Vampires

When you hear the word vampire you probably think of Dracula, maybe you think of the villains from the TV series Buffy The Vampire Slayer, vamps such as Spike, Angel, Darla, and Drusila. You might even think of Edward Cullen *shudder*. But you probably think of vampires as contemporary figments of the human imagination, dating back only as far as say, the original publication of Bram Stoker's Dracula. But in truth, almost every civilization, almost every country has myths of vampires, stories so old some predate written word, and were passed by word of mouth. I'm not about to announce that I believe vampires to be real, but it is fascinating none the less that stories of vampires are common throughout every  part of the world.

There is much to talk about on the subject of vampires; their powers, their weaknesses, how they come to be, supposed "real life" vampires in history, their relation in regards to other mythical monsters, their role in contemporary entertainment, the various myths about them throughout human history, and much much more. All of this can be found within the contents of The Vampire Book, the Encyclopedia of the Undead by j. Gordon Melton, a book that does not use the title encyclopedia lightly. Although it could not possibly contain all information available on vampires, it does contain hundreds upon hundreds of pages of vampire related content.

Truthfully I am not even certain where to begin, so diving right in, let's talk about the different vampiric myths from around the world, including the various properties of each vampire we discuss. In later posts we'll cover "real life" vampires, and the contemporary vamp and his role in our media/entertainment.
 According to the Encyclopedia the first written mention of  a vampire was in 1047, "First appearance in written form of the word upir (an early form of the word later to become "vampire") in a document referring to a Russian prince as 'Upir Lichy,' or wicked vampire."
In Africa there is legend of a vampire called obayifo (also known as the asiman), and one called asasabonsam. The obayifo was actually a witch living in the community in disguise. At night she would leave her body and travel as a ball of light sucking the blood of the children.
The Ashanti peoples of Ghana (in Western Africa) describe the asasabonsam as a vampire-like monster.It sat in trees in the forest and used its hook like feet to snare its victims, it is said to be humanoid in appearance with iron teeth.
In Armenia there is a tale of a vampire local to Mount Ararat in the Caucasians. Attacking travelers in the night, Dakhanavar was said to suck the blood from their feet, "protecting" the valleys of the area from intruders.
According to the Aboriginals of Australia the yara-ma-yha-who were little red men, usually no bigger than four feet, with abnormally large heads and mouths, no teeth, and suckers on the tips of their fingers and toes. The yara-ma-yha-who were said to hide in wild fig trees, waiting to drop down on unsuspecting victims who came to rest under the tree. They would attach their suckers to their victims and suck their blood, just enough to leave them weak and helpless, then later return to swallow their victims whole.
It would be impossible to list every type of vampire, from every country and ancient civilization, so forgive me for picking and choosing just a few more.
In China a vampire is called a chiang-shih (or kiang shi), belief in which was derived, at least in part from the Chinese belief in two souls. According to Chinese believes their is a rational soul and an irrational soul, the irrational one called the p'ai or p'o. A body that is controlled by the p'ai and has no rational soul is a chiang-shih. "The chiang-shih seems to have originated as a means of explaining problems associated with death. The Chiang-shih arose following a violent death due to suicide, hanging, drowning, or smothering. It could also appear in a person who had died suddenly, or as a result of improper burial procedures. The dead were thought to become angry and restless if their burial was postponed for a long time after their death." (an expert from the passage about vampires in China, in The Vampire Book)
Three vampire-like creatures can be found in stories from Greece, the empusai, the lamiai, and the mormolykiai, and all three were known for drinking blood." described as coarse-looking women with deformed, serpentlike lower bodies....The lamiai were known primarily as demonic beings who sucked the blood from young children; however they had the power to transform themselves into beautiful young maidens in order to attract and seduce young men."
Vampires may not be real, but they have a presence in just about every culture known to man, and I think that alone makes them worth studying.
TBC...