Dracula castle
inspired me to make this painting.
Dracula, one of the most famous characters in the world, was
always linked to Transilvania province - Romania, which is believed to be a
foggy mysterious land, with lots of vampires and castles. The legend tells that
the famous Count played a very important role in the 15th century in this part
of the world, as the ruler of the Romanian province Wallachia and he was a
bloody vampire. The real history tells us that Vlad the Impaler (in Romanian:
Vlad Tepes) ruled in Wallachia (Tara Romaneasca at the border with
Transilvania) for about 8 years (1448; 1456-1462; 1476). Vlad Tepes was born in
November or December 1431, in the fortress of Sighisoara, Romania. His father,
Vlad Dracul, (the name inspired
author Bran Stoker, to write the novel Dracula) at that time appointed
military governor of Transylvania by the emperor Sigismund, (the emperor of
austro-hungarian empire) had been inducted into the Order of the Dragon about
one year before. The order - which could be compared to the Teutonic Order of
Knights - was a semi-military and religious society, originally created in 1387
by the Holy Roman Emperor, to protect the interests of Catholicism, and to
crusade against the Turks. He was for instance particularly known throughout
his land for his fierce insistence on honesty and order. Almost any crime, from
lying and stealing to killing, could be punished by impalement. Being so
confident in the effectiveness of his law, Dracula placed a golden cup on
display in the central square of Tirgoviste city. The cup could be used by
thirsty travellers, but had to remain on the square. According to the available
historic sources, it was never stolen and remained entirely unmolested
throughout Vlad's reign. Very special relations were between Vlad and the Saxon merchants from the cities of
Sibiu and Brasov. The Saxons were brought to the south of Transylvania in the
12th and 13th centuries, in order to defend the borders with Wallachia, but
also for colonizing the lands. The battle against the Turks began in 1459 with
Vlad`s refusal to pay the requested tribute. More than this, he fixed by nails
the Turkish messengers` turbans on their head, as they didn`t want to uncover
themselves, saying that it was forbidden by their religion. The alliance with
Mattias Corvin, king of Hungary, played a very important role for Vlad. In the
winter of 1461-1462, he organized a surprise campaign in the south of Danube,
during which more than 20.000 Turks were killed. In his letter to Mattias
Corvin, the Impaler enumerated with a macabre accuracy the burnt places, but
the number of victims also: 23.884 exactly, without counting the ones burnt
alive in their houses or the ones whose heads weren`t presented to my officers.
The reply came quickly. In the spring of 1462, the sultan Mehmed the 2nd
crossed the Danube with a 60.000 soldiers army (almost the double of the army
which Vlad had at his disposal) and went directly to Targoviste. The famous
night attack of the Impaler`s army happened in June, this attack causing panic
in the Turkish camp, making them retire. But this doesn’t prevent the Turkish
army from going forward.
Finding himself without allies, Vlad, forced to retreat towards Tirgoviste,
burned his own villages and poisoned the wells along the way, so that the
Turkish army would find nothing to eat or drink. Moreover, when the Sultan,
exhausted, finally reached the capital city, he was confronted by a most
gruesome sight: thousands of stakes held the remaining carcasses of some 20,000
Turkish captives, a horror scene which was ultimately nicknamed the
"Forest of the Impaled." This terror tactic deliberately
stage-managed by Dracula was definitely successful; the scene had a strong
effect on Mehmed's most stout-hearted officers, and the Sultan, tired and
hungry, admitted defeat. Nevertheless, following his retreat from Wallachian
territory, Mehmed left the next phase of the battle to Vlad's younger brother
Radu, the Turkish favorite for the Wallachian throne. At the head of a Turkish
army and joined by Vlad's detractors, Radu pursued his brother to Poenari
castle on the Arges river.
According to the legend, this is when Dracula's wife, in order to escape
Turkish capture, committed suicide by hurling herself from the upper
battlements, her body falling down the precipice into the river below - a scene
exploited by Francis Ford Coppola's production. Vlad, who was definitely not
the kind of man to kill himself, managed to escape the siege of his fortress by
using a secret passage into the mountain. Helped by some peasants of the Arefu
village, he was able to reach Transylvania where he met the new king of
Hungary, Matthias Corvinus. However, instead of providing some help, Matthias
arrested Dracula and imprisoned him at the Hungarian capital of Visegrad.
Vlad`s decline was due to a fake letter, written most probably by the Saxon
merchants, letter which proved the ties between the Impaler and the Turks. Thus
Vlad was accused of treason and arrested at the order of Mattias Corvin. There
was also another reason for which the Hungarian king acted like this. In the
winter of 1462, Vlad had asked for help from Mattias Corvin, who had received
money from the Pope in that purpose. So, the accusing and arresting of the
Wallachian ruler hid also the fact that Mattias Corvin didn`t help Vlad, but
didn`t return the money received for the Crusade either. Between 1462 and 1474
Vlad the Impaler was prisoner at Visegrad and Pesta. Moreover, his defamation
began. The German stories, spread by Mattias Corvin and the Saxon merchants
would create a bloody and cruel image of Vlad in all the Western Europe.
