Vlad Tepes (1431-1476 )
Official History
Dracula, the name of Stoker's model originated from Vlad III Dracula (call
Tepes, pronounced tse-pesh), a fifteenth century voivode or prince of
Wallachia of the princely House of Basarab. Wallachia is a province of Romania
bordered to the north by Transylvania and Moldavia, to the east by the Black
Sea
and to the south by Bulgaria. Wallachia first emerged as a political entity
during the late thirteenth century from the fall of the East Roman Empire. The
first prince of Wallachia was Basarab the Great (1310-1352), an ancestor of
Dracula. By the late fifteenth century the House of Basarab had split into two
rival clans; the descendants of Prince Dan and those of Prince Mircea the Old
(Dracula's grandfather). These two branches of the royal house were bitter
rivals. Both Dracula and his father, Vlad II Dracul, murdered rivals from the
Danesti upon reaching the throne. In 1431 Vlad II was invested with the Order
of the Dragon by the Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund of Luxembourg. The Order
of the Dragon was a knightly order dedicated to fighting the Turk. Its emblem
was a dragon, wings extended, hanging on a cross. From 1431 onward Vlad II
wore the emblem of the order. The dragon was the symbol of the devil and
consequently and alternate meaning of 'drac' was dragon. Under this
interpretation
Vlad II Dracul becomes Vlad II, the Dragon and his son, Vlad III Dracula
, becomes Vlad III, the Son of the Dragon (“ Dracul ”literally means “ the
devil ”, “ ulea' ” ending in Romanian indicates “ the son of ”, “ Tepes ”
means the Impaler).
Dracula was born in 1431 in the Transylvanian city of Sighisoara. At that
time Dracula's father, Vlad II Dracul, was living in exile in Transylvania.
Vlad Dracul was in Transylvania attempting to gather support for his planned
effort to seize the Wallachian throne from the Danesti prince, Alexandru I.
Little is known about the early years of Dracula's life. It is known that he
had an elder brother, Mircea, and a younger brother named Radu. His early
education was left in the hands of his mother, a Transylvanian noblewoman, and
her family. His real education began in 1436 after his father succeeded in
claiming the Wallachian throne and killing his Danesti rival. His training was
typical of that common to the sons of the nobility throughout Europe. His
first tutor in his apprenticeship to knighthood was an elderly boyar who had
fought under the banner of Enguerrand de Courcy at the Battle of Nicolopolis
against the Turks. Dracula learned all the skills of war and peace that were
deemed necessary for a Christian knight.
The political situation in Wallachia remained unstable after Vlad Dracul
seized the throne in 1436. The power of the Turks was growing rapidly as one
by
one the small states of the Balkans surrendered to the Ottoman onslaught. At
the same time Hungary was reaching its zenith during the reign of John
Hunyadi, the White Knight of Hungary, and his son King Matthias Corvinus. Any
prince of Wallachia had to balance his policies precariously between these two
powerful neighbors. The prince of Wallachia was officially a vassal of the
King
of Hungary. In addition, Vlad Dracul was a member of the Order of the Dragon
and sworn to fight the infidel. At the same time the power of the Ottomans
seemed unstoppable. Even in the time of Vlad's father, Mircea the Old,
Wallachia had been forced to pay tribute to the Sultan. Vlad was forced to
renew that
tribute and from 1436-1442 attempted to walk a middle course between his
powerful neighbors. Throughout the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the
princes of Wallachia attempted to maintain a precarious independence by
constantly
shifting allegiances between these powerful neighbors.
In 1442 Vlad attempted to remain neutral when the Turks invaded
Transylvania. The Turks were defeated and the vengeful Hungarians under John
Hunyadi
forced Dracul and his family to flee Wallachia. Hunyadi placed a Danesti ,
Basarab II, on the Wallachian throne. In 1443 Vlad II regained the Wallachian
throne with Turkish support, on the condition that he sign an new treaty with
the
sultan that included not only the customary annual tribute but the promise to
yearly send contingents of Wallachian boys to join the sultan's Janissaries.
In 1444, to further assure the sultan of his good faith, Vlad sent his two
younger sons to Adrianople as hostages. Dracula remained a hostage in
Adrianople until 1448.
