Vampires and werewolves hating one another isn’t anything new. It’s an age old feud known by all. You have movies like Underworld, books like Twilight and Anita Blake and so forth all showing either a strained relationship between the two species or full out hatred. But believe it or not, vampires and werewolves share a few similarities.
First off, like vampires, werewolves also caused mass alarm in Europe during the 1500s and onwards. Back then people were terrified of becoming a vampire, they did all sorts of insane things to corpses and went all out to prevent vampires from coming into being, there were even “experts” that wrote multiple pamphlets on the subject to inform the people about these supposed vampire infestations. People feared werewolves in the same way as they feared vampires. Fun fact: there were nearly thirty thousand cases of lycanthropy reported between 1520 and 1630.
Then there was this old belief that someone that was a werewolf in life would then return as a vampire once they died. Because of this, in Slavic territories (as well as a few others), many names originally used for werewolves eventually came to be used for vampires (vrykolakas, vukodlak, vurkodlak and volkodlak).
In France, demonologists wrote of a unique kind of werewolf called the loublin. This werewolf was found in cemeteries, digging up corpses and then eating them. Werewolf myths like this were found all around the world, along with vampire myths as well. In Montenegro, there was a belief that all vampires must spend time in wolf form. In Greece, anyone that ate a sheep that had been originally killed by a wolf would become a vampire.
The Essay on Ethics & people
The question of ethics is particularly important for a person who is both part of society and works with a group. The development of community and collective self is impossible without the struggle of opposing ideas and positions, and the collision of different points of views and opinions through which it is possible to overcome contradictions and disagreements. The relationship within a team ...
Werewolves, on the other hand, do not have any control over their transformation. They shift shape from human form to wolf-like form whenever they are in the presence of a full moon. The full moon is perhaps the most widely known method of werewolf transformation. The full moon method has been widely perpetuated by the mainstream media including most fiction books and movies featuring werewolves. It depends upon who you talk to as to what extent the moon plays in the shifting process – some believe that the full moon is the sole influence that triggers the transformation, while others believe that it plays a part but only for new werewolves. Whichever side you believe, the one thing that is clear is that the moon – in particular the full moon, does play some part in the process. Perhaps because vampires are thought to have control over their form, while werewolves do not, each creature has a distinctive set of personality characteristics when stereotyped in film and literature. Vampires are seen as cold, both figuratively and literally.
They are capable of regarding normal humans placidly, with icy sharp logic. The iconic image of a vampire is of a pale man in a cape laughing creepily or simply staring. In contrast, werewolves are seen as passionate and almost animalistic. The iconic image of a werewolf is of a man caught mid-transformation, ripping at his shirt as his body turns from human into fierce and bulky animal. These two creatures also differ in terms of the type of threat they present to humans.
Vampires actively seek humans to kill (or to turn into vampires, depending on the story).
They require regular meals of fresh human blood in order to survive, and so they act as literal silent predators. The fear that we feel when watching a vampire movie is the fear of what unknown and alien force might wait hidden in the darkness. Werewolves are not typically described as actively stalking humans, and indeed are often shown as very loving to humans when the moon is new. However, they can hurt human beings when they are in wolf form. The fear evoked at a werewolf movie is the fear of betrayal, the fear of those we trust and care for transforming into something utterly different and destructive.
The Essay on Hobbes and Machiavelli on Human Nature and Fear
.2 Compare Hobbes and Machiavelli on Human Nature. What is the role of Fear in each? Thomas Hobbes and Machiavelli shared a commonality in the time period in which they each lived. Separated by approximately 100 years, both thinkers were focusing on political theory. Hobbes' theory tended to focus on the social contract between a people and its government. Machiavelli's theory focused on the ...
Until the Civil War, the deadly tuberculosis, or “consumption”, an airborne disease for which was no known cure, was the major cause of death in America. Those afflicted with tuberculosis evoked the idea of a vampire. Victims suffered the most during the night and woke up coughing; bloody spittle gathered at the corners of their mouths Ghostly in appearance, the patients, with their emaciated forms, crimson lips and sunken eyes seemed to be walking corpses. After they did die of tuberculosis their corpses would appear to gain weight when they began to bloat, their nails would curl and their hair would grow.
The deadly epidemic was wasting whole families and entire communities. In a last desperate effort to combat the plague, families began exhuming their dead in an attempt to save the living. Essentially, the corpses of people who died from tuberculosis were viewed as vampires, responsible for contaminating others by nightly visiting them (although the word “vampire” was never used to describe him/her).
As a defensive measure, much like inoculation – where a little of a disease is injected into the body so the body can build resistance – families would dig up the dead, burn the heart and feed the ashes to family members in an attempt to ward off the disease. If the heart contained liquid, it was used to treat the disease.
In some cases, all of the exhumed remains were burned to ward off the death of family members. Sometimes the bones were rearranged. Heads and leg bones were severed. These were not clandestine activities and while physicians and clergy did not endorse the practice, they did not openly condemn it either. The most famous (and latest recorded) case is that of nineteen year old Mercy Brown who died in Exeter, Rhode Island in 1892. Her father, assisted by the family physician, removed her from her tomb two months after her death. Her heart was cut out then burnt to ashes. An account of this incident was found among the papers of Bram Stoker and the story closely resembles the events in his classic novel, Dracula.
The Essay on Tuberculosis: Infectious Disease
Abstract Introduction: Despite the decline of tuberculosis in the population at large, healthcare workers (HCW) are still at risk of infection. Methods: In a narrative review the TB risk in HCW and preventive measures are described, with the focus on epidemiology and Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) regulations in Germany. Results: There is an increased risk of infection not only in pneumology ...
Throughout history, vampires and werewolves have been seen as enemies not alias. Whether you believe or not, you have to admit they are amazing creatures. Believing in creatures such as these proves the imagination can be unbelievably creative. Hopefully the books and movies of the past will not be the last we’ve heard of these rogue animals.
Works Cited Page:
* The vampire book: the encyclopaedia of the undead 2nd edition / J. Gordon Melton
Detroit : Visible Ink Press, c1999
* The encyclopaedia of vampires, werewolves, and other monsters / Rosemary Ellen Guiley
New York, NY : Facts on File, c2005.
* Vampires, werewolves & demons / [written by Lynn Myring] by Myring, Lynn Adelaide : London : Rigby ; Usborne, 1979
* Vampires vs. werewolves: whose side are you on? / Martin Howden by Howden, Martin
Melbourne, Vic.: Wilkinson Publishing, 2010
