WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.120 I want you to start this deep dive with an image 00:00:02.120 --> 00:00:05.799 in your head, and I'm going to ask you to immediately 00:00:05.799 --> 00:00:07.900 delete the image you probably just conjured up. 00:00:08.060 --> 00:00:10.699 Forget the black cape, forget the widow's peak, 00:00:10.900 --> 00:00:14.339 forget the bats fluttering against a full moon. 00:00:14.519 --> 00:00:16.760 And please, definitely forget the bad Transylvanian 00:00:16.760 --> 00:00:19.480 accent. Exactly. Instead, I want you to picture 00:00:19.480 --> 00:00:23.140 a dinner party. It's Easter Sunday, mid -1400s. 00:00:23.140 --> 00:00:27.160 Okay. The location is a princely court in a place 00:00:27.160 --> 00:00:32.090 called Wallachia. And the guests, they are the 00:00:32.090 --> 00:00:34.789 absolute elite, the wealthy, the powerful, the 00:00:34.789 --> 00:00:37.390 landed gentry. The who's who of the medieval 00:00:37.390 --> 00:00:39.649 Balkans, basically. Right. They're eating, they're 00:00:39.649 --> 00:00:41.329 drinking, probably feeling pretty good about 00:00:41.329 --> 00:00:43.369 their station in life, wearing their finest silks 00:00:43.369 --> 00:00:46.810 and furs. And then the host locks the doors. 00:00:46.950 --> 00:00:49.969 And by the time those doors open again, the entire 00:00:49.969 --> 00:00:52.429 social order is effectively extinct. Because 00:00:52.429 --> 00:00:55.619 the host is Vlad III. the man history remembers 00:00:55.619 --> 00:00:58.899 as Dracula. Or to use the name that really terrified 00:00:58.899 --> 00:01:02.359 an entire continent for decades, Vladipay. Vlad 00:01:02.359 --> 00:01:05.379 the Impaler. Vlad the Impaler. So today, we are 00:01:05.379 --> 00:01:08.760 stripping away all the Bram Stoker fiction. We 00:01:08.760 --> 00:01:11.019 aren't talking about vampires or, you know, sunlight 00:01:11.019 --> 00:01:13.579 allergies or looking in mirrors. We are doing 00:01:13.579 --> 00:01:16.920 a deep dive into the reality of a man who was, 00:01:17.040 --> 00:01:19.459 in so many ways, infinitely more terrifying. 00:01:20.000 --> 00:01:23.019 And honestly, more complex than any supernatural 00:01:23.019 --> 00:01:25.340 creature Hollywood could ever dream up. That 00:01:25.340 --> 00:01:27.620 is absolutely the goal, to look at the human 00:01:27.620 --> 00:01:30.480 being behind the monster mask. And to do that, 00:01:30.519 --> 00:01:33.019 we have a massive stack of sources to get through. 00:01:33.099 --> 00:01:35.799 This isn't just folklore. We've got Ottoman chronicles 00:01:35.799 --> 00:01:37.920 written by the people who actually fought him. 00:01:37.980 --> 00:01:39.959 Right. We have German pamphlets that, I mean, 00:01:39.959 --> 00:01:42.560 they were basically the 15th century equivalent 00:01:42.560 --> 00:01:45.540 of tabloids. Totally. And we even have some cutting 00:01:45.540 --> 00:01:48.659 edge chemical analysis from just last year, 2023. 00:01:49.359 --> 00:01:51.560 that completely changes how we physically picture 00:01:51.560 --> 00:01:53.640 the man himself. And the mission for this discussion 00:01:53.640 --> 00:01:56.900 really is to walk a very fine line. We need to 00:01:56.900 --> 00:01:59.819 figure out the central tension of his life. Was 00:01:59.819 --> 00:02:02.980 this guy a sadistic psychopath who tortured people 00:02:02.980 --> 00:02:05.319 for sport because he, you know, he enjoyed the 00:02:05.319 --> 00:02:08.759 screams? Or was he desperate