Vlad the Impaler was a fifteenth century historical
ruler with a well-earned reputation for savagery. Even hearing the name conjures up two grisly
images: Thousands of screaming innocents impaled on giant wooden spikes in the fields of Eastern
Europe, and shadowy Transylvanian noblemen drinking blood in decrepit old castles. But, thereâs an awful lot more to this brutal
Wallachian ruler than fanciful legends about ancient counts and bloodthirsty vampires. So, letâs strip away the terrifying myths
and reveal the even darker truths behind Vlad The Impaler, thought by many to be one of
the evillest men of all time. By some accounts, his total number of victims
rises as high as 100,000 - many of which were killed in unimaginably horrific ways, and
overseen personally by Vlad himself. Vladâs forces were never the largest, often
coming in at around 24,000 strong, but he compensated for this by building a brutal
reputation across all of Eastern Europe as a man who must be feared and respected on
pain of death. To be captured by Vladâs forces often meant
being tortured to death with extreme prejudice, and mounted like a trophy outside his territory
to scare off any encroaching enemies. If you were lucky, heâd kill you before
the worst of the mutilation began, but few people who fell into the clutches of Vlad
the Impaler could count themselves as lucky. This is a man so bloodthirsty that rumours
circulated about him literally drinking the blood of his slain enemies, believing it would
grant him strength. While doubt has been cast about whether he
actually ever dipped his bread in the blood of his impaled victims, itâs a testament
to his character that stories like these are entirely believable, considering he made a
habit of looting, burning, and slaughtering whole cities if their inhabitants dared to
defy him. If he ever actually did drink blood, it probably
wouldnât even rank among the top ten of his most awful atrocities. Especially considering other acts on this
list include running people through on huge wooden spikes, total dismemberment, and in
some cases even skinning enemies alive. For a man who practically seemed like a monster
in human skin, youâre probably wondering how he could rise to power? Well, like many of historyâs most terrifying
rulers, Vlad the Impaler was quite literally born into it. Born in Wallachia â a historical region
in modern Romania â between 1428 and 1431, Vlad the Impaler was actually the third Vlad
of the House of DrÄculeČti. Thatâs a name that probably rings a bell,
thanks to Irish gothic horror writer Bram Stoker, but weâll get back to that. Back during Vlad IIIâs era, Wallachia was
caught between two ruling families â his own, the DrÄculeČti, and a rival house of
nobles, the House of DÄneČti. These families both descended from the House
of Basarab, who founded Wallachia, leaving their descendants with a claim to the throne
over which many bloody, Game-of-Thrones-style wars were fought. Vlad the Impaler â or Vlad Tepes, as he
was known in his native tongue â was the son of Vlad of Wallachia, aka Vlad II, aka
Vlad Dracul. That last one means âVlad The Dragonâ,
a name he earned from being part of The Order of the Dragon â A group dedicated to protecting
Christianity from the perceived threat of the Muslim Ottoman Empire based in Turkey. The name âDraculaâ, often attached to
Vlad the Impaler, doesnât have anything to do with vampirism or â as some other
scholars suggest - Satanism. It actually means âSon of the Dragon.â The name proved to be prophetic, as Tepes
would take after his father as a legendary military leader. When youâre a ruler, especially a ruler
of an embattled territory like Wallachia, itâs important to build yourself a strong
reputation. If you wanted to be taken seriously, the fastest
way to do that is to make a grisly example of someone â and thankfully for Vlad, he
was an expert at making grisly examples, particularly of the Transylvanian Saxons. These Saxons, unlike the British Anglo-Saxons,
were German migrants and traders whoâd settled in the area after it was conquered by Hungary
in the 12th Century. Vladâs first point of contention with the
Saxons was a religious difference: The Saxons were Catholics, and Vlad â a deeply religious
man â was a follower of the Romanian Orthodox Church. However, the true impetus behind Vladâs
horrific treatment of the Saxons was a question of loyalty â the Hunyadi family, who ran
the military wing of Hungary, were at odds with the nationâs monarchs. The Transylvanian Saxons were supporters of
the Hapsburg King of Hungary, whereas Vladâs loyalty lay with the Hunyadis, whoâd helped
install him into power. In 1457, John Hunyadiâs widow, Erzsebet
Szilagy, was the target of Saxon protests. Vlad happily helped the Szilagy forces rampage
through some Saxon villages, where they looted and burned the homes of the people suspected
of organising the protests. This ended up being a bigger headache for
Vlad than he initially imagined â The Saxons responded to his violence by supporting two
challengers to his throne: Dan III, and his own half-brother, known as Vlad the Monk. This caused an escalation in Vladâs violence,
when his efforts at diplomacy fell flat. Vlad declared all-out war on his Saxon challengers,
