DRACULA and bad things that have happenedon Saint Valentines

Day. Connect the dots

Sympathy for the Devil? The Case of Vlad III, alias

Dracula

To anyone who concedes that evil exists in theological or metaphysical

terms, Vlad III, Prince of Wallachia, the so-called Impaler, must number
among those who most notoriously personify this mysterious force and
yet to some he was, and remains, a freedom fighter, even a defender
of Christianity against the inroads of militant Islam. As a boy and
a youth, he spent years as a hostage in the court of the Ottoman
Sultan and had to reckon with death at a moment's notice should his
father break the terms of his fealty to the Sultan. His half-brother, also
in the custody of the Sultan, had to defend his chastity by stabbing the
Sultan in the thigh when about to be sexually abused. Vlad' s
most favored means of execution, impaling, could be construed as a
symbolic form of sexual assault as in its most grisly form it involved
the rupture and penetration of the lower region of the body by a
wooden stake. Thus Vlad's fascination with one of the most obscene,
degrading and cruel forms of torture may have been initiated by a
desire for revenge. Of course, relativizing apologists may interject ,
Vlad lived in harsh times After all, he adopted impaling from
the Ottomans themselves, who apparently introduced this measure
during the siege of Constantinople. Offering no quarter to the
inhabitants of towns where their leaders had refused the terms of
surrender before a siege was standard practice even in biblical times.
So why single out Vlad III as the very epitome of evil?

In terms of the sheer quantity of the deaths he inflicted in a cruel

manner he was exceptional even in his day. The sight of the "forest of
the impaled" that met the eyes of Sultan Mehmet and his army was
appalling enough to deter that sultan from further pursuing his current
military campaign in Wallachia and Transylvania. Those who wish to
defend Vlad have argued that there was method in Vlad's madness to
the extent that only the most drastic means secured him a chance of
surviving when all the odds were squarely against him. Arguably, we
enlightened taxpayers in many nations today implicitly aid and abet
the potential use of weapons that, if ever used, would exterminate
entire populations and even end all human life on this planet.

As far as his brutal treatment of Turks is concerned, Vlad's grim

methods served to enhance his prestige in some quarters the Christian
world. Constantinople, the Second Rome, had recently fallen and in
the Levant Islam seemed to be gaining ground on several fronts. When
the Pope canvassed for support of a new crusade, Vlad
expressed interest in doing his bit; to establish his military prowess
beyond any shadow of doubt he assembled a collection of many
thousands of noses cut off from the corpses of his victims. His skill as a
military leader was proven by his conduct of guerrilla tactics, his resort
to scorched earth tactics in the face of overwhelming enemy forces on
the open field as well as by commanding his troops very effectively in
phases of conventional warfare.

The fact that Vlad was engaged in war with the Ottoman empire seems
to have blunted some of the criticism leveled against him by his
detractors, especially when a widespread attitude condoned the
imposition of harsh measures against Infidels that would be regrettable
if meted out to fellow Christians. For centuries to come non-Christians
were enslaved without a qualm despite it being seen as distasteful
to enslave those who were Christians. Earlier in the Middle Ages the
crossbow was deemed a most inhuman contraption, even unlawful, by
the Church if aimed at Christians but not so if used against non-
Christian foes. Of course, we discover the exact obverse in Muslim
attitudes to Christians during the same time period. Besides, Vlad
could prove just as cruel to Christians as he could to Muslims, as his
execution of Saxons in the Siebenburgen area of Transylvania showed
only too clearly. In fact Vlad's evil reputation as a demonic
monster, which ultimately culminated in Count Dracula the
vampire in Bram Stoker's famous novel, goes back to printed
illustrations of Vlad's impaled victims made possible by the recent
invention of the book press, which the Saxons employed as a
propaganda tool to much effect.

In the first and in some ways most chilling case of Vlad's bloodthirsty
and vindictive state of mind the next case we consider adds perfidy
and even an element of sacrilege to a catalog of Vlad's atrocities. In
1457, Vlad, only recently installed in power as the ruler of Wallachia,
took a drastic step to eliminate the power and influence of the Boyars
in his realm. The Boyars belonged to class of nobles who as
independent magnates like the barons in the reign of King John in
England, could thwart the claim of absolute power to which Vlad
aspired. Having accepted Vlad's invitation, five hundred Boyars
participated in a banquet held on Easter Sunday in the grand hall of
the royal palace in Targoviste, then, with Bucharest, the capital of
Wallachia. No sooner had the guests finished their repast than they
were arrested on charges of complicity in the death of Vlad's father.
The older Boyars were summarily impaled outside the city walls
whereas the younger members of the class were sent on a
horrendous forced march to a craggy height on which they were made
to build an impregnable and strategically vital fortress. Here one could
almost discern an early anticipation of the process of Selection that
took place in Auschwitz and other Nazi death camps.

Over and above Vlad's disrespect for humanity, the timing of the
massacre incurs the charge that he brazenly challenged
divine authority to boot. History affords few comparable cases of
perfidy resulting in the massacre of ones own guests. Mehmet Ali
eliminated the Mamelukes in Egypt by using much the same ruse in
1811. The massacre of Huguenots on Saint Bartholomews in 1572
combined the same elements of timing an atrocity so as to fall on a
holy day and inviting guests to a celebration that would signal their
doom. A singularly grim irony attaches to Saint Valentines Day in the
years 1349, 1945 and 1929 respectively. In the first instance the Jews
of Strasbourg were burnt alive; in the second a great number of the
inhabitants of Dresden along with thousands of refugees were
incinerated by British bombers. In perhaps the most bloodcurdling
incident in American gang warfare seven mobsters were mown down
by Al Capones men dressed as policemen. a garage by There have
been several notable cases of exploiting the distraction offered by a
religious holiday in history. I remind readers of the Yom Kippur war and
the attack George Washington made on Hessian troops at Christmas
after crossing the Delaware in 1776. All is fair in love and war, as they
say. In short, I find no true parallel to Vlads treatment of the Boyars.

To religious minds his cognomen of Dracula appears relevant. His

father had become a member of the Grand Order of the Dragon, hence
the dragon displayed in his heraldic crest and his appellation which,
when transferred to his son, became Dracula, the son of the dragon. In
common parlance the same name referred to the Devil. In medieval
legends the Devil was credited with the immense power of a master
builder. The architect of Cologne Cathedral supposedly enlisted the aid
of the archfiend. The energy and the skill that marked Vlad's ability to
raise mighty castles and fortresses are truly remarkable as any visitor
to Romania today will affirm. Were it not for the enormity of his crimes
Vlad could well elicit admiration as well as dread and repugnance.
Certainly the tourist industry today has done nothing to conceal his
amazing architectural achievements. Unfortunately Vlad was a human
being like us despite the bid to assign him to a non-human category
occupied exclusively by demons and devils. For all that there is no
doubt in my mind that Vlad III was evil and as such the bearer of a
warning to us all, especially now.

P. S. In the meantime visit Romania, a much overlooked but highly

worthwhile goal for tourists, as my son and I discovered only last
week. I can highly recommend a taxi-driven days outing with a friendly
and astonishingly well informed guide.