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FREQUENT HANDICAPS THAT VAMPIRES MUST COPE WITH IN UNLIFE
By Strigoi (Patick Johnson)
Inability to Enter a Dwelling Without Being First Invited In
"He may not enter anywhere at first, unless there be some member of the household to bid him to come; though afterwards he can come as he pleases."
- Professor Van Helsing in Mina Harker's Journal, Chapter XVIII of Dracula by Bram Stoker
The closest that I can find to this in the original myths and folk beliefs is a quotation from a text by Father Leone Allaci, originally published in 1645, concerning the beliefs on his native Greek island, Chios:
"For very often, inhabiting this body, he [the devil] comes forth from the grave, and going abroad through villages and other places where men dwell, more especially at night, he makes his way to what so ever house he will, and knocking upon the door he calls aloud by name in a hoarse voice one who dwells within. If such a one answers he is lost; for assuredly he will die the next day. But if he does not answer he is safe. Wherefore in this island of Chios all the inhabitants, if during the night they are called by anyone, never make reply the first time. For, if a man be called the second time it is not the vrykolakis who is summoning him but somebody else."
(This last quote can be found on page 224 of The Vampire in Europe by Montague Summers.)
A Romanian variation of this latter belief is given by Agnes Murgoci in her article "The Vampire in Roumania" in Folk-Lore, vol. 37, no. 4 (Dec., 1926):
"At anytime of the year it is well, especially at night-time, never to answer until someone calls you three times, for vampires can ask a question twice but not three times. If you reply when they speak to you, they may turn your mouth askew, make you dumb, cut off your foot, or kill you."
Inability to Cross Water
"It is said, too, that he can only pass running water at the slack or the flood of tide."
- Professor Van Helsing in Mina Harker's Journal, Chapter XVIII of Dracula by Bram Stoker
"The Count, even if he takes the form of a bat, cannot cross the running water of his own volition, and so he cannot leave the ship."
- Professor Van Helsing in Jonathan Harker's Journal, Chapter XXV of Dracula by Bram Stoker
It is not known how Stoker arrived at this notion. Perhaps he invented it. But there are precedents for this in folk beliefs.
On some of the Greek islands, including Hydra, Kythnos and Mitylene there was occasionally found the practice of re-burying the corpse of an alleged vampire on a desert island in belief that the vampire could not cross the water to another shore.
In his book The Customs and Lore of Modern Greece (first published in 1892, reprinted in 1968 by Argonaut, Inc.), Rennell Rodd wrote:
"Hydra is said to have been formerly infected by vampires, but a zealous bishop transferred them to the unoccupied island of Therasia, in the Santorin group, where they still walk at night, but being unable to cross salt water, find no one to torment."
One case of this practice on the island of Kythnos recorded by Henry Hautteweur in his Le Folklore de l'Isle de Kythnos (Brussels, 1898) is translated on pages 268-70 of The Vampire in Europe by Montague Summers, first published in 1928. Here the vampire broukolakas) is a dead man named Andilaveris who terrorized his village every night but Friday, the only time when he must rest in the grave. Finally the village priest, the night watchmen of the cemetery and Church, and some other people exhumed the corpse on a Friday night, put it in a burlap sack, and transported it by barque to the tiny, uninhabited island of Daskaleio. But, at some point on this journey, apparently after they reached the islet, the vampire revived from his slumber and attacked the priest by throwing mud and excrement. But somehow (the text doesn't say) they managed in the end to bury him at a remote spot on the
desert island.
Montague Summers gives another example in his earlier book, The Vampire: His Kith and Kin, first published in 1927. This one is taken from Travels and Discoveries in the Levant, Volume I, p. 213, by Newton (London, 1866). Summers wrote, as one complete paragraph, the following:
"Newton....says that in Mitylene the bodies of those who will not lie quiet in their gravcs are transported to a small adjacent island, a mere eyeot without inhabitants were they are re-interred. This is an effectual bar to any future molestation for the vampire cannot cross salt water. Running water he too can only pass at the slack or flood of the tide."
On first impression, this quote from Summers may suggests that Newton himself said something to the effect that: "Running water he too can only pass at the slack or flood of the tide." This could then be taken as evidence that Bram Stoker, author of Dracula, got his notion directly or indirectly from Newton's book. However, on reflection, it seems that, without further evidence, it is at least as likely that this sentence has nothing to do with what Newton wrote and that Summers last sentence in the paragraph was simply inspired by Bram Stoker's novel, Dracula. The prime piece of further evidence would of course be the full quotations on the subject in Newton's book.
