Vampires, Burial, and Death: Folklore and RealityIn this book, Paul Barber surveys centuries of folklore about vampires - from the tale of a sixteenth-century shoemaker from Breslau whose ghost terrorized everyone in the city, to the testimony of a doctor who presided over the exhumation and dissection of a graveyard full of Serbian vampires - and offers the first scientific explanation for the origin of the vampire legends. His book will be fascinating reading for scientists, historians, and anthropologists as well as for anyone interested in folklore. |
Contents
Introduction | 1 |
Peter Plogojowitz | 5 |
The Shoemaker of Silesia | 10 |
Visum et Repertum | 15 |
De Tourneforts Vrykolakas | 21 |
How Revenants Come into Existence | 29 |
The Appearance of the Vampire | 39 |
Apotropaics I | 57 |
Some Theories of the Vampire | 98 |
The Body after Death | 102 |
Actions and Reactions | 120 |
Hands Emerging from the Earth | 133 |
Down to a Watery Grave | 147 |
Killing the Vampire | 154 |
Body Disposal and Its Problems | 166 |
Conclusion | 195 |
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Common terms and phrases
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