In 1444 the King of Hungary, Ladislas Posthumous, broke the peace and
launched the Varna campaign under the command of John Hunyadi in an effort to
drive
the Turks out of Europe. Hunyadi demanded that Vlad II fulfill his oath as a
member of the Order of the Dragon and a vassal of Hungary and join the
crusade against the Turk. The Pope absolved Dracul of his Turkish oath but the
wily politician still attempted to steer a middle course. Rather than join the
Christian forces himself he sent his oldest son, Mircea. Perhaps he hoped the
sultan would spare his younger sons if he himself did not join the crusade.
The results of the Varna Crusade are well known. The Christian army was
utterly destroyed in the Battle of Varna. John Hunyadi managed to escape the
battle under conditions that add little glory to the White Knight's
reputation.
Many, apparently including Mircea and his father, blamed Hunyadi for the
debacle. From this moment forth John Hunyadi was bitterly hostile toward Vlad
Dracul and his eldest son. In 1447 Vlad Dracul was assassinated along with his
son Mircea. Mircea was apparently buried alive by the boyars and merchants of
Tirgoviste. Hunyadi placed his own candidate, a member of the Danesti clan, on
the throne of Wallachia.
On receiving the news of Vlad Dracul's death the Turks released Dracula and
supported him as their own candidate for the Wallachian throne. In 1448
Dracula managed to briefly seize the Wallachian throne with Turkish support.
Within two months Hunyadi forced Dracula to surrender the throne and flee to
his
cousin, the Prince of Moldavia, while Hunyadi once again placed Vladislav II
on the Wallachian throne.
Dracula remained in exile in Moldavia for three years, until Prince Bogdan
of Moldavia was assassinated in 1451. The resulting turmoil in Moldavia forced
Dracula to flee to Transylvania and seek the protection of his family enemy,
Hunyadi. The timing was propitious; Hunaydi's puppet on the Wallachian
throne, Vladislav II, had instituted a pro-Turkish policy and Hunyadi needed a
more reliable man in Wallachia. Consequently, Hunyadi accepted the allegiance
of
his old enemy's son and put him forward as the Hungarian candidate for the
throne of Wallachia. Dracula became Hunyadi's vassal and received his father's
old Transylvanian duchies of Faragas and Almas. Dracula remained in
Transylvania, under Hunyadi's protection, until 1456 waiting for an
opportunity to
retake Wallachia from his rival.
In 1453 the Christian world was shocked by the final fall of Constantinople
to the Ottomans. The East Roman Empire which had existed since the time of
Constantine the Great and which for a thousand years had shielded the rest of
Christendom from Islam was no more. Hunyadi immediately began planning another
campaign against the Turks. In 1456 Hunyadi invaded Turkish Serbia while
Dracula simultaneously invaded Wallachia. In the Battle of Belgrade Hunyadi
was
killed and his army defeated. Meanwhile, Dracula succeeded in killing
Vladislav II and taking the Wallachian throne but Hunaydi's defeat made his
long
term tenure questionable. For a time at least, Dracula was forced to attempt
to
placate the Turks while he solidified his own position.
Dracula's main reign stretched from 1456 to 1462. His capital was the city
of Tirgoviste while his castle was raised some distance away in the mountains
near the Arges River. Most of the atrocities associated with Dracula's name
took place in these years. It was also during this time that he launched his
own campaign against the Turks. This campaign was relatively successful at
first. His skill as a warrior and his well-known cruelty made him a much
feared
enemy. However, he received little support from his titular overlord,
Matthias Corvinus, King of Hungary (the son of John Hunyadi) and Wallachia's
resources were too limited to achieve any lasting success against the
conqueror of
Constantinople.
The Turks finally succeeded in forcing Dracula to flee to Transylvania in
1462. Reportedly, his first wife committed suicide by leaping from the towers
of Dracula's castle into the waters of the Arges River rather than surrender
to the Turks. Dracula escaped across the mountains into Transylvania and
appealed to Matthias Corvinus for aid. Instead the King had Dracula arrested
and
imprisoned in a royal tower near Buda. Dracula remained a prisoner for twelve
years.
Apparently his imprisonment was none too onerous. He was able to gradually
win his way back into the graces of Hungary's monarch; so much so that he was
able to meet and marry a member of the royal family (some of the sources
claim Dracula's second wife was actually the sister of Matthias Corvinus). For
most of the period of Dracula's incarceration his brother, Radu the Handsome,
ruled Wallachia as a puppet of the Ottoman sultan. When Radu died (1474) the
sultan appointed Basarab the Old, a member of the Danesti clan, as prince.
