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In all the dark pages of the supernatural there is no more terrible tradition than that of the Vampire, a pariah even among demons. Foul are his ravages; gruesome and seemingly barbaric are the ancient and approved methods by which folk rid themselves of this hideous pest. The tradition is world-wide and of the greatest antiquity. How did it arise? How did it spread? Does it indeed contain some vestige of truth, some memory of savage practice, some trace of cannibalism or worse? These and similar problems inevitably suggested by a consideration of Vampirism in its various aspects are fully discussed in this work which may not unfairly claim to be the first serious and fully documented study of a subject that in its details is of absorbing interest, although the circumstances are of necessity macabre and ghastly in the highest degree.
Montague Summers (1880-1948) did a fantastic job researching the folklore and beliefs about vampires in many civilizations reading many books in different languages, including Greek, Latin, German, Italian (dialets), French, and English, to create one of the best works about vampires ever written and published. The author, a member of the Roman Catholic clergy, wrote numerous books about witches, vampires, werewolves, and other related subjects too. The Vampire, his Kith and Kin: The History of Vampirism is definitively a great book.
In his Preface to The Living Dead: A Study of the Vampire in Romantic Literature, James Twitchell writes that he is not interested in the current generation of vampires, which he finds "rude, boring and hopelessly adolescent. However, they have not always been this way. In fact, a century ago they were often quite sophisticated, used by artists varied as Blake, Poe, Coleridge, the Brontes, Shelley, and Keats, to explain aspects of interpersonal relations. However vulgar the vampire has since become, it is important to remember that along with the Frankenstein monster, the vampire is one of the major mythic figures bequeathed to us by the English Romantics. Simply in terms of cultural influence and currency, the vampire is far more important than any other nineteenth-century archetypes; in fact, he is probably the most enduring and prolific mythic figure we have. This book traces the vampire out of folklore into serious art until he stabilizes early in this century into the character we all too easily recognize.
THE VAMPIRE, His Kith and Kin examined the reasons for the old belief in Vampirism, its growth and dissemination in many lands, and its crystallization into a permanent and determinate legend. This new volume, The Vampire in Europe, uniform with the other, deals with the subject from a historical point of view and presents the evidence which gave rise to the theories. This evidence, drawn from little-known authors, musty chronicles, and the obscurer occultists, is in many cases derived from official sources, civil and ecclesiastical. The first chapter treats of Vampirism in ancient Greece and Rome. Accounts of the extraordinary outbreaks of Vampirism in England during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries have been gathered from Geoffrey of Monmouth and William of Newburgh. Particular attention is paid to the alleged irritation which gave rise to so much literature in the early eighteenth century, while the curious situation in modern Greece is fully discussed. Included in this critical edition are the authoritative text, rare contextual and source materials, illustrations, criticism, contemporary reviews, and Greek and Latin translations. A biographical note is also included.
"Throughout the whole vast shadowy world of ghosts and demons there is no figure so terrible, no figure so dreaded and abhorred, yet [looked upon] with such fearful fascination, as the vampire, who is himself neither ghost nor demon, but yet who partakes the dark natures and possesses the mysterious and terrible qualities of both." So begins this riveting study by one of the foremost authorities on witchcraft and occult phenomena. An indefatigable researcher, Summers explores the presence of vampires in Greek and Roman lore, in England and Ireland during Anglo-Saxon times, in Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Russia, Romania, and Bulgaria, even in modern Greece. More than just a collection of library lore, however, this detailed examination of the history of vampirism in Europe also includes anecdotes and firsthand accounts gathered by the author from peasants in places where belief in vampires was still common. A fascinating, sometimes terrifying book, The Vampire in Lore and Legend is a "mine of out-of-the-way information full of unspeakable tales," writes The New York Times; and according to Outlook, "a fascinating inquiry into the vampire legend . . . a storehouse of curious and interesting lore." Of great interest to any enthusiast of the supernatural and the occult, this book will appeal as well to the legions of general readers captivated by this ancient myth.
Throughout history vampires have been viewed as hideously repellant, strikingly attractive, dangerously evil, and piteously gloomy. This title explores vampire beliefs from the blood sucking beasts of ancient times to the immortal teen heartthrobs of the twenty-first century.