People Practiced Anti-Vampire Rituals in Bulgaria Until Three Decades Ago

Source: http://www.ancient-origins.net/histo...601?nopaging=1



Thanks to Bram Stoker’s Gothic horror novel Dracula, many people associate vampires with the region of Transylvania in Romania. However, it was only around 25 years ago that anti-vampire rituals stopped being practiced in Bulgaria. These rituals have been going on since at least the 13th century.

In Bulgaria’s folklore beliefs, it was said that ‘bad people’ could turn into vampires after they died if they weren’t stabbed in the chest with an iron or wooden rod before being buried. That rod would also be a way to pin the individuals into their graves so they couldn’t terrorize the living at midnight.


Illustration of a vampire

Bulgarian archaeologist Nikolay Ovcharov said “We are not medieval people to believe in vampires but in the past people believed that they existed and conducted ceremonies to prevent the dead from turning into these devilish creatures.”

Ovcharov, who is sometimes called “Bulgaria’s Indiana Jones”, also said that there was a person specially chosen to stab dead bodies with stakes in some Bulgarian villages until as recently as 25-30 years ago.


Vampire Killing Kit circa 1840.

More than 100 “vampire-treated” people have been discovered in Bulgaria. All of them were men and prominent citizens. One example of a “vampire” skeleton was located in the coastal town of Sozopol in 2012 and another was found on Bulgaria's Perperikon , a 7,000-year-old sacred site located deep in the Rhodope Mountains.

Anti-vampire rituals were practiced in Serbia and other Balkan countries as well. “Vampire” burial sites were discovered in Poland too. Although the majority of people say vampires are based on superstition and folklore, a minority still claims vampires exist.