The Ultimate Vampire Resource and Directory

Invictus





Out of the night that covers me,

Black as the Pit from pole to pole,



I thank whatever gods may be

For my unconquerable soul.





In the fell clutch of circumstance

I have not winced nor cried aloud.



Under the bludgeonings of chance

My head is bloody, but unbowed.





Beyond this place of wrath and tears

Looms but the horror of the shade,



And yet the menace of the years

Finds, and shall find me, unafraid.





It matters not how strait the gate,

How charged with punishments the scroll,



I am the master of my fate;

I am the captain of my soul.

A 1047 AD reference to one "Upir Lichy" refers to the first vampire. However....



The oldest known document with a reference to a 'vampire-like" being is a 2400 BC tablet known as "The Sumerian King List", a list of all the kings of Sumer, their paternal lineage, and the years of their rule. One entry is for the famous King Gilgamesh. It says that Gilgamesh's father was a Lillu. In Sumerian myth, there were a number of beings who, like the incubi and succubi [q.v. 2.04], come to sleeping

individuals to mate with them. Lillu is an incubus (male). One of the succubi was Lilake/Lilitu whom some claim to be a forerunner of Lilith.



But not even Sumer can be definitively credited as coming up with the first vampire. Why? Because Sumer is also the first civilization to develop cuneiform, a form of writing which uses word sounds rather than pictures. Consequently, there is no written histories prior to Sumer.



Tales of the undead consuming the blood or flesh of living beings have been found in nearly every culture around the world for many centuries. Today we know these entities predominantly as vampires, but in ancient times, the term vampire did not exist; blood drinking and similar activities were attributed to demons or spirits who would eat flesh and drink blood; even the devil was considered synonymous with the vampire. Almost every nation has associated blood drinking with some kind of revenant or demon. The Ancient Indian deity Kali with fangs, and a garland of corpses or skulls, was intimately linked with the drinking of blood. Tales of vetalas, ghoul-like beings that inhabit corpses, have been compiled in the Baital Pachisi, a prominent story in the Kathasaritsagara tells of King Vikramāditya and his nightly quests to capture an elusive one. Pishacha, the returned spirits of evil-doers or those who died insane, also bear vampiric attributes. Even Egypt had its blood-drinking goddess Sekhmet.



The Persians were one of the first civilizations to have tales of blood-drinking demons: creatures attempting to drink blood from men were depicted on excavated pottery shards.Ancient Babylonia had tales of the mythical Lilitu synonymous with and giving rise to Lilith and her daughters the Lilu from Hebrew demonology. Lilitu was considered a demon and was often depicted as subsisting on the blood of babies. However, the Jewish counterparts were said to feast on both men and women, as well as newborns.



Ancient Greek mythology described the Empusa,[60] Lamia,and striges (the strix of Ancient Roman mythology). Over time the first two terms became general words to describe witches and demons respectively. Empusa was the daughter of the goddess Hecate and was described as a demonic, bronze-footed creature. She feasted on blood by transforming into a young woman and seduced men as they slept before drinking their blood. Lamia preyed on young children in their beds at night, sucking their blood. Like Lamia, the striges, feasted on children, but also preyed on young men. They were described as having the bodies of crows or birds in general, and were later incorporated into Roman mythology as strix, a kind of nocturnal bird that fed on human flesh and blood.