pragmatist, a ruler 00:02:08.759 --> 00:02:11.759 of a tiny state sandwiched between superpowers 00:02:11.759 --> 00:02:15.080 who used terror as a calculated political tool? 00:02:15.240 --> 00:02:18.300 Is the ultimate historical case study in Do the 00:02:18.300 --> 00:02:21.379 Ends Justify the Means? If the means involve 00:02:21.379 --> 00:02:24.659 20 ,000 wooden stakes. Yeah. But before we get 00:02:24.659 --> 00:02:26.400 to the blood and the horror, we have to clear 00:02:26.400 --> 00:02:28.879 up the branding. Yeah. Because Dracula is such 00:02:28.879 --> 00:02:31.840 a loaded word for us now. It just screams monster. 00:02:32.039 --> 00:02:34.259 It does. But that wasn't the original vibe, was 00:02:34.259 --> 00:02:36.219 it? Not at all. In fact, if you were walking 00:02:36.219 --> 00:02:39.080 around the courts of Europe or Wallachia in, 00:02:39.259 --> 00:02:42.479 say, the 1430s, Dracula didn't mean vampire. 00:02:42.479 --> 00:02:44.620 It was a status symbol. A status symbol. It was 00:02:44.620 --> 00:02:47.120 a flex. Yeah. And it all starts with his father, 00:02:47.280 --> 00:02:49.699 Vlad II. Vlad the Father. Right. Vlad the Father 00:02:49.699 --> 00:02:53.460 was a nobleman who, in 1331, was inducted into 00:02:53.460 --> 00:02:56.039 something called the Order of the Dragon. And 00:02:56.039 --> 00:02:58.120 this is crucial context that always gets left 00:02:58.120 --> 00:03:00.080 out of the movie. Okay. The Order of the Dragon. 00:03:00.180 --> 00:03:01.879 What was it? It wasn't just a social club, right? 00:03:01.979 --> 00:03:05.650 Yeah. No, no, not a drinking buddy system. This 00:03:05.650 --> 00:03:09.189 was a militant, chivalric fraternity founded 00:03:09.189 --> 00:03:12.110 by Sigismund of Luxembourg, who was the Holy 00:03:12.110 --> 00:03:14.750 Roman Emperor and the King of Hungary. So this 00:03:14.750 --> 00:03:17.430 is very high level geopolitics we're talking 00:03:17.430 --> 00:03:19.949 about. The highest level. The order's mandate 00:03:19.949 --> 00:03:24.669 was explicit. Defend Christianity. And specifically... 00:03:25.039 --> 00:03:27.759 To stop the Ottoman Empire from advancing into 00:03:27.759 --> 00:03:29.680 Europe. Right, because the Ottomans were the 00:03:29.680 --> 00:03:31.979 rising superpower of the age. Absolutely. So 00:03:31.979 --> 00:03:34.479 the Order of the Dragon was, you could say, the 00:03:34.479 --> 00:03:37.219 frontline defense. It's like a medieval NATO 00:03:37.219 --> 00:03:40.039 special ops unit, but with, you know, more capes 00:03:40.039 --> 00:03:41.580 and swords. That's a pretty good way to put it. 00:03:41.740 --> 00:03:44.460 And the symbol of this order was a dragon. So 00:03:44.460 --> 00:03:46.259 because his father was a member, he took the 00:03:46.259 --> 00:03:48.520 name Dracul, which in the language of the time 00:03:48.520 --> 00:03:51.680 meant the dragon. Okay, so Dracul is the dragon. 00:03:52.110 --> 00:03:54.530 Correct. Now, in the Slavonic linguistic tradition 00:03:54.530 --> 00:03:56.969 they used in Wallachia, if you add an A or an 00:03:56.969 --> 00:04:00.150 E at the end of a name, it means son of. Ah, 00:04:00.349 --> 00:04:02.430 so the grammar does all the heavy lifting. Exactly. 