Vampires
Vampires - in the lower mythology of Europe dead at night getting up from the grave or being in the shape of a bat, sucking the blood of sleeping people, Sender nightmares. Vampires are "unclean" dead - criminals, suicides, deaths of premature death and the dead from the bites of vampires.
The image of a vampire is not rare for the cinema and literature, although vampires from works of art, usually, have some differences from the vampire mythology. In folklore, the term, usually, used to refer to the blood-sucking essence of Eastern European legends, but often referred to as vampires and similar creatures from other countries and cultures.
It seems that until the XIX century, vampires in Europe were described as horrible monsters from the grave. Vampires, usually, became suicidal, criminals or evil sorcerers, though in some cases become a vampire "offspring of sin" could pass his vampirism on innocent victims. However, sometimes it can become a vampire and victim of a brutal, untimely or violent death. Most Romanian belief in vampires (except Strigoi) and European vampire stories have, according to the literature, of Slavic origin. Vampire can be killed by plunging a stake or something silver (bullet, knife) in the heart or burn.
In XVIII-XIX centuries rumors about vampires came not only to the ears of the king of England, but also spread to New England, particularly in Rhode Island and Eastern Connecticut. In these areas, there are many documented cases where families dug those who used to enjoy, and removed the corpses of the heart, in the belief that the deceased was a vampire responsible for illness and death in the family (although the word "vampire" was never used to describe him / her). It was believed that the dead of night visits deadly tuberculosis (or "tuberculosis", as it was called in those days) to the members of his family became the cause of the disease the disease. The most famous (and latest recorded) case was a nineteen year old Mercy Brown, who died in the American Exeter in 1892. Her father, who was assisted by a family doctor, pulled her out of the tomb two months after her death. Her heart was cut out and burned to ashes. Record of this case was found among the papers of Bram Stoker, and the story closely resembles the events in his classic novel "Dracula."
Belief in vampires still exists. Although some cultures have kept their original belief in the undead, most modern believers are influenced by artistic image of the vampire as he appears in films and literature.
In the 1970s, there were rumors (spread by local media) about a vampire preying on the Highgate Cemetery (Highgate Cemetery) in London. Adult vampire hunters in large numbers thronged the cemetery. Among several books describing this case, we can note books Sean Manchester (Sean Manchester), a local resident who is one of the first to suggest the existence of "Highgate Vampire" and who claimed to be expelled and destroyed all the vampire nest in the area.
In the modern folklore of Puerto Rico and Mexico, the chupacabra is considered the creation of those that eats flesh or drink the blood of animals. This gives grounds to consider it another kind of vampire. "Hysteria due chupacabra" is often associated with deep economic and political crises, particularly in the mid-1990s.
In late 2002 and early 2003, hysteria about the so-called vampire attacks spread throughout the African country of Malawi. The crowd sounded a death with stones and attacked at least another four people, including the governor Chivayya Eric (Eric Chiwaya), based on the belief that the government was colluding with vampires.
In Romania, in February 2004, some of the relatives of the late Toma Petre (Toma Petre) feared that he became a vampire. They dragged his corpse, tore his heart, burned it, and mixed the ashes with water, then to drink it.
Zombies
Zombies are, usually, be understood as supernatural way a human corpse. In today's epic, we also meet zombie animals. Also, zombies can still call a person who does not control their own actions and the body in general. Also, in a figurative sense, zombie people - craze something or someone.
The exact origin of the term, as the word itself, is still a lot of rumors and controversy. We only know one thing. Zombies come to us from Africa. Do not get too into the details, and etymology. Zombies appeared in the West Indies, particularly in Haiti, along with the cult of voodoo, brought with them African "guests."
Similarity zombies are found not only in the culture of West Africa and the Caribbean. In Japanese mythology, there is the spirit of bosc, who feeds on human flesh. Bosc spirits are the souls of people who died of starvation.
The first person to mention in the present context the term "zombie" is considered to be well-known American occultist and explorer William Seabrook (William Seabrook). It happened in 1929 in a book by William "Magic Island," which he wrote after a visit to Haiti, where he met with a voodoo sorcerers. American was generally odious personality and wrote many bestsellers about your experience cannibalism, voodoo, and confinement in a mental hospital. And he died an unnatural death from a drug overdose.
The publication was the first impetus to the emergence of interest in the company to a zombie. Within three years after this was filmed the first picture on the theme of zombies - "White Zombie", the events which are taking place in Haiti, where the slave owner controls an army of zombies, engaged in the cultivation of sugar cane on his plantations. The concept of zombies in a context in which we see it now in movies, games and literature, was formed in the late 60-ies of the last century, after the release of pictures of George Romero's "Night of the Living Dead."
Sources
Barber, Paul (1988). Vampires, Burial and Death: Folklore and Reality. New York: Yale University Press. ISBN 0-300-04126-8.
Bunson, Matthew (1993). The Vampire Encyclopedia. London: Thames & Hudson. ISBN 0-500-27748-6.
Black, J. Anderson (2000) The Dead Walk Noir Publishing, Hereford, Herefordshire, ISBN 0-9536564-2-X
