'Tis the season - Halloween and Old Legends

Bram Stoker

As Halloween approached, this is the season when many fire up their TVs to enjoy some classic horror movies. One of the most popular is Dracula!

Many believe that Ireland's Bran Stoker got his idea from the Romanian prince known as Vlad the Impaler and Vlad Dracula. He was the son of Vlad Dracul, or Vlad the Dragon. Adding the A to form the name Dracula means son of the dragon.

But this isn't where Stoker's vampire story actually began!

Here in Ireland where Bram Stoker was born and raised, there is an ancient chieftain called Abhartach who ruled a petty kingdom in today's Northern Ireland. The area was dotted with petty kingdoms ruled by tribal warlords dating back to the 5th and 6th centuries.

Legends paint Abhartach as a small, disfigured man who was jealous and suspicious by nature. He was cruel and unyielding, and some legends say he also had magic which made him all the more evil. Of course, he trusted no one, not even his wife and suspected her of having an affair. One night, he decided to catch her in the act and climbed out of a window of their castle to creep along the stonework to her bedroom, however, he ended up falling to his death.

Abhartach was buried with all of the rights of his station in a place called Slaughtaverty. However, that wasn't to be the end of this cruel overlord. He arose and returned to his castle and demanded the loyalty from his  subjects...they but give him bowls of blood to sustain his life. Those who refused were slain. By drinking their blood, he became known as a *marbh bheo*, or living dead.

Eventually the people had had enough. Tired of living in more fear than when Abhartach was alive, they hired an assassin, Cathán, to kill him. Once slain, Abhartach was reburied in his grave, but again, he arose and demanded blood loyalties from his subjects. 

Confused, Cathán consulted with local Druids (holymen of the time) and a plan was formed. Abhartach would be slain once more, but this time with a sword made from the wood of a sacred yew tree and driven through Abhartach's heart, then he must be buried upside down. Thorny twigs and branches and yew ash was to be scattered above the grave and around it before the topsoil was replaced. Finally, a large, heavy stone was to be placed directly on top of the burial site. The theory was that upside down, Abhartach would dig himself away from the surface and would never to walk the earth again.

Abhertach's Burial Place

Little more than 1300 years later, this Irish legend would spark the idea of a blood thirsty monster in the Irish born writer, Bram Stoker. He also fed off the legends of Vlad the Impaler to create the iconic Dracul we know today.

The ground where Abhartach was buried has long been considered bad ground and all the centuries, nothing has been built around or near it. While King Abhartach's monument no longer exists, the heavy stone placed upon his final burial is still there, in place, protecting the Irish people. And a single Yew tree has grown up from the rushes scattered over the burial site before the stone had been placed.

Some have tried in recent times to remove the tree and stone, however chains broke each time on chain saws and hand saws couldn't get through the bark. When the stone was chained to drag away by machines, those chains also broke, lashing one man and nearly killing him. Witnesses say that his spilled blood was soaked into the soil immediately, as if feeding Abhartach's ancient corpse, and all efforts to remove the tree and stone were abandoned and has never been attempted again.

It should also be noted that Patrick Weston Joyce wrote the book A History of Ireland, published in 1880, and told the story of Abhartach. This was a fully 17 years before Stoker's Dracula had been published...

Are vampires real? You be the judge... bwahahahahahaha

Something old is new again

Dracula Pen
Vials containing sand from Whitby, and
Silver Sand and earth from the
Carpathian Mountain Region of Romania
near Count Dracula's home.

So, I got this in the post today.

A pen, you say?

Who cares, you say?

What if I were to tell you that this pen has connections to Vlad Țepeș...

Vlad Drăculea...

Vlad the Impaler...

Vlad III, Prince of Wallachia...

Dracula!!

Well, it's all true, and I have a certificate of authenticity to prove it!

Signed by the Reverend Canon David W. Smith, Rector of St Mary's Parish Church in Whitby and Ruswarp, England.

 The timber used to craft this unique pen is reclaimed from the old church after renovations, and has been certified that the timber felled for the church dates back to the 17th century.

It's real, and I can prove it.

OK, so Vlad III, Prince of Wallachia, was alive in the 15th century, but Bram Stoker's Dracula had slightly more recent ties to the church with his creation of Count Dracula, in his work Dracula, published in 1897.

The box contained a great little booklet with history about St Mary's and the connection to Count Dracula of Bram Stoker fame.

It includes some photos and some interesting narrative. I think just as interesting are the vials of earth and sand included in this nifty box.
Why have they done this?

 Well, based on the story, the ship, The Demeter, sailing from Varna to Whitby was full of silver sand for ballast, and several coffins filled with 'mould', or earth.

Whitby, being a coastal community, would have sandy beaches.

So a bit of sand from both countries and Bulgarian earth to represent what was in the coffins.

From Chapter 7:

9 August -- The sequel to the strange arrival of the derelict in the storm last night is almost more startling than the thing itself. It turns out that the schooner is Russian from Varna, and is called the Demeter. She is almost entirely in ballast of silver sand, with only a small amount of cargo, a number of great wooden boxes filled with mould.

From Chapter 8:

For a moment or two I could see nothing, as the shadow of a cloud obscured St Mary’s Church and all around it.

Then as the cloud passed I could see the ruins of the Abbey coming into view; and as the edge of a narrow band of light as sharp as a sword-cut moved along, the church and the churchyard because gradually visible.

Whatever my expectation was, it was not disappointed, for there, on our favourite seat, the silver light of the moon struck a half reclining figure, snowy white.

The coming of the cloud was too quick for me to see much, for shadow shut down on light almost immediately; but it seemed to me as though something dark stood behind the seat where the white figure shone, and bent over it. What it was, whether man or beast, I could not tell…

Of course, now I want to reread Bram Stoker's Dracula (a free read these days).

How cool would it be to visit Bran Castle (you've got to see this video with the volume up!)?!

And I've only to drive down to Dublin City to see the house at 30 Kildare Street where Stoker lived while writing Dracula.

For anyone interested in buying one of these one of a kind hand crafted pens (they also do ballpoint), just contact York and Beyond, who also sell pens with historic timber from Yorkminster Abbey, and timber felled on the Bronte estate.

From the lid of the presentation box - hand etched and smoked.