00:04:02.569 --> 00:04:06.110 So Vlad III, our guy, becomes Dracula. Literally, 00:04:06.229 --> 00:04:08.909 the son of the dragon. Which is honestly a top 00:04:08.909 --> 00:04:12.430 -tier superhero name. Son of the dragon. It sounds 00:04:12.430 --> 00:04:15.550 so noble, fierce, knightly. It does. But you 00:04:15.550 --> 00:04:17.689 know, linguistics is a funny thing, and language 00:04:17.689 --> 00:04:20.649 evolves. Over time, in the Romanian language, 00:04:20.930 --> 00:04:23.829 the word dracolog shifted its meaning. How so? 00:04:24.029 --> 00:04:26.629 It stopped meaning just dragon, and it started 00:04:26.629 --> 00:04:29.949 meaning the devil. Wow. So while he was born 00:04:29.949 --> 00:04:32.949 as the son of the dragon, history slowly morphed 00:04:32.949 --> 00:04:35.850 his name into son of the devil. That feels like 00:04:35.850 --> 00:04:38.149 some incredibly heavy foreshadowing. It's almost 00:04:38.149 --> 00:04:40.990 literary how perfect that shift is. It really 00:04:40.990 --> 00:04:43.569 is. But we also have to address the other name. 00:04:44.230 --> 00:04:46.870 The one that makes you physically wince. The 00:04:46.870 --> 00:04:49.209 Impaler. Did people actually call him that to 00:04:49.209 --> 00:04:51.629 his face? Like, excuse me, Mr. The Impaler, your 00:04:51.629 --> 00:04:53.829 two o 'clock is here. Absolutely not. Unless 00:04:53.829 --> 00:04:56.110 they had a serious death wish. And even then, 00:04:56.110 --> 00:04:57.709 I wouldn't recommend it. During his lifetime, 00:04:57.810 --> 00:05:00.290 he was just Vlad or Vlad Dracula. So the nickname 00:05:00.290 --> 00:05:03.920 came later. Much later. The moniker Vlad... Vlad 00:05:03.920 --> 00:05:05.740 the Impaler, that comes from the Ottomans first. 00:05:05.920 --> 00:05:08.860 The writer Tursyn Beg referred to him as Kazikla 00:05:08.860 --> 00:05:11.699 Voivoda, the Impaler Lord, around the year 1500. 00:05:12.120 --> 00:05:14.459 So the Turks gave him the nickname. Yes, because 00:05:14.459 --> 00:05:16.339 they were the ones on the receiving end of it 00:05:16.339 --> 00:05:19.220 most often. And then later, Romanian history 00:05:19.220 --> 00:05:21.579 writing adopted it, mostly to distinguish him 00:05:21.579 --> 00:05:23.379 from all the other Vlads in the history books. 00:05:23.639 --> 00:05:25.439 It's a way to keep the family tree straight. 00:05:25.699 --> 00:05:27.899 It's a bit like being named after your favorite 00:05:27.899 --> 00:05:31.000 hobby. Just a very, very dark, very specific 00:05:31.000 --> 00:05:34.319 hobby. A very specific hobby, yes. But to understand 00:05:34.319 --> 00:05:38.000 why he chose that hobby, why he became a man 00:05:38.000 --> 00:05:40.939 defined by such brutality, we have to look at 00:05:40.939 --> 00:05:43.139 the map. I feel like with these medieval deep 00:05:43.139 --> 00:05:46.339 dives, geography is always destiny. It is completely 00:05:46.339 --> 00:05:48.699 inescapable here. You cannot understand Vlad 00:05:48.699 --> 00:05:51.399 without understanding Wallachia. Which is modern 00:05:51.399 --> 00:05:54.439 day southern Romania, right? Right. But you should 00:05:54.439 --> 00:05:57.120 think of it less as a country and more as... 00:05:57.389 --> 00:06:00.310 a corridor, a buffer zone. Okay. To the north, 00:06:00.329 --> 00:06:02.689 you have the Kingdom of Hungary, a Catholic European 00:06:02.689 --> 00:06:06.089 power. To the south, across the Danube River, 00:06:06.170 --> 00:06:08.389 you have the Ottoman Empire. And the Ottomans 00:06:08.389 --> 00:06:11.990 are this Islamic, rapidly expanding superpower 00:06:11.990 --> 00:06:15.290 that has its sights set on conquering, like Rome 00:06:15.290 --> 00:06:17.689 and Vienna. Precisely. And Wallachia is the ham 00:06:17.689 --> 