In 1475, after the intervention of Stephan the Great (the Moldavian ruler),
Vlad was released and he returned in 1476 on the throne of Wallachia. It would
only last one month, as he was killed in December, after a conspiracy of the
boyars. The legend goes that Vlad was buried at the Snagov monastery (only the
body, as the head had been taken to the Turks, at Constantinople), but the
archaeological research from 1930s only discovered some horse bones. His body
lies in front of the altar. In 1935, a richly dressed but beheaded corpse was
exhumed at Snagov, a fate known to have overtaken Dracula, whose head was
supposedly wrapped, perfumed and dispatched as a gift to the Turkish sultan.
The name of the already well-known Wallachian prince became even more famous
after Bram Stoker from Dublin (1847-1912) has published his novel
"Dracula" in 1897.
The author was a stage director, member in the Golden Down parapsychology
association in London and a passionate researcher of Irish and Hindu vampirism.
His novel, published in millions of copies, has as its main hero a vampire, Szekler
count, named Dracula.
The action develops against a Transylvanian background about which the author
himself says: " I read that every known superstition in the world is
gathered into the horseshoe of the Carpathians, as if were, the centre of some
sort of imaginative whirlpool."
In the first pages of this book we meet a young attorney (Jonathan Harker) who
has been asked to journey out to Dracula's castle to arrange certain real
estate transactions. Harker's carriage, driven by a man whose hands are claws,
hurtles at the edges of precipices until he is finally discharged in the
darkness to be met and taken to Dracula's castle. There, everything is more or
less as we expect it, only much more so. His staying there becomes full of
terror as he finds out part of Count's secrets. He writes a diary for his
fiancee, Mina Murray, who is waiting for him in England. Think of the monstrous
ego of the vampire. He thinks himself so important that he is willing to live
forever, even under the dreary conditions imposed by his condition. Avoiding
the sun, sleeping in coffins, feared by all, he nurses his resentments.
The Count leaves to London. One of his victims, Lucy Westenra, is a free spirit
who has three suitors and is Mina's best friend. Lucy becomes an Un-Dead after
her death. Her soul is saved by Lord Arthur and his friends: Dr. Seward,
Professor Van Helsing and Quincey Morris. Mina becomes the next target.
Professor Van Helsing is the brain behind all the actions against The Count.
Using his magical powers, Dracula is cooling off his thirst with Mina's blood.
Will she become an "undead" too? Her friends are decided to not let
this happen. Without a safe place to rest Dracula is forced to go back home, in
Transylvania.
The story has a happy end. After following for days the group in charge with
delivering the chest containing Dracula's body, Dr. Steward, Quincey Morris,
Jonathan and Van Helsing managed to do their job right in the last minute of
the sunset. On the instant, came the sweep and flash of Jonathan's great knife
through his throat whilst at the same moment Mr. Morris's bowie knife plunged
into the heart.
Beside the negative fame brought by the name of Dracula and by the stories of
the Transylvanian Saxon merchants, at the end of the 19th century another
decisive element was added at the future renown of the Romanian ruler. The Bram
Stoke’s book. Bram Stoker had never travelled to Romania. His information came
from the London libraries, as Jonathan Harker himself, one of the main
characters of the novel, stated: “Having had some time at my disposal when in
London, I had visited the British Museum, and made search among the books and
maps in the library regarding Transylvania; it had struck me that some
foreknowledge of the country could hardly fail to have some importance in
dealing with a nobleman of that country. I find that the district he named is
in the extreme east of the country, just on the borders of three states,
Transylvania, Moldavia, and Bukovina, in the midst of the Carpathian mountains;
one of the wildest and least known portions of Europe. The region that Harker
describes is the Bargau region, near Bistrita. He tells that just in the pass
which links Transylvania with Moldavia, in the ruins of a castle, Dracula, a
Transylvanian (!!) count lives and every night he turns into a vampire.
The place where the castle is isn`t identified: “I was not able to light on any
map or work giving the exact locality of the Castle Dracula, as there are no
maps of this country as yet to compare with our own Ordance Survey Maps”. So,
the famous Dracula`s castle is not located at Bran (wrongly linked to the
legend)), but at Bargau, where, in order to exploit the legend, a mediaeval
looking hotel, called “Dracula Castle” was built in the 1980s. The last reign
being finished with his death. Let`s not forget that in those times the rulers
came to the throne and left it, according to the interests and the support of
the boyars and of the Turks, too.
George
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