I don't know if this was mentioned here but just watched a DVD on Vampires from National Geographic exploring the myths, legends, and whether or not vampires really exist.
No great sensational ending but they pretty much debunked the vampire myth. Most of the folklore apparently was related to an outbreak of a disease that fortunately we don't have to experience thanks to modern science.
The biggest surprise to me was that Count Vlad of Romania who seems to be considered the original Dracula wasn't even known until around 1990. Apparently Bram Stoker based his novel on a deceased female along with agrarian folklore.
It was interesting that they looked at "modern vampires" or those that claim to be vampires today. The hypothesis was that maybe there was a rational explanation. Maybe an Iron deficiency or anemia. They did some bloodwork on someone who had his teeth modified to look like a vampire and claims that he needs to drink human blood to find an scientific explanation and the blood work came back normal.
No explicit conclusions but the implicit conclusion is that vampirism of old was a way to explain diseases that were then unknown and modern vampirism is basically a social phenomena without any reasonable explanation.
No great sensational ending but they pretty much debunked the vampire myth. Most of the folklore apparently was related to an outbreak of a disease that fortunately we don't have to experience thanks to modern science.
The biggest surprise to me was that Count Vlad of Romania who seems to be considered the original Dracula wasn't even known until around 1990. Apparently Bram Stoker based his novel on a deceased female along with agrarian folklore.
It was interesting that they looked at "modern vampires" or those that claim to be vampires today. The hypothesis was that maybe there was a rational explanation. Maybe an Iron deficiency or anemia. They did some bloodwork on someone who had his teeth modified to look like a vampire and claims that he needs to drink human blood to find an scientific explanation and the blood work came back normal.
No explicit conclusions but the implicit conclusion is that vampirism of old was a way to explain diseases that were then unknown and modern vampirism is basically a social phenomena without any reasonable explanation.
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