Cases of vampires unable to pursue someone any longer after the latter crossed running water are also found in Chinese tales. For examples, see the third tale and the last tale that I give in Gallery 6 under "The Undead in China."
There are also precedents in Western Europe, albeit these apply more directly to other supernatural creatures.
For example, according to Katherine Briggs, Oxford scholar and former president of The English Folklore Society, in her book An Encyclopedia of Fairies (Pantheon Books, 1976), p. 336:
"If chased by evil fairies, one could generally escape by leaping to safety across running water, particularly a southward flowing stream."
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In the above photo from the English language version of Dracula produced by Universal Pictures in 1931, Count Dracula (Bela Lugosi) loses his cool when Professor Van Helsing (Edward Van Sloan) offers him a cigarette. On the inner face of the lid is a mirror.
Reflection Not Seen in a Mirror
"He throws no shadow; he make in the mirror no reflect, as again Jonathan Harker observed."
- Professor Van Helsing in Mina Harker's Journal, Chapter XVIII of Dracula by Bram Stoker
There are no recorded folk beliefs that directly match this. This notion seems to be Bram Stoker's own invention.
But all over Europe there was once a taboo against there being an non-draped mirror in the same room with a corpse which was sometimes interpreted as being that the spirit of the dead person might become trapped in the mirror or that if a mirror reflected both the body of the dead and that of a living person at the same time, the living person would die soon after the dead person was buried.
And there was the more basic belief found in many parts of the world, including both ancient and 19'th century Greece, that the reflected image of a person actually was his soul.
Although there is no precedence in folklore where the vampire is not reflected by a mirror, there are at least two ways that the notion can be constructed from folk beliefs.
One way is to adopt the idea that the image of a person in a mirror is the soul of the person. Then, if the vampire has no soul, he has no reflection.
A second way is rather the opposite. First assume that all reflected images in a mirror are simply those of material bodies, as modern science explains it. But then also assume, as is the case in the folklore of Gypsies and occasionally some other Europeans, that the vampire which appears above ground is actually the immaterial soul of the dead person which leaves the corpse at night. It then appears to be the animated material body when viewed directly. But the seemingly material image is projected from the vampire's soul directly to the mind of its living observer. Hence, the vampire can't be seen in a mirror.
But, alas, until either all the dead truly rise from their graves, or a time machine is invented, we will probably never know for sure what the old folks or Bram Stoker would have to say about such theories.
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The sketch above shows the common garlic plant( allium sativum). Note the clusters of flowers at the top of two of the stems. Before the plant is fully mature, the flower buds are inside a thin white shell which appears somewhat like the more familiar bulb between the stem and the root which contains the cloves and grows below ground.
Aversion to Garlic
Shortly after I had arrived, a big parcel from abroad came for the Professor. He opened it...and showed a great bundle of white flowers...
"These are for you, Miss Lucy," he said...
"...This is medicinal but you do not know how. I put him in your window, I make pretty wreath, and hang him around your neck so that you sleep well..."
..."Oh Professor, I believe you are putting a joke on me. Why, these flowers are only common garlic."
- Dr. Seward's Diary, Chapter X of Dracula by Bram Stoker.
Arthur bent and kissed her, and then we sent him and Quincey out of the tomb; the Professor and I sawed the top of the stake; Then we cut off the head and filled the mouth with garlic...
- Dr. Seward's Diary, Chapter XVI of Dracula by Bram Stoker.
"Then there are things which so afflict him that he has no power, as the garlic that we know of..."
- Professor Van Helsing in Mina Harker's Journal, Chapter XVIII of Dracula by Bram Stoker.
We know from Bram Stoker's research notes, including excerpts from newspapers, magazines,and books he collected while writing Dracula, that he knew about Romanian folk belief concerning both garlic and vampires from, at least, the article by Emily Gerard, "Transylvanian
Superstitions" published in the July, 1885 issue of the magazine The XIX Century.
Gerard wrote in this article:
"In very obstinate cases it is further recommended to cut of the head and replace it in the coffin with the mouth filled with garlic, or to extract the heart and burn it, strewing the ashes over the grave."
Almost thirty years after the publication of Bram Stoker's Dracula, Agnes Murgoci wrote in her article "The Vampire in Roumania" (Folk-Lore, December, 1926):
"Garlic keeps off vampires, wolves, and evil spirits, and millet has a similar action. On St. Andrew's Eve [Nov. 29] and St. George's Eve [April 22], and before Easter and the New Year, windows should be anointed with garlic in the form of a cross, garlic put on the door and
everything in the house, and all the cows in the cow shed should be rubbed with garlic. When vampires do enter, they do by the chimney or the keyhole, so these orifices require special attention when garlic is rubbed in. Even although the window is anointed with garlic, it is wisest to keep it shut."
