Vampire Myths Around The World

By Sara Bellum On November 12, 2012 In Sara Bellum No Comments

Dear Sara,

Which cultures have or had vampire myths?

Sincerely, Max S.

Dear Max,

We can thank Mary Shelley’s friend John Polidori (despite the use of his name as a fictional character, he was a real person) 1819 work THE VAMPYRE and, later but more influentially, Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel DRACULA for popularizing the mythology we’re most familiar with these days. However, the notion of blood-drinkers and/or the living undead has been around for a surprisingly long time, in a surprisingly wide range of lands and locations. An incomplete list includes the Balkans (which encompass Transylvania) as one obvious source, but variations on vampire myths also come from ancient Greece, China, Babylon, Syria, Persia, Africa, Hebrew tradition and later Prussia, Serbia, Germany, Austria and France, to name a few.

-Sara Bellum

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Sara Bellum

Editor at Buzzy Multimedia Publishing

The name's Sara Bellum, and I'm the editor-at-large here at BuzzyMag - the hostess with the mostess, if you will. I like to think that my first calling is fighting crime and delivering a heaping dose of sweet, sweet justice to all manner of thugs, miscreants, hoodlums, ruffians, and ne'er-do-wells, but unfortunately, violent vigilantism doesn't exactly pay big bucks these days.

Times are tough, my friends, and I've got bills to pay, so I decided to put my encyclopedic knowledge of all things sci-fi & fantasy-related to use to help me land a day job. To tell you the truth, it's kind of a nice change of pace. My manicures have been lasting a bit longer lately.