We are all familiar with the traditional bloodsuckers; suck the blood out of the living, live in a dark castle, speak with a funny accent, and many more other associations such as a deadly aversion to garlic. But vampires weren’t always seen as these figures in media, no rather vampires used to be feared creatures causing striking fear into the hearts of people past even to the point of causing mass hysteria about them.
But first, where did vampires originate from? Well, the origin of vampires is pretty spotty since many cultures and mythologies worldwide have their vampiric entities such as the Malaysian penanggalan, the Greek vrykolakas, and the asanbosom from West Africa among many others. But the version we are most familiar with arises from Eastern Europe specifically from the country of Bulgaria albeit with a few tweaks here and there, despite how different these vampires are most share some similarities such as feasting on blood or being some undead being or spirit.
A vampire’s first appearance in the media was in 1819 in John Polidori’s short work The Vampyre which the story was highly influential and successful. However, the work best known for skyrocketing the vampire genre is arguably Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Dracula, and with it came the essential elements of the modern vampire opening a new door for the genre. The vampire’s first film premiere came in the form of F.W. Murnau’s 1922 silent horror film: Nosferatu which is also receiving a remake by Robert Eggers and is expected to be released on Christmas Day of this year the remake shows just how impactful Nosferatu was.
Since then, vampires have found homes in pop culture, such as the highly famed Twilight books and TV series, the drama series The Vampire Diaries, and even kid’s cartoons, such as Sesame Street’s lovable Count von Count, better known as the Count or the Hotel Transylvania’s Dracula, among many other loved vampire characters. There is even a cereal with Count Chocula. With the influence of vampires so prevalent in modern media, it’s hard to believe that these bloodsuckers went from malevolent beings to adored icons in pop culture.
