The Man Behind the Transylvanian Vampire: A Place Worth Visiting

Who was Vlad?

The Legend

It all started with a book written by Bram Stoker. In this book, he wrote about a vicious blood-sucking creature that would hide from the sun, sleep in coffins, and be pale as snow: the classic vampire that inspired so many others to write about these immortal creatures and develop the story in a more fashionable manner that would attract the public. As you well know, in the modern days it seems rather cool to be a vampire, and it inspires a lot of Halloween costumes. But you would be surprised to know that he didn't really know who Vlad Tepes was. He was inspired by Emily Gerard's article about the superstitions of Transylvania published in 1885, not the voivode.

So, then, who was Vlad? Was he as cruel and barbaric, as you heard? Well, let's take a trip down the history lane and see for ourselves.

The Reality (I'll try to keep it short and sweet.)

Vlad Tepes; The Impaler; Dracula: all these names have the root in the same legendary voivode of Wallachia.

He is an impressive character in the Romanian history to study, and the most known voivode of Romania, for that matter. He ruled over Wallachia three times between 1448 and his death. He, for sure, did not accomplish that easily. For starters, he and his brother were hostages in the Ottoman Empire from 1442 just so they could secure his father's loyalty to the Ottomans, who was the voivode of Wallachia at the time. You see, being under the Ottoman influence had its bad parts. They had to pay tributes to the sultan that were really expensive.

Although he was a hostage, they taught him how to fight, strategy, and how they win. This was a great advantage when he came to lead Wallachia later on, because he knew his enemy very well.

After his father and his elder brother's death, he wanted to claim Wallachia. However, he was not on the guest list so he crashed the party as the head of the Ottoman army in 1448. It was successful, but not for long because he was forced to flee back to the Ottoman Empire not long after and lived in exile until 1449. He managed to get back into the country, and wiggled his way back into Wallachia with the support of the Hungarian army in the summer of 1456. He then promised to fight against any Ottoman invasion.

So he began his voivodeship in a very bloody way. Multiple sources say that hundreds or thousands of people were executed during the first years. He had no mercy and killed everybody who plotted against his father and brother who were murdered—or himself, for that matter. He impaled every criminal. It was a time when you could leave a bag of gold on the street and nobody would ever touch it.

He also wouldn't accept the Ottoman suzerainty, which pissed off the sultan who wasn't getting any more tributes from him. The sultan ordered him to come to Constantinople, but Vlad impaled his envoy. Then Vlad started a campaign against him and more than 23,884 were killed at his order.

The sultan couldn't bear that, so he raised an army of 150,000 men to invade and occupy Wallachia, but Vlad was smarter. As the Ottoman army came for them they went more north, but on their way out he ordered for all the fountains to be poisoned and all other possible resources to be destroyed.

The Ottoman army camped, so at night Vlad and his troops dressed as Ottoman troops and came over them creating a chaos in the camp. The Ottomans didn't know who is friend or foe in the dark night. In the morning, the Ottomans that remained continued their invasion until a point where they were faced with the most horrific view ever: they came across the forest of the impaled. There were twenty thousand corpses impaled that created a horrific view, which was meant to break the army's spirit. And so it did, because they left.

Vlad made a lot of enemies, so it was no surprise that he was imprisoned for unclear reasons, released, had the throne again, and then was killed in a fight against Basarab Laiotă, supported by the Ottomans.

Vlad was a brutal voivode, but does it raise to your expectations? And would you dare to go into the home of this mass murderer?