00:06:19.860 in the sandwich. It's the kill zone. It is the 00:06:19.860 --> 00:06:22.639 kill zone. It's the buffer state. If the Ottomans 00:06:22.639 --> 00:06:24.920 want to invade Europe, they have to march through 00:06:24.920 --> 00:06:27.579 Wallachia. If the Hungarians want to push back 00:06:27.579 --> 00:06:31.079 the Turks, they fight in Wallachia. So being 00:06:31.079 --> 00:06:33.120 the prince of Wallachia was arguably the most 00:06:33.120 --> 00:06:35.819 dangerous job in Christendom. I think so. You 00:06:35.819 --> 00:06:38.439 were never safe. You had to play both sides constantly 00:06:38.439 --> 00:06:40.800 just to survive. Always switching alliances. 00:06:41.220 --> 00:06:43.500 And playing both sides. Well, it has consequences. 00:06:43.680 --> 00:06:47.680 In 1442, Vlad's father... hits a breaking point. 00:06:48.019 --> 00:06:50.860 He has to prove his loyalty to the Ottoman sultan, 00:06:51.100 --> 00:06:54.459 Mira II. And the price of that loyalty isn't 00:06:54.459 --> 00:06:57.000 gold or land. It's his children. And this is 00:06:57.000 --> 00:06:59.519 the moment that breaks the boy and makes the 00:06:59.519 --> 00:07:02.509 monster. It was a practice. Well, you could call 00:07:02.509 --> 00:07:05.269 it hostage diplomacy. It was standard procedure 00:07:05.269 --> 00:07:08.589 for the Ottomans. To ensure a vassal state like 00:07:08.589 --> 00:07:11.089 Malakia wouldn't attack them, the sultan demanded 00:07:11.089 --> 00:07:14.089 collateral. And he took Vlad, who was about 11 00:07:14.089 --> 00:07:16.350 or 12 at the time. So young. And his younger 00:07:16.350 --> 00:07:18.750 brother, Radu, who was only about 6. I want to 00:07:18.750 --> 00:07:21.389 pause on that for a second. 11 and 7, these are 00:07:21.389 --> 00:07:23.230 elementary school kids. They're taken from their 00:07:23.230 --> 00:07:25.910 home, handed over to the enemy, and taken to 00:07:25.910 --> 00:07:29.970 a fortress called Ivriges in Anatolia. This is 00:07:29.970 --> 00:07:33.290 not a study abroad program. No, it is imprisonment 00:07:33.290 --> 00:07:35.290 with a constant hanging threat of execution. 00:07:36.029 --> 00:07:38.970 They knew, because they were told, that if their 00:07:38.970 --> 00:07:42.149 father made one wrong move back home, the sultan 00:07:42.149 --> 00:07:44.490 would kill them. Goes like that. Probably execute 00:07:44.490 --> 00:07:46.930 them on the spot. They lived with that sword 00:07:46.930 --> 00:07:49.230 hanging over their necks every single day for 00:07:49.230 --> 00:07:51.290 years. But here's where the story really splits, 00:07:51.430 --> 00:07:53.269 because you mentioned the two brothers reacted 00:07:53.269 --> 00:07:56.250 to this trauma in completely opposite ways. This 00:07:56.250 --> 00:07:58.449 is the key insight. This is the Cain and Abel 00:07:58.449 --> 00:08:00.810 dynamic that drives the entire narrative forward. 00:08:01.069 --> 00:08:04.189 So what happened? Radu, the younger one he adopted, 00:08:04.490 --> 00:08:06.720 he was described. as being incredibly handsome. 00:08:06.980 --> 00:08:09.399 History knows him as Radu the Handsome, and he 00:08:09.399 --> 00:08:12.399 was charming, malleable. He eventually converted 00:08:12.399 --> 00:08:15.399 to Islam. He even befriended the sultan's son, 00:08:15.620 --> 00:08:19.000 the future Mehmed the Conqueror. So Radu integrates. 