Vlad the Impaler

Historians and vampire buffs have traced the "vampire line", so to speak, back to Transylvania, where Vlad was born. His father and brother will sentenced to death when he was 17, and he spent a great portion of his life extracting revenge on their deaths. He claimed the throne in Wallachia and ruled for six years, during which time he ordered the deaths of over 40,000 people. Most of these people were impaled on various instruments to bring about their death, hence the nickname, the Impaler. He was also called Vlad Dracula, which means son of Dracul. Bram Stoker loosely based his character, Dracula, on this singularly vicious man.

Elizabeth Bathory

Elizabeth Bathory, a noblewoman, was put on trial and found guilty of murdering over 650 young women, mostly servants that worked for her at her husband's estate. The cruel and unusually graphic ways in which she killed these women was an enormous scandal in Hungary. She is considered by many to be the first authentic historical vampire; to this day, there are rumours that she bathed in the blood of her victims to maintain a youthful appearance. Her court documents, however, were sealed. And so it shall remain a mystery...

Dracula

No vampire has done more for the genre than the dark man himself, Dracula. This book was a turning point for the myth in many ways. Dracula reestablished the link between Christianity and vampires, in Van Helsing's use of the eucharistic wafer and holy water in the book, in addition to Harker's rosary repelling Dracula. In addition, the book (by way of its lasting popularity) established garlic, the staked heart and beheading as the vampire hunter's methods of choice. It also turned Transylvania into the vampire mecca of the world. Dracula influenced dozens of movies and has become a treasured classic, as well as a good starting place for vampire lovers.

The Vampire Lestat

Ah, Lestat, intrepid boy king of the vampire realm. With the advent of Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles, vampire lore took on a new twist. Lestat allowed us for the first time to see the man behind the cloak, in all his tortured humanity and effervescent charm. The last few decades have ushered in a new, secular brand of vampires and Lestat leads the way. Unhindered by morals, immune to the power of the cross and holy water that have so beleaguered his literary peers, he rides a new wave of myth and belief. And challenges it at every turn. Lestat is the most important literary vampire figure of this century.