted by fears of an early death after killing a vampire. He dies in a fall, then four villagers claimed he visited them at night. They die too. His exhumed body is full of fresh blood. He and the other four villagers are staked.