Vampires

Question 1

Who becomes a vampire?

Answer 1

• The unclean dead
  - A dead witch or sorceror
  - The offspring of a witch and devil or a witch and werewolf
  - A dead individual over whose corpse a black cat jumped
  - A child born with two sets of teeth
  - Persons who have ingested meat contaminated by vampires

Question 2

How to identify a vampire

Answer 2

• Unattractive, ugly, smelly
  - Very cunning
  - They mostly come out at night… mostly
  - Most active at liminal periods
  - Dispelled by the call of a dick I mean cock I mean rooster
  - Can fly through the air
  - Can get out of his coffin without disturbing the grave
  - Not deterred by locked windows or doors
• Can get into the house through a small hole or crack not protected by iron object, harrow teeth, garlic
• Teeth often grow and turn into iron
• Makes him capable of chewing flesh and bone
• Sometimes blind, but can identify victims from smell and sound
• Usually does not kill victims right away, drains their life force little by little
• Not all victims of vampires become vampires themselves
• Only certain people become vampires after being bitten and only under certain circumstances
• Vampire is a compulsive counter
  
  • If you throw seeds at him, he has to count them all before he can attack you
• Believed to be causes of droughts, nasty storms, and epidemics

Question 3

Containing strategies:

Answer 3

• Bury them in a liminal space outside the boundaries of the village
  - Place the body face down in the coffin
  - Stake the face-down body with an ash, aspen, alderwood, or hawthorn stake
  - A metal spike, nail, or harrow tooth
  - Cut off the head
  - Break the legs, cut the hamstrings and Achilles tendons
  - Stuff the corpse’s mouth with garlic or other special herbs
  - Millet, sesame, or poppy seeds
  - The river/water can “dissolve” them
  - Cremate the corpse

Question 4

Slavic Vampires:

Answer 4

• Not associated with counts, castles, or country/states
• Actually is a peasant
• Returns to place that is most familiar to him
• Might move back in to old house
• Presence would cause everyone else in the house to sicken and die
• The illness would spread to other parts of the neighborhood

Question 5

Sustenance:

Answer 5

• Stealing “breath”
• Taking blood from people or animals
  
  • Not necessarily from sucking it, may drain it into a bucket and drink it
• Eating flesh
• [Psychic vampirism]