"Leesten to them - the cheeldren uff de night!"
Posted on 06/17/2014 11:15:54 AM PDT by nickcarraway
Estonian researchers believe they may have finally discovered the whereabouts of “Dracula’s” grave, which is in Italy and not the Romanian Transylvanian Alps as first thought.
The inspiration behind Bram Stoker’s 1897 gothic novel “Dracula” is thought to be Vlad III, the 15th century Prince of Wallachia in Eastern Europe. Known posthumously as Vlad the Impaler, the ruler was known for his brand of cruelty across Europe, which included impaling his enemies.
Vlad’s ultimate enemy were the Ottomans. Depictions of his endless cruelty made history books, securing his reputation as one of the biggest villains in Turkey’s collective consciousness, as written by Emrah Güler of the Hürriyet Daily News in 2012. Vlad’s story was also converted into a ballet last year in Turkey.
Born in 1431, Count Vlad Tepes was part of a noble family who belonged to the Order of the Dragon, a group that was founded as a means of protecting Christianity in Eastern Europe from Ottoman expansion. His father was nicknamed Dracul, meaning “Dragon,” so the young Vlad became known as Dracula, or “son of Dragon.”
In 1476, Vlad Tepes disappeared in battle. While some sources have claimed he died, researchers claim he was in fact imprisoned by the Turks, who hauled him away in chains. His daughter Maria was meanwhile brought to the Neapolitan court, whose ruling family was allied with her own family, where she was adopted and eventually married to a Neapolitan nobleman.
Scholars from the University of Tallinn say they have discovered evidence that suggests the count was taken prisoner, ransomed to his daughter in Italy and then buried in a church in Naples.
Researchers are claiming a newly uncovered headstone in Naples’ Piazza Santa Maria la Nova, in the same graveyard as his daughter and son-in-law, could be his final resting place.
The headstone was discovered by Neapolitan student, Erika Stella, who was writing a dissertation on the history of the church. Stella shared the photograph on the Internet and experts identified it with a certain level of confidence after years of research.
Medieval history scholar Raffaello Glinni said the 16th century tomb is covered in images and symbols of the House of the Transylvanian “Carpathians,” and not the tomb of an Italian nobleman.
“When you look at the bas-relief sculptures, the symbolism is obvious. The dragon means Dracula and the two opposing sphinxes represent the city of Thebes, also known as Tepes. In these symbols, the very name of the count Dracula Tepes is written,” Glinni told reporters.
Researchers have applied for permission to investigate the grave from Italian officials.
Thought she was “The Thing”....
He knew how to deal with Islam...I give him credit for that.
And he was elected only seven years after 9/11...didn't take the country long to go blind, did it?
That's not true at all!
Sometimes he impaled his friends too.
Vlad was a good, extraordinary man who held the evil plague of Islam from Entering Europe’s back door. The world would be a much better place if our Western leaders had a little more Vlad in them, and a little less boy George.
Yeah, but so many of the electorate has been educated by Progressives for decades. I remember the first time I saw this - in grade school. We used to talk about America as a melting pot - then one year the 'Social Studies' text book started talking about a mosaic.
Good thing his dad wasn't nicknamed "dog". :-P
Every “Adult Swim” fan knows that Dracula is buried in Memphis, Tennessee.
Oh, sure. Open that grave? Go for it, guys!!!
It wasn’t their heads that Vlad put on sharpened sticks. . . .
"Leesten to them - the cheeldren uff de night!"
He scared the sultan so bad with his twenty thousand strong forest of the impaled, that the sultan turned tail and ran and left the fight for others.
I give him no credit. A truly evil man. One does not have to pick sides between evil and evil. :-).
What a leader! /S
I’m not trying to claim that he was the holiest man who lived. I give him his due for crushing one of the greatest dangers-—if not THE greatest-—to civilization.
How much better off would people be, worldwide, if the threat of modern Islam were broken? How many murdered would still be drawing breath?
Was Dracula evil? A lot of his atrocities were exaggerated and possibly invented by his neighbors who had also refused to send any money or do anything when he needed their help against the Turks. I read a Historian that said that very likely Dracula’s “crimes” were invented for two reasons: as propaganda from Dracula’s “friends” who wanted to excuse their crimes and greed. 2) Smut sells.
I don’t have any doubt he was impaling lots of Turks, but considering the Romanians view him as a national hero, I am not so sure he was a mass murderer of his own people (well, except maybe the Boyars... but, they had it coming.)
After all these years, he still scares the s-—t out of me.
Yes the Romanians would like to rewrite history ... just like liberals in this country. Doesnt change the body of evidence that Vlad was one sick and evil SOB. Nailing hats to peoples’ heads. Bizarre.
A ballet? That seems so incongruous.
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