00:08:19.000 --> 00:08:21.399 He kind of becomes one of them. He becomes fully 00:08:21.399 --> 00:08:24.019 integrated into the Ottoman court. He plays the 00:08:24.019 --> 00:08:26.819 game. He realizes, you know, the Ottomans are 00:08:26.819 --> 00:08:29.420 the superior power, and he decides to join the 00:08:29.420 --> 00:08:32.480 winning team. But Vlad? Vlad survives by resisting. 00:08:32.700 --> 00:08:36.450 He was stubborn. He was likely abused because 00:08:36.450 --> 00:08:38.870 of that stubbornness. Physical punishment was 00:08:38.870 --> 00:08:41.429 very common. He watched his brother become friends 00:08:41.429 --> 00:08:43.549 with their captors and he hated him for it. He 00:08:43.549 --> 00:08:46.490 saw it as a betrayal. He viewed Radu as weak, 00:08:46.649 --> 00:08:49.860 as a traitor, but... And this is the part that 00:08:49.860 --> 00:08:52.740 defines his entire military career. He didn't 00:08:52.740 --> 00:08:55.919 just sit in the dark and sulk. He studied. What 00:08:55.919 --> 00:08:57.519 was he studying? He's a prisoner. Everything. 00:08:57.600 --> 00:09:00.320 He learned fluent Turkish. He memorized their 00:09:00.320 --> 00:09:02.840 military command structure. He analyzed their 00:09:02.840 --> 00:09:06.120 psychology. He watched the Janissaries, the Sultan's 00:09:06.120 --> 00:09:09.039 elite troops train. Wow. He was locked in a cell 00:09:09.039 --> 00:09:11.440 or at least under house arrest, basically radicalizing 00:09:11.440 --> 00:09:13.799 himself and taking detailed notes on exactly 00:09:13.799 --> 00:09:16.440 how to destroy the people holding the keys. He's 00:09:16.440 --> 00:09:18.340 downloading the enemy's operating system. system. 00:09:18.340 --> 00:09:20.220 He's figuring out all the bugs in the code. That's 00:09:20.220 --> 00:09:22.879 a perfect analogy. Meanwhile, while he's doing 00:09:22.879 --> 00:09:25.580 all this, back home, the Game of Thrones situation 00:09:25.580 --> 00:09:27.899 is just getting completely out of hand. It is 00:09:27.899 --> 00:09:31.360 a total bloodbath. In 1447, while the boys are 00:09:31.360 --> 00:09:34.080 still hostages, the Wallachian nobles, they're 00:09:34.080 --> 00:09:36.840 called the boyars, they stage a coup. Um, no. 00:09:37.080 --> 00:09:39.679 They conspire with John Hunati, who's the regent 00:09:39.679 --> 00:09:43.340 of Hungary. They kill Vlad's father and his older 00:09:43.340 --> 00:09:46.320 brother, Mircea. What they did to him is, it's 00:09:46.320 --> 00:09:48.460 horrific. This is the part that really turns 00:09:48.460 --> 00:09:51.480 my stomach. The records say the Boyars blinded 00:09:51.480 --> 00:09:54.080 Murcia with hot pokers and then buried him alive. 00:09:54.320 --> 00:09:56.659 Buried alive. Just imagine the psychological 00:09:56.659 --> 00:09:59.500 impact of hearing that news while you're sitting 00:09:59.500 --> 00:10:02.700 in an Ottoman dungeon. Your father is dead. Your 00:10:02.700 --> 00:10:04.940 older brother was tortured to death. And the 00:10:04.940 --> 00:10:07.299 people who did it are your own countrymen, the 00:10:07.299 --> 00:10:09.340 nobles who were sworn to protect your family. 00:10:10.000 --> 00:10:13.299 That betrayal is the absolute bedrock of Vlad's 00:10:13.299 --> 00:10:15.600 worldview. He learns two things in captivity. 