Ellen Lloyd – AncientPages.com – Most people in the Western world interested in vampires are familiar with Dracula whose story was inspired by Vlad III, a Prince in Wallachia who was often called Dracula.
Vetala is an unusual vampire because it possesses the knowledge of past, present, and future. Credit: svetlanarib79 – Adobe Stock
Prince Dracula was certainly a cruel, ruthless, and bloodthirsty ruler, but he was not a vampire. Bram Stoker’s Dracula written in 1897 is undoubtedly one of the most famous vampire stories that still fascinates, but it’s not the first account of a bloodthirsty creature that inspired the creation of vampires.
Humans have long feared and yet been attracted by monsters of various kinds. We encounter some horrifying and dangerous beings in ancient legends and myths, Our ancestors were convinced several of these frightening creatures were real and the belief in vampires goes far back in time even if vampires, as we know them today, arrived on the scene only in the eighteenth century.
One of the most interesting bloodsucking creatures that may even have contributed to Stoker’s legendary Dracula story is the Hindu spirit known as the vetala.
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