During his captivity Dracula also renounced the Orthodox faith and adopted
Catholicism.
The exact length of Dracula's period of captivity is open to some debate.
The Russian pamphlets indicate that he was a prisoner from 1462 until 1474.
However, during that period Dracula managed to marry a member of the Hungarian
royal family and have two sons who were about ten years old when he
reconquered Wallachia in 1476. McNally and Florescu place Dracula's actual
period of
confinement at about four years from 1462 until 1466.
In 1476 Dracula was again ready to make another attempt to recover his
throne. Dracula and Prince Stephen Bathory of Transylvania invaded Wallachia
with
a mixed force of Transylvanians, a few dissatisfied Wallachian boyars and a
contingent of Moldavians sent by Dracula's cousin, Prince Stephen the Great of
Moldavia. Dracula's brother, Radu the Handsome, had died a couple of years
earlier and been replaced on the Wallachian throne by another Turkish
candidate, Basarab the Old, a member of the Danesti clan. At the approach of
Dracula's army Basarab and his coherents fled, some to the protection of the
Turks,
others to the shelter of the mountains. After placing Dracula on the throne
Stephen Bathory and the bulk of Dracula's forces returned to Transylvania,
leaving Dracula's tactical position very weak. Dracula had little time to
gather
support before a large Turkish army entered Wallachia determined to return
Basarab to the throne. Dracula's cruelties over the years had alienated the
boyars who felt they had a better chance of surviving under Prince Basarab.
Apparently, even the peasants, tired of the depredations of the Impaler,
abandoned him to his fate. Dracula was forced to march to meet the Turks with
the
small forces at his disposal, somewhat less than four thousand men.
Dracula was killed in battle against the Turks near the small town of
Bucharest in December of 1476. Some reports indicated that he was assassinated
by
disloyal Wallachian boyars just as he was about to sweep the Turks from the
field. Other accounts have Dracula falling in defeat, surrounded by the bodies
of his loyal Moldavian bodyguard (the troops loaned by Prince Stephen of
Moldavia remained with Dracula after Stephen Bathory returned to
Transylvania).
Still other reports claim that Dracula, at the moment of victory, was
accidentally struck down by one of his own men. Dracula's body was decapitated
by the
Turks and his head sent to Constantinople where the sultan had it displayed
on a stake as proof that the Impaler was dead. He was reportedly buried at
Snagov, an island monastery located near Bucharest.
The Impaler
Impalement was Dracula's preferred method of torture and execution.
Impalement was and is one of the most gruesome ways of dying imaginable.
Dracula
usually had a horse attached to each of the victim's legs and a sharpened
stake
was gradually forced into the body. The end of the stake was usually oiled and
care was taken that the stake not be too sharp; else the victim might die
too rapidly from shock. Normally the stake was inserted into the body through
the buttocks and was often forced through the body until it emerged from the
mouth. However, there were many instances where victims were impaled through
other bodily orifices or through the abdomen or chest. Infants were sometimes
impaled on the stake forced through their mothers' chests. The records
indicate that victims were sometimes impaled so that they hung upside down on
the
stake.
Death by impalement was slow and painful. Victims sometimes endured for
hours or days. Dracula often had the stakes arranged in various geometric
patterns. The most common pattern was a ring of concentric circles in the
outskirts
of the city that was his target. The height of the spear indicated the rank
of the victim. The decaying corpses were often left up for months. It was once
reported that an invading Turkish army turned back in fright when it
encountered thousands of rotting corpses impaled on the banks of the Danube.
In 1461
Mohammed II, the conqueror of Constantinople, a man not noted for his
squeamishness, returned to Constantinople after being sickened by the sight of
twenty thousand impaled corpses rotting outside of Dracula's capital of
Tirgoviste. The warrior sultan turned command of the campaign against Dracula
over to
subordinates and returned to Constantinople.
Thousands were often impaled at a single time. Ten thousand were impaled in
the Transylvanian city of Sibiu (where Dracula had once lived) in 1460. In
1459, on St. Bartholomew's Day, Dracula had thirty thousand of the merchants
and boyars of the Transylvanian city of Brasov impaled. One of the most famous
woodcuts of the period shows Dracula feasting amongst a forest of stakes and
their grisly burdens outside Brasov while a nearby executioner cuts apart
other victims.