00:10:15.940 --> 00:10:19.100 One, the Ottomans are an existential threat that 00:10:19.100 --> 00:10:23.000 must be stopped at all costs. And two, you cannot 00:10:23.000 --> 00:10:26.720 trust your own aristocracy. The boyars are treacherous 00:10:26.720 --> 00:10:28.919 snakes. The only way to survive is to be more 00:10:28.919 --> 00:10:31.460 terrifying than the enemy and more ruthless than 00:10:31.460 --> 00:10:34.740 your own people. Trust no one. Strike fear into 00:10:34.740 --> 00:10:37.519 everyone. That's the formula. So when he finally 00:10:37.519 --> 00:10:40.700 gets out. after being released by the Ottomans 00:10:40.700 --> 00:10:44.259 as, what, a puppet ruler, which obviously didn't 00:10:44.259 --> 00:10:46.980 work out for them, he eventually takes the throne 00:10:46.980 --> 00:10:51.200 for his second reign in 1456. And this time... 00:10:51.549 --> 00:10:53.870 He is not interested in diplomacy. He goes straight 00:10:53.870 --> 00:10:56.350 for the jugular. He does. And this brings us 00:10:56.350 --> 00:10:58.289 right back to that Easter feast we started with. 00:10:58.330 --> 00:11:01.190 The red wedding moment. Exactly. He invites all 00:11:01.190 --> 00:11:03.450 the boyars, the very nobles he suspects of killing 00:11:03.450 --> 00:11:05.769 his father and his brother, and he asks them 00:11:05.769 --> 00:11:07.809 a simple question over dinner. What's the question? 00:11:07.950 --> 00:11:10.409 How many princes have you survived? That is a 00:11:10.409 --> 00:11:12.950 trap. A total trap. Some of them bragged, oh, 00:11:12.990 --> 00:11:15.870 I've seen 10 princes rule. Some said 20. To them, 00:11:15.870 --> 00:11:17.889 this was a boast about their longevity, their 00:11:17.889 --> 00:11:20.970 power. To Vlad, it was a confession of treason. 00:11:21.419 --> 00:11:24.159 It proved they were disloyal, just churning through 00:11:24.159 --> 00:11:26.379 rulers whenever it suited them to keep the central 00:11:26.379 --> 00:11:29.980 government weak. So the dinner party ends abruptly. 00:11:31.700 --> 00:11:34.779 Very abruptly. He has the leaders executed and 00:11:34.779 --> 00:11:37.700 paled on the spot. But for the younger, more 00:11:37.700 --> 00:11:40.340 able -bodied ones, he doesn't kill them immediately. 00:11:40.480 --> 00:11:42.659 He enslaves them. What does he do with them? 00:11:42.759 --> 00:11:44.860 He marches them up a mountain to a place called 00:11:44.860 --> 00:11:48.080 Ponari without stopping, and he forces them to 00:11:48.080 --> 00:11:50.860 build his fortress. His castle. These are soft 00:11:50.860 --> 00:11:53.299 -handed aristocrats. They've never worked a day 00:11:53.299 --> 00:11:55.940 in their life. Exactly. The chronicles say they 00:11:55.940 --> 00:11:58.320 worked until their fine clothes literally fell 00:11:58.320 --> 00:12:00.159 off their bodies and they died of exhaustion. 00:12:00.360 --> 00:12:03.059 He works the old aristocracy to death to build 00:12:03.059 --> 00:12:05.460 his new stronghold. That is some heavy, heavy 00:12:05.460 --> 00:12:08.240 symbolism. He is physically replacing the old 00:12:08.240 --> 00:12:10.139 feudal system with a structure built on their 00:12:10.139 --> 00:12:12.620 bones. It's brutal, but it's incredibly efficient. 00:12:12.899 --> 00:12:15.100 He then replaces them with a new meritocracy. 00:12:15.320 --> 00:12:17.860 Right. He promotes peasants and lower -ranking 00:12:17.860 --> 00:12:21.120 soldiers who are loyal to him. Yes. He builds 00:12:21.120 --> 00:12:23.779 a state machine that answers only to him. He 00:12:23.779 --> 00:12:26.019 creates a new nobility that owes everything to 00:12:26.019 --> 00:12:28.919 Vlad. But he doesn't stop with the nobles. He 00:12:28.919 --> 00:12:31.419 picks a fight with the economy, specifically 00:12:31.419 --> 00:12:34.179 with the Transylvanian Saxons. And these are 00:12:34.179 --> 00:12:36.080 the German -speaking merchants who had settled 00:12:36.080 --> 00:12:38.940 in the region. Usually a ruler wants to keep 00:12:38.940 --> 00:12:40.960 the merchants happy. They bring in the tax revenue. 