Vampire
A vampire is a mythical creature with a human-like appearance that subsists by feeding on the vital essence (usually the blood) of humans. In European folklore, vampires are undead humanoid creatures that visit loved ones and cause mischief or deaths in the neighbourhoods they inhabited while they were alive. They wear shrouds and are often described as bloated and of ruddy or dark countenance, contrasting with the modern gaunt, pale vampire which dates from the early 19th century.
Vampiric entities have been recorded in cultures around the world, but the term vampire was first popularized in Western Europe following reports of an 18th-century mass hysteria drawing on a pre-existing folk belief in Southeastern and Eastern Europe. This delusion led, in certain cases, not only to individuals being accused of vampirism, but also to the corpses of such suspected vampires being pierced with stakes.
Local variants in Southeastern Europe were also known by different names, such as shtriga in Albania, vrykolakas in Greece and strigoi in Romania, cognate with Italian strega, meaning 'witch'.
In modern times, the vampire is generally held to be a fictitious entity, although belief in similar vampiric creatures (such as the chupacabra) still persists in some cultures. Early folk belief in vampires has sometimes been ascribed to the ignorance of the body's process of decomposition after death and how people in pre-industrial societies tried to rationalize this, creating the figure of the vampire to explain the mysteries of death. In 1982, scientist David Dolphin suggested that Porphyria was linked with legends of both vampirism and werewolves, receiving much media exposure. This theory has since been largely discredited.
The charismatic and sophisticated vampire of modern fiction was born in 1819 with the publication of "The Vampyre" by the English writer John Polidori; the story was highly successful and arguably the most influential vampire work of the early 19th century. Bram Stoker's 1897 novel Dracula is remembered as the quintessential vampire novel and provided the basis of the modern vampire legend, even though it was published after fellow Irish author Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu's 1872 novel Carmilla. The success of this book spawned a distinctive vampire genre, still popular in the 21st century, with books, films, television shows, and video games. The vampire has since become a dominant figure in the horror genre.
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