(Curiously, in her article "Transylvanian Superstitions", Emily Gerard mentions the practice of putting square cut blocks of green turf in doors and windows on the Feast Day of St. George, April 23, to keep witches from entering houses, barns, and stables. She also says that the witches
hold a special Sabbath on the Eve of St. George.)
Garlic was also used in other countries for the same purpose. These countries include Bulgaria and Bavaria.
There was also an interesting parallel in Scotland. According to the Encyclopedia of Superstitions by Edwin and Mona Radford (Philosophical Library, 1949), garlic was hung about houses in Scotland on All Hollow's Evil to keep out evil spirits.
Impeded by the Branch of a Thorny Plant
"The branch of wild rose on his coffin keep him that he move not from it..."
- Professor Van Helsing in Mina Harker's Journal, Chapter XVIII of Dracula by Bram Stoker.
Stoker's source for this was probably the book about Transylvania by Emily Gerard, The Land Beyond the Forest. There she not only reproduced her article "Transylvanian Superstitions" but also wrote that, at burial, a wild rose was placed on a corpse to prevent it, or
its spirit, from leaving the coffin.
In his book Mytholgie du Vampire en Roumanie (Monaco: Editions du Rocher, 1981) Adrien Cremene states that in Romania sometimes the head and feet of a corpse alleged to be or suspected to become a vampire are bound with thorns or that of a kind of briar.
Montague Summers wrote on page 309 of his book The Vampire in Europe, first published in 1928, that:
"...on the Eve of St. George's Day in Transylvania there used not to be a Saxon farm in Transylvania which had not the gates of the yard decorated with branches of wild rose bushes in order to keep out the witches."
Often branches of hawthorn were used for such purposes.
One example of this is given in Vampires, Death, and Burial by Paul Barber (Yale University Press, 1988):
"In Eastern Serbia, a small hawthorn peg may be driven into the grave, beside the cross, to prevent the corpse from becoming a vampire."
In the book The Lore of the Forest by Alexander Porteus, first published in London in 1928 by George Allen & Unwin, it is written:
"Thorns, thistles, etc., are credited with having a certain magic power owing to their capacity to lay hold of a thing. On Walpurghis Night [April 30 - the Eve of May Day], the night on which all witches met to hold their unholy revels, it was customary in Bohemia to place branches of hawthorn, gooseberry, wild rose, and other prickly plants on the thresholds of the cow-houses in order to catch the witches and prevent them from entering."
Hawthorn was also considered by some people in Eastern and Central Europe to be the best material for a stake used to destroy a vampire.
A Christian rationalization for the power of thorny plants over vampires and witches is that the plant represents the crown of thorns worn by Jesus after he was condemned to die on the cross.
But the general belief is older than Christianity. In his book Fasti, the ancient pagan Roman author Ovid gives a tale where a branch of white thorn, a species of hawthorn, is placed in a window to prevent the blood-sucking striges from preying upon an infant. (More details about Ovid's account are given in Gallery 2 of this web site.)
Vulnerable to Bullets
"...a sacred bullet fired into the coffin kill him so he be true dead."
- Professor Van Helsing in Mina Harker's Journal, Chapter XVIII of Dracula by Bram Stoker.
It seems most probable that Stoker also got the general notion here from Emily Gerard. In "Transylvanian Superstitions", she wrote:
"....every person killed by a Nosferatu likewise becomes a vampire after death, and will continue to suck the blood of innocent people till the spirit has been exorcised, either by opening the grave of the person suspected and driving a stake through the corpse, or firing a pistol shot into the coffin."
I haven't found any credible examples in folk belief where the bullet is blessed, but there is a precedent for silver bullets used against vampires in folklore. In the archives of the University of California at Berkeley, there is an account from a Serbian immigrant who said that a silver coin with a cross on it could be broken into four pieces, loaded into a shot gun, and fired to kill a vampire. (I haven't read the Berkeley document myself; my source here is Vampires, Burial, and Death by Paul Barber, footnote on p. 54.)
In connection with this, it is interesting that in England and Scotland it was once believed that witches could take the form of animals, especially hares, and that it was invulnerable to all material shot from guns except silver. And one prescription calls for cutting a silver coin into four pieces before inserting it into the barrel of the gun. Excerpts from original accounts of this belief are given in The Werewolf by Montague Summers.
