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Vampires

vampire

Regardless of whether they are the heroes or villains of their story, vampires captivate our imaginations. These blood-sucking fiends (or, in some cases, friends) hide in the shadows, cloaked in the darkness of night. While vampires may hide from the sun, let us metaphorically shine a light on these ferocious, fanged creatures of the night.

Take a bite out of these vampire facts.

  • ‎One vampire myth is that vampires are compelled to count things. One way to deter vampires, then, is to throw seeds at them; while they stop to count the seeds, you run away. Sesame Street uses this myth as the basis for the character Count von Count, a vampire who likes to count things.
  • ‎Another myth is that only red-heads could become vampires.
  • In many vampire legends, vampires cannot enter a house or room without being invited in. However, once they have been invited in, they can return anytime they wish without being invited.
  • ‎Vampires were blamed for the spread of the bubonic plague in Europe during the 1300s.
  • ‎One of these myths is not like the others … Malaysian lore has many different types of vampires. One of those types of vampires is called the “Pelesit” that takes the form of a cricket or grasshopper, and can inhabit a body. You’ll know someone is possessed by a Pelesit if they can’t stop talking about cats.
  • And it’s not just bats — vampires can also turn into rats, owls, moths, foxes and wolves.
  • It was a common practice in 17th and 18th century Poland to bury corpses with a sickle across the neck if it was thought that the corpse could rise again as a vampire.
  • The same writing competition that produced Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein also produced the first vampire short-story. The Vampyre, written by John William Poldari (the physician of Lord Byron), was published in 1819.
  • Before The Vampyre, there are mentions of vampires in the eighteenth century. This includes Lord Byron’s epic poem, The Giaour.
  • ‎The 1872 novella, Carmilla, and Irish vampire legends heavily influenced Bram Stoker as he wrote the 1897 novel Dracula.
  • ‎The character of Dracula was based on a real person — Vlad Dracula, or Vlad the Impaler. He was a ruler of Wallachia, which is part of modern-day Romania, in the 1400s.
  • ‎One of the first vampire movies, Nosferatu, is considered an unofficial (and unauthorized) adaptation of Dracula. Names and details were changed for the film, but Stoker’s heirs still sued the filmmakers for plagiarism. While the court ruled in favor of Stoker’s family and ordered all copies of Nosferatu to be destroyed, a few survived.

Raise your stakes and check out some of these fang-tastic tales.

Vunce Upon a Time
I Love My Fangs
Upside Down
Vampire Island
The Vampire in My Bathtub
Isadora Moon Goes to School
A Taste for Red
Bunnicula
Amelia Fang and the Barbaric Ball
Middle School Bites
Vampires Don’t Wear Polka Dots
This Totally Bites
Pain in the Neck
Manny Loses His Fangs
The Sleepless Little Vampire
Vampire Baby
Vampire’s Boys Good Night
Dear Vampa
Vamperina Ballerina
Spooky Friends
Monster Academy
Millennium Snow
The Clockwork Scarab
Twilight
Vampire Kisses
The Coldest Girl in Coldtown
The Reformed Vampire Support Group
Eighth Grade Bites
The Vampire Diaries
Vampire Academy
Slayer
Marked
Hearts at Stake
A Living Nightmare
The Beautiful
Demons of the Ocean
The Eternal Kiss
Blue Bloods
Crave
Bloodlines
Evernight
The Last American Vampire
Dracula
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Interview with the Vampire
A Discovery of Witches
The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Vampire Slaying
Vampire Knits
The Vampire Archives
Bloody mary
Those Who Hunt the Night
Vampironica
Salem’s Lot
Dead Until Dark
Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Slayer
Bite Marks
Wild Hunger
Black Rose Alice
Dark Lover
American Vampire
In the Footsteps of Dracula

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