The Mystery Of Vampires : Cultural Connections

The myth of the vampire existed in a multitude of civilizations and cultures under various names such is strigoi (for the Romanian territory), Apotamkin, etc. But no matter the name, vampires will always refer to gothic creatures that drain the blood of humans, thus being monstrous.

Vampires have been around for centuries, they represent the fear of many things such as sexuality, race, gender, etc. and above all, they stand for the fear of diseases. Vampires have once been the symbol of horror due to their terrific depictions and were described as a threat to the humanity. Throughout time, the image of vampire has changed dramatically from a monstrous, inhumanely creature that doesn’t belong to human society to such an attractive and adaptive figure that expresses more of the human side than the evil. They developed human feelings, senses, and live within our society. Modern vampire movies are often more romantic and “sympathetic” comparing to the past. Vampires have abandoned their horror and evolved to a more

The vampire is the popular character in folklore from early civilization to modern life. The vampire appears in people mind with the passion of immortality, fear, love and mystery. People are attracted with vampire because the superstition of the vampire has done for centuries. Are they real? What are they? Where they come from? There are a few of thousand questions about the beliefs of vampire during many centuries. People don’t stop their curiosity with vampire- the legend that emulates the world cultures and religions. One of the most important reason that made vampire still popular until today is the great transformation. During the time, with the creative of human, vampire reforms to fit with modern age. According to the “Jung and the Jungians on Myth”, Steven Walke implies myth is a metaphor and come from the collective of human psyche. People use vampire as the tools to explain human thinking. Therefore, the charging in the thinking of people in different period of time will effect to the symbol of vampire. The research will explain the transformation of vampire by diving to three main topics: the vampire in the historical and religion thinking; the charging of vampire in literature and movie; the symbol of vampire in modern people thinking. Although three main topics seem separately, these connect and develop other idea like cause and effect. Depend on the information of history, the image of vampire in novel become reality. From the idea of vampire in novel, modern

 The most famous vampire is Dracula who derived from the book Dracula written  by Bram Stoker on May 26, 1897 (http://www.livescience.com/24374-vampires-real-history.html) To create this legendary character he combined old european folk tales with his own creative thoughts and turned his character Dracula into a world renowned legend. “It's a novel that used a mythological creature to tap into the fears of a generation and was so successful that the same exact mythological creature has been doing the same exact thing ever since.” The vampires that are popular today are much different from Dracula but they all owe something to Stoker's

This is the main aim of this investigation - to identify and discuss the factors which influenced the constantly changing literary and cultural depiction of vampires. What turned the symbol of threat and horror into a mysterious outsider?

“The word vampire (or vampyre) entered the English language in 1732, according to The Oxford English Dictionary” (Skal 200). One can’t go living life without knowing about the vampire because they’re everywhere! Someone can

The myths are not fully from one certain time period. Older myths said that vampires were not human at all, they were supernatural beings, possibly demonic, creatures that never took human form. During the Middle Ages, people put twists on the myths to make them corpses coming back to life, or even newer myths making vampires be born. Throughout

In the late nineteenth century vampires started to evolve into to what is the modern day vampire. Although they were still seen as “evil”, the vampires of the late twentieth century were no longer creepy creatures that would crawl out of their coffins to seduce women and feed from their blood. This was the start of a new period of

Vampire legends and myths are thousands of years old and find homes in most cultures around the world. From the chiang-shih of China to the Lamia of Greek legend, a mix of a woman and winged Serpent (Richardson, 2007). These myths, however, have little in common with modern tellings of the vampire, which are based on European myths. The European vampire myths originated in places like China, Tibet and India and was taken back to the coast of Greece and into the Balkans, which include the Carpathian Mountains and Transylvania (Richardson, 2007).

Throughout history, many reports of vampirism were told in Eastern Europe. Beresford (2008) Writes that the vampire folklore and superstition

Although they are not the oldest tales of vampire, much of what is popular in the modern vampire tale stems out of European vampire stories. Almost every aspect of the idea of the vampire is derived from the legends that originate from ancient Greece, Romania, the Romani people, and even live on in multiple places such as Serbia and England.

The generalization for vampires has been displayed in films and literature for hundreds of years. The stereotypical versions of vampires are that they have long fangs, sleep in coffins during the day, and suck the blood out of humans. Both novels contradict those stereotypes in different ways. To understand the diversity of the vampires described in both novels, one must examine the characteristics that the vampires display and the meaning and purpose behind them. David D. Gilmore’s book “Monsters” analyzes monsters and other mythical creatures. Gilmore describes why humanity invented the idea of

Different cultures have different ideas of the supernatural and the vampire in particular. The vampire that is known today comes from 9th Century southern Eastern Europe from a time of Christianity versus Paganism. Many of these myths are from the area now known as Romania, where Dracula is set, but the legends of demons and spirits go back much further to ancient Greece and China. The vampire seen in ‘Dracula’ is much closer to the original European folklore vampire of a blood drinking, coffin dwelling creature , although most of the traditional folklore vampires were not created by other vampires but by a problem with the burial ritual. The description of ‘Dracula’, as “demoniac” , this shows the fear that was created with vampires, the word ‘demonic’ having connotations of hell and darkness.

Scholars would theorize vampires were ways ancient people would associate with uncanny events that could not be explained due to their lack of education, primitive medicine and crude technology. According to Theodora Goss, “the vampire functioned as [a] scapegoat … [allowing] the villagers to confront their fears” (Theodora Goss). Due to this lack of education of death and disease, folklore stories would substitute modern science. Scientific American would state, “… [Vampires] tell an important story about how people understood natural events such as death, decomposition, and the transmission of disease prior to the advent of scientific medicine” (Scientific American). Due to this style of conversational exchange, stories of vampires would

To start, where do Vampires come from? People have been educated through the media and books that, vampires are creatures that are created when a human being is bitten by another vampire and afterward feeds on blood. The movies specify that one will not fully turn into a vampire unless he or she drinks blood. Most movies even show them as bad for the society. Movies such as blade, Dracula and vampire diary all show how human beings turn into vampires. According to Browning, “Vampires self-described nature begins to manifest around or after puberty” (4). A person who is a vampire does not discover it until he or she reaches adolescence age. Vampires has been known throughout existence and people actually believe that they really do exist. “The term vampire was not popularized until the early 18th