and burned several villages of key Vlad The Monk supporters to the ground. He also struck against Dan III, by wiping
out the village of Bod near Brasov. This particular offensive was where Vlad coined
his greatest trademark: The few prisoners he took during the battle he had brutally
impaled at the city of Targoviste. And if you picture this impalement as a sharpened
stake forced through the chest â as many sanitised depictions tend to show â youâre
both a kinder and less imaginative man than Vlad the Impaler. In his method, victims often had a slightly
duller spike forced up their anus, and left there. Over the following hours â and, if youâre
really unlucky, days â your body weight would force the stake further into your abdomen,
at which point it would horrifically displace your internal organs. Itâs a gruesome way to die, and thus, makes
an incredibly effective psychological warfare tactic. He was sending a strong message: âIf you
mess with Vlad, your fate is on the spike.â But thatâs far from the only sadistic method
Vlad employed in dispatching his enemies. He was also rather fond of having his men
literally hack their victims to bloody pieces, such as in the Saxon city of Talmes, and even
having people boiled alive in huge cauldrons, as he enjoyed doing to Saxon merchants who
didnât follow his trade rules. He handed out brutal executions like candy
â having 41 students impaled just for being suspected of subversion. Many accounts have it that Vlad enjoyed dining
among his fields of impaled victims â perhaps as a power move, to further his reputation
as a terrifying enemy. And this perception worked. Vlad continued to rampage and slaughter through
the Saxon forces until Dan III was finally in his clutches. In a truly gangster move, Vlad forced Dan
to dig his own grave while a priest read him his own funeral rites. Dan was then decapitated and buried, eliminating
yet another threat to Vladâs power. After this, Vlad â having thoroughly subjugated
his Saxon enemies â decided to call a truce. A far more formidable enemy was on the horizon:
The powerful Ottoman empire, headed by the late Sultan Muradâs ambitious and ruthless
son, Sultan Mehmed II. Mehmed sent a detachment of emissaries to
Vlad in order to essentially negotiate his surrender, but that wasnât how Vlad Tepes
rolled. His confidence bolstered by his new alliances
with the remaining Saxons, and the forces of Hungary, Vlad literally had the emissaryâs
skullcaps nailed to their skulls to send a message. Mehmed was successfully provoked, and all-out
war began, but Vlad organized a series of vicious guerrilla conquests â splitting
his army into small groups whoâd covertly and ruthlessly attack larger Ottoman strongholds,
breaking them apart from within. Vladâs most infamous act followed shortly
after, when Sultan Mehmed, enraged by Vladâs victories, sent a powerful force of 60,000
men with top-of-the-line armour and weaponry straight to Wallachia. Vlad was outnumbered and outgunned, but there
was one factor that Sultan Mehmed didnât take into account: He may have been stronger
than Vlad, but nobody was more brutal. He staged a terrifying night attack on an
Ottoman encampment outside Targoviste in 1462, where he took 5,000 men. When the full might of the Ottoman forces
arrived shortly after, they discovered that Vlad had mounted all 5,000 â in addition
to fifteen thousand other Ottoman prisoners - on his trademark spikes. This grisly display would later be dubbed
âThe Forest of The Impaled.â To the invading Ottomans, Vlad seemed less
like an average ruler and more like an inhuman monster â the kind of terrifying, legendary
figure who makes a perfectly logical inspiration for the worldâs most famous vampire. Mehmed ordered his forces to retreat the next
day. The troopâs morale just couldnât survive
seeing 20,000 of their countrymen turned into rotting shish-kebabs. The Ottomanâs came to know Vlad as the âImpaler
Kingâ, an iconic nickname that would live on in different forms for centuries to come. Vlad continued his bloody reign, on and off,
for the rest of his life. Even when he was deposed and imprisoned for
a time, he was later released by his captors to once again wage bloody war against the
Ottomans. Heâd slaughter, impale, and dismember his
enemies with glee all the way up until his death â when he was killed defending his
beloved principality from Ottoman invasion in January of 1477. For many modern Romanians, Vlad is still revered
as a powerful ruler and a good man to his citizens â though to his unfortunate enemies,
like the Saxons and the Ottomans, youâd be forgiven for thinking he was the most evil
man who ever lived. Check out âMost Evil Man â Ivan The Terribleâ
and âMost Evil Man â Joseph Stalinâ for more information on some of historyâs
most terrifying rulers. Sometimes, the reality is a lot more terrifying
than the fiction.
M-am uitat la jumate si sunt dezgustat de cat cacat poate manca. Daca era primul minut ca un intro, asa, un "hai sa va spun o poveste interesanta" era ceva, dar jumate sa tina acelasi cacat parca scris de nord coreeni vorbind de americani, muie.
What the hell? Asta seamÄnÄ foarte mult cu animaČiile Kurzgesagt.
Nice find, though!
Ce deČeu, ĂŽn plm