Visum Et Repertum

Vlad II, called Tepes (the Impaler)

While still in the bosom of Sigismund's protection, Vlad Dracul sired three legitimate sons, the second of whom was also named Vlad, born in December 1431. He was groomed from childhood as a prince of the blood: proud, cold, and unfeeling. His political science was that a prince should be feared rather than loved, and he carried that philosophy into his adult life.

Fascinated as a boy by death, in the form of hangings of criminals at the Jewler's Donjon near the castle where he grew up, Vlad the Younger soon showed himself a cunning and devious child. He avoided the fate of one of his brothers, who was buried alive by the boyars, or landowners, of Wallachia, as Vlad I's popularity waned.

Held by the Turks after his father's death, he served in the Turkish army as an officer, learning the art of torture and impalement. Finally escaping from the Sultan's forces, he hid away in Moldavia until, with the aid of a force put together at great effort, he was able to reclaim the Wallachian throne in 1456, at the age of 25. His ascent to the throne was greeted by the arrival of a comet in the skies over Europe, an event of dread for most, but for Vlad an auspicious sign. He worked its image into his coin, the Wallachian eagle on the reverse to remind the carrier to whom the comet referred. He fortified Bucharest against the return of the Turk, solidifying the resistance begun by the boyars Janos Hunyadi and Michael the Brave.

To cement his power, he had to remove the boyars from their lands. In the spring of 1457, on Easter day, he took a force and surrounded the boyars at feast. He took their wives and children and impaled them around the feast tables, then chained the men and carried them away as slave labor on his new palace.

Vlad's rule was harsh and cruel, the threat of impalement a constant deterrent to crime and disloyalty. A typical story of the time recalls this in vivid detail:

"Having asked the old, the ill, the lame, the poor, the blind, and the vagabonds to a large dining hall in Tirgoviste, Dracula ordered that a feast be prepared for them. On the appointed day, Tirgoviste groaned under the heavy weight of the large number of beggars who had come. The prince's servants passed out a batch of clothes to each one, then they led the beggars to a large mansion where tables had been set... The beggars had a feast that became legendary... Most of them became dead drunk... and became incoherent, they were suddenly faced with fire and smoke on all sides. The prince had ordered his servants to set the house on fire... the doors were locked... When the fire naturally abated, there was no trace of any living soul."

The tales of Vlad Dracula's cruelty became legendary. Romanian folklore holds hundreds of horribly graphic descriptions of punishments he meted out on his subjects for crimes, real and imagined. He is accused of the deaths of 40,000 to 100,000 people, and not just by impalement. He employed strangling, hanging, burning, boiling, skinning, roasting, and burying them alive. He is known to have ordered cannibalism on prisoners.

At the end of his haunted life, Vlad Dracula is supposed to have been buried at Snagov, under the monastery he helped rebuild, on an island in the middle of a lake. The forest of Vlasia surrounds the lake, whose still waters were said to have been witness to atrocities committed by Dracula there in the ancient monastery.

 

Vampire, Gothic and related literature

have a chat in the Forum

Vampire Pictures

Run your own website? Get a discount on all our products!