Impalement was Dracula's favorite but by no means his only method of
torture. The list of tortures employed by this cruel prince reads like an
inventory
of hell's tools: nails in heads, cutting off of limbs, blinding,
strangulation, burning, cutting off of noses and ears, mutilation of sexual
organs
(especially in the case of women), scalping, skinning, exposure to the
elements or
to wild animals and boiling alive.
No one was immune to Dracula's attentions. His victims included women and
children, peasants and great lords, ambassadors from foreign powers and
merchants. However, the vast majority of his victims came from the merchants
and
boyars of Transylvania and his own Wallachia. Many have attempted to justify
Dracula's actions on the basis nascent nationalism and political necessity.
Many
of the merchants in Transylvania and Wallachia were Saxons who were seen as
parasites, preying upon the Romanian natives of Wallachia, while the boyars
had proven their disloyalty time and time again. Dracula's own father and
older brother were murdered by unfaithful boyars.
Dracula began his reign of terror almost as soon as he came to power. His
first significant act of cruelty may have been motivated by a desire of
revenge
as well as a need to solidify his power. Early in his main reign he gave a
feast for his boyars and their families to celebrate Easter. Dracula was well
aware that many of these same nobles were part of the conspiracy that led to
his father's assassination and the burying alive of his elder brother,
Mircea. Many had also played a role in the overthrow of numerous Wallachian
princes. During the feast Dracula asked his noble guests how many princes had
ruled
during their life times. All of the nobles present had out lived several
princes. One answered that at least thirty princes had held the throne during
his
life. None had seen less than seven reigns. Dracula immediately had all the
assembled nobles arrested. The older boyars and their families were impaled
on the spot. The younger and healthier nobles and their families were marched
north from Tirgoviste to the ruins of a castle in the mountains above the
Arges River. Dracula was determined to rebuild this ancient fortress as his
own
stronghold and refuge. The enslaved boyars and their families were forced to
labor for months rebuilding the old castle with materials from another
nearby ruin. According to the reports they labored until the clothes fell off
their bodies and then were forced to continue working naked. Very few of the
old
gentry survived the ordeal of building Castle Dracula.
Throughout his reign Dracula systematically eradicated the old boyar class
of Wallachia. The old boyars had repeatedly undermined the power of the prince
during previous reigns and had been responsible for the violent overthrow of
several princes. Apparently Dracula was determined that his own power be on
a modern and thoroughly secure footing. In the place of the executed boyars
Dracula promoted new men from among the free peasantry and the middle class;
men who would be loyal only to their prince. Many of Dracula's acts of cruelty
can be interpreted as efforts to strengthen and modernize the central
government at the expense of feudal powers of the nobility and great towns.
Dracula was also constantly on guard against the adherents of the Danesti
clan. Some of his raids into Transylvania may have been efforts to capture
would-be princes of the Danesti. Several members of the Danesti clan died at
Dracula's hands. Vladislav II was murdered soon after Dracula came to power in
1456. Another Danesti prince was captured during one of Dracula's forays into
Transylvania. Dracula impaled thousands of the citizens of the town that had
sheltered his rival. The captured Danesti prince was forced to read his own
funeral oration while kneeling before an open grave before his execution.
Dracula's atrocities against the people of Wallachia were usually attempts
to enforce his own moral code upon his country. He appears to have been
particularly concerned with female chastity. Maidens who lost their virginity,
adulterous wives and unchaste widows were all targets of Dracula's cruelty.
Such
women often had their sexual organs cut out or their breasts cut off. They
were also often impaled through the vagina on red-hot stakes that were forced
through the body until they emerged from the mouth. One report tells of the
execution of an unfaithful wife. Dracula had the woman's breasts cut off, and
then she was skinned and impaled in a square in Tirgoviste with her skin lying
on a nearby table. Dracula also insisted that his people be honest and hard
working. Merchants who cheated their customers were likely to find themselves
mounted on a stake beside common thieves.
Vlad was not only a mere butcher. He was famous for his good words and the
way he questioned people before killing them, always justifying his acts by
the desire of justice and some vicious sense of humour as an epitaph.