Also, in Eastern and Central Europe, vampires going about outside their graves were sometimes destroyed by firing rifles or pistols at them even though the vampire was invisible to most people. (I give two examples of this in Gallery 3 under "Gypsy Vampires.")
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The photo above shows Carlos Villar in the playing the role of Count Dracula and Lupita Tovar playing the role of Mina in the Spanish language version of Dracula produced by Universal Pictures in 1931 - at the same time it produced the English language version starring Bela Lugosi. In the Spanish version, wolfsbane is substituted for garlic. (My thanks to Lupita Tovar for the picture, which she autographed for me at the Dracula 97 convention at Los Angeles in August, 1997.)
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The sketch above was drawn by Taebernaemonatis in 1731. It shows a species of wolfsbane, probably aconitum lycoctonum. The roots were once known in German as Heilgift ("healing poison").
Aversion to Wolfsbane
Under the name wolfsbane there are included at least two flowers of the aconite family. Most especially the name applies to aconitum lycoctonum. But the name sometimes is also given to aconitum napellus, more commonly called monk's hood. Both species contain poisonous alkaloids called aconites.
There is no mention of a vampire being averse to wolfsbane in Bram Stoker's Dracula.
But in a Spanish film version of Dracula, starring Carlos Villerias as Count Dracula, produced in 1931 by Universal Pictures at the same time they were making the English version starring Bela Lugosi, wolfsbane takes the place of garlic.
Whether or not the film makers knew it at the time, there actually are folkloric precedents for this.
In the folklore archives of the University of California at Berkeley, there is the recorded testimony of an immigrant from eastern Germany. This immigrant said that in his native land wolfsbane and silver knives were placed under mattresses and cribs to keep away both werewolves and vampires. (My source here is again Paul Barber's book, Vampire's Burial and Death, but this time the information is given on page 63.)
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The sketch of a millet plant (panicum miliacum above is from Mattioli's Commentaries published in Lyons, France in 1579. Note the many grains of seed. In America today, it is grown to make cattle, hog, and poultry feed.
Compulsions Regarding Grains, Seeds, Knots, etc.
In Europe, in China, in India, and in South America there was found the practice of using such things as seeds, grains of rice or millet, pebbles, and iron filings as a means to hamper undead vampires or blood sucking sorcerers and witches.
But here the vampire is not repelled or pierced by the objects. Rather he is compelled to either eat them or to count them one at a time.
In Eastern and Central Europe following a burial of a person who might become undead, seeds and organic grains were sometimes placed in the coffin, in the grave, over the grave, on the paths from the cemetery to the homes of the living, and on the thresholds and roofs of the homes.
In his book Mythologie du Vampire en Roumanie (1981), Adriene Cremene gives an anecdote from Romania where the relatives of a dead person would leave the cemetery after his burial, throwing grains of millet in the path and saying "Let the strigoi eat each year one grain of millet and not eat the hearts of his family."
In Macedonian Folklore by G. F. Abbot (1903), there is a case described where a vampire hunter lured a vampire (vrykolakis) into a barn where there was a heap of millet grains. The vampire became so pre-occupied with counting these grains that the vampire hunter was able to nail him to a wall without any resistance on the part of the vampire. Abbot also wrote that some Macedonians protected themselves from a possible vampire following a burial by placing mustard seeds on the roof and thorny plants outside the doors.
There are many examples of this general practice, although it is not always obvious whether the vampire had to count or eat each particle. I frequently find commentaries in books that lean one way or the other in regard to such ambiguous cases, but I usually take these interpretations with a grain of salt.
An interesting variation of the belief occurs in Afro-American lore in the South American country of Surinam. Here, the asema is a blood sucking sorcerer or witch who leave his or her skin at night and flies off in the form that appears to be a ball of light. One way to prevent the night-flying asema from entering a home is to place a sesame seeds or rice grains mixed with the nails of a ground owl before the entrances. The asema is compelled to count the seeds or grains, but each time it inadvertently picks up an owl's nail it lets go off all the seeds or grains it had counted and is forced to start over again.
In Central Europe, nets were sometimes placed in the coffin in the belief that if the corpse became undead., then the vampire would be compelled to either untie all the knots or to count them.
And in the Cajun lore of Louisiana, the loups garou is a blood drinking werewolf who is compelled to count all the holes in a sifter placed near a home.
I don't know of any examples of such beliefs being used in modern fiction. But sometimes I wonder if there was not a second pun intended when the The Count, a vampire who specializes in counting, was invented for the entertaining and educating television program for young children, Sesame Street.
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