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Dracula Part 2: Vlad the Impaler 5358 Views


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Description:

Vlad the Impaler was an appropriately named guy, until he went on tropical vacations. Then, he went by Vlad the Imtanner. For some facts that are actually true, check out this video.


Transcript

00:01

We speak student!

00:07

Dracula

00:09

Vlad the Impaler

00:11

a la Shmoop

00:13

So as I was researching

00:16

the background for Dracula,

00:19

I came across a lot of references

00:22

to Vlad the Impaler.

00:24

And, from my reading, Vlad the Impaler

00:27

would find victims for various reasons,

00:30

and it was unclear as to why he would impale people.

00:33

[ evil laugh ]

00:34

But what he would do is stick

00:36

a post in the ground with a pointy tip,

00:39

and a few guys would swing the poor person being impaled.

00:42

It would go through their chest

00:44

and not kill them.

00:45

[ pained groan ]

00:46

That was, I guess, a sport

00:48

- or something that he did just to... - A spectacle.

00:51

Lawn decorations in 15-whatever.

00:54

[ moan ]

00:57

Was Vlad the Impaler the inspiration for Dracula?

01:00

Oh, yeah. So part --

01:02

I mean, the novel goes into --

01:04

When the novel goes into a little bit of

01:05

the extensive biography

01:08

of Count Dracula, since he's hundreds of years old...

01:11

[ aww ]

01:12

Part of it is that he's

01:14

not just a nobleman,

01:15

but he comes from this very aristocratic clan.

01:19

That was part of the repulsion of the invasions of the Ottoman Empire,

01:23

so in modern day Turkey.

01:24

So the person --

01:26

The vampire, I should say, Count Dracula,

01:29

always had this sort of basis.

01:30

And his clan was noted for

01:33

being a very militaristic, warring clan.

01:36

Vlad the Impaler, I think,

01:39

is one of the sort of

01:41

the stories in the firmament

01:44

from where Dracula takes off.

01:47

Got it. Makes sense.

01:49

[ whoop ]

01:51

Was Vlad the Impaler the inspiration for Dracula?

01:58

[ evil laugh ]

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