00:12:41.179 --> 00:12:43.840 Why go after the money? Because it was a trade 00:12:43.840 --> 00:12:47.320 war but with body counts. The Saxons were bypassing 00:12:47.320 --> 00:12:49.740 Wallachian customs duties. It was tax evasion, 00:12:49.740 --> 00:12:51.500 essentially. They were hurting local merchants. 00:12:51.860 --> 00:12:53.559 Okay, so there's an economic reason. There is. 00:12:53.720 --> 00:12:56.320 But worse, they were playing politics. They were 00:12:56.320 --> 00:12:59.299 actively funding Vlad's rivals. They were sheltering 00:12:59.299 --> 00:13:01.559 other claimants to the throne, people like his 00:13:01.559 --> 00:13:04.039 half -brother Vlad Kalugurl or another rival 00:13:04.039 --> 00:13:06.480 named Dan. So they were funding a regime change 00:13:06.480 --> 00:13:09.480 against him. Precisely. So Vlad decides to impose 00:13:09.480 --> 00:13:12.440 sanctions. But his version of sanctions involves 00:13:12.440 --> 00:13:15.639 sharp wooden poles. He raids their villages in 00:13:15.639 --> 00:13:18.600 Transylvania around the cities of Braav and Sibiu. 00:13:18.799 --> 00:13:20.960 And this is where the legend of the impaler really 00:13:20.960 --> 00:13:24.059 takes root and spreads to the West. It is. Because 00:13:24.059 --> 00:13:26.059 he didn't just kill the men who were fighting 00:13:26.059 --> 00:13:29.740 him. He impaled everyone. Merchants, women, children. 00:13:30.039 --> 00:13:32.710 No one was spared. We have to talk about the 00:13:32.710 --> 00:13:35.990 cauldron story here because the sources get very 00:13:35.990 --> 00:13:38.990 well, very specific about his creativity during 00:13:38.990 --> 00:13:42.149 these raids. They do. The German pamphlets from 00:13:42.149 --> 00:13:43.750 the time. And remember, these are written by 00:13:43.750 --> 00:13:45.970 the Saxons. He was attacking claim all sorts 00:13:45.970 --> 00:13:48.789 of horrors. They claim he forced mothers to be 00:13:48.789 --> 00:13:51.509 impaled together with their babies. And then 00:13:51.509 --> 00:13:54.629 there is a story about a giant copper cauldron. 00:13:54.649 --> 00:13:57.250 OK, set the scene for us. The claim is that he 00:13:57.250 --> 00:13:59.669 built this massive pot with holes cut in the 00:13:59.669 --> 00:14:08.769 lid. He would put people. That is just unbelievably 00:14:08.769 --> 00:14:10.710 gruesome. Do we buy that? Is that historical 00:14:10.710 --> 00:14:14.029 fact or is that 1400s propaganda? I think we 00:14:14.029 --> 00:14:16.049 have to be incredibly skeptical. These stories 00:14:16.049 --> 00:14:18.029 were written by his enemies, the people he was 00:14:18.029 --> 00:14:20.389 killing. They had a vested interest in portraying 00:14:20.389 --> 00:14:23.309 him as the literal Antichrist to get the rest 00:14:23.309 --> 00:14:25.470 of Europe to hate him and, you know, maybe send 00:14:25.470 --> 00:14:28.659 an army to stop him. Did he boil people? Maybe. 00:14:28.740 --> 00:14:31.059 He was certainly capable of it. But the fact 00:14:31.059 --> 00:14:33.440 that these stories spread so widely tells you 00:14:33.440 --> 00:14:35.940 about the level of fear he inspired. He wanted 00:14:35.940 --> 00:14:37.840 people to believe he was capable of anything. 