*Blog from mythology.com

Dracula, Nosferatu, Lestat… Vampires! The name alone sparks an image in our minds of an ultra-slick, alluring, pale-faced man with an elegant cape, pointy teeth and a Bela Lugosi-esque accent, who vants to suck your blood. Besides giving people unwanted cases of goose-bumps and terrorizing the dreams of children the world over, the vampire has had a rich and storied past.

First, a bit of background on the origins of Vampire folklore. Back in the 1730’s, a team of doctors went to Siberia to investigate tales of vampirism. They wrote about the case of Arnold Paole, who had died years prior in a lethal wagon accident, but had since returned from the grave to become the undead terrorist of the town. Paole’s case is an excellent example of what kind of “evidence” the villagers used to justify their fantastic fables.

When they exhumed his body, they noticed that he had not decayed much. They also found blood around his mouth and his complexion was ruddy (obviously due to all of the blood he had been drinking). But, most strikingly, when they drove a stake through his no-longer beating heart, as any reasonable person would have done, they heard a chilling gasp escape the dead man’s lips.

Now, before you start breaking off and sharpening chair legs and filling you bath tub with holy water, allow me to bring to your attention that all of these things are easily explained. To start, burying a body substantially slows the decomposition process. If you don’t believe me, go ahead and ask that guy with the bug fetish from C.S.I. The “new” blood around his mouth was only old blood that had been trapped in his body, due to the lack of embalming. The reddish complexion was another natural phase of decomposition (the C.S.I. bug guy will probably agree with that also). But, my favorite, the eerie gasp of the poor dead man: Driving the stake into his heart put pressure on the chest cavity, causing trapped gas to pass over the vocal chords on its way out.

While I can sarcastically write volumes on the topic, I think I’ll leave you to ponder on this for a while. I am going to go watch “Lost Boys” and maybe even “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” (not the show either, the shamefully awesome 90’s movie that couldn’t quite save Pee Wee Herman’s career).

In the meantime, take this quiz to find out what famous vampire you are. I was Count Dracula (it must be because I’m rich and irresistible).