00:14:38.080 --> 00:14:40.769 It's pure psychological warfare. If your enemy 00:14:40.769 --> 00:14:42.870 thinks you're a demon who boils people alive, 00:14:43.190 --> 00:14:45.289 they might think twice about cheating on their 00:14:45.289 --> 00:14:48.710 taxes or funding your rival. Exactly. Fear was 00:14:48.710 --> 00:14:51.769 his primary currency. It was his main tool of 00:14:51.769 --> 00:14:54.230 statecraft. But all of this, the nobles, the 00:14:54.230 --> 00:14:57.049 merchants, the boiling cauldrons, this is all 00:14:57.049 --> 00:14:59.350 just the warm -up act, isn't it? This is local 00:14:59.350 --> 00:15:01.450 politics. The main event was always going to 00:15:01.450 --> 00:15:03.570 be the Ottoman Empire. The inevitable collision. 00:15:04.200 --> 00:15:06.399 Vlad knew it was coming. He had already stopped 00:15:06.399 --> 00:15:09.000 paying the tribute, the jizya tax, to Sultan 00:15:09.000 --> 00:15:11.679 Mehmed II. And let's just remind everyone who 00:15:11.679 --> 00:15:14.159 Mehmed II is. This isn't some local warlord. 00:15:14.299 --> 00:15:17.440 This is the man who conquered Constantinople 00:15:17.440 --> 00:15:21.220 in 1453. He ended the thousand -year -old Byzantine 00:15:21.220 --> 00:15:24.039 Empire. He is the most powerful man in the entire 00:15:24.039 --> 00:15:26.779 geopolitical neighborhood. Defying him is basically 00:15:26.779 --> 00:15:30.580 suicide. It was seen as madness. But Vlad provokes 00:15:30.580 --> 00:15:33.789 him intentionally. There is a famous story recorded 00:15:33.789 --> 00:15:36.490 by the historian Antonio Bonfini about the turbine 00:15:36.490 --> 00:15:39.009 incident. Oh, this one is classic, Vlad. It's 00:15:39.009 --> 00:15:41.929 so dark, but it's also weirdly witty. It is. 00:15:42.090 --> 00:15:44.809 So Ottoman messengers come to Vlad's court to 00:15:44.809 --> 00:15:47.789 demand the tribute. They bow, but they refuse 00:15:47.789 --> 00:15:50.629 to take off their turbans in his presence. When 00:15:50.629 --> 00:15:53.409 Vlad asks why, they cite their religious custom 00:15:53.409 --> 00:15:56.809 and their law. And Vlad, being a spickler for 00:15:56.809 --> 00:15:59.090 etiquette. Vlad says, then I shall strengthen 00:15:59.090 --> 00:16:02.070 your custom. So he orders his guards to nail 00:16:02.070 --> 00:16:04.429 the turbans to the ambassador's heads. Three 00:16:04.429 --> 00:16:06.929 spikes each, driven right into the skull. Now, 00:16:06.950 --> 00:16:09.190 you never have to take them off. It's a message. 00:16:09.450 --> 00:16:12.210 It's a very clear message. I do not submit to 00:16:12.210 --> 00:16:14.970 anyone. Your customs do not apply here. So Mehmed 00:16:14.970 --> 00:16:17.730 gets the message, and I assume the corpses of 00:16:17.730 --> 00:16:20.909 his envoys. He decides enough is enough. He sends 00:16:20.909 --> 00:16:23.909 a team to trap Vlad. He does. He sends a commander 00:16:23.909 --> 00:16:26.649 named Hamza Bey and an envoy, Catabolinos, to 00:16:26.649 --> 00:16:28.769 ambush him. They tell Vlad they just want to 00:16:28.769 --> 00:16:30.850 negotiate. But remember... Vlad knows the item 00:16:30.850 --> 00:16:33.509 in playbook. He grew up with these people. He 00:16:33.509 --> 00:16:36.350 anticipates the trap. He brings a bigger army 00:16:36.350 --> 00:16:39.190 and he captures their entire ambush party and 00:16:39.190 --> 00:16:42.950 he impales them all. He gives Hamza Bey the highest 00:16:42.950 --> 00:16:45.929 stake of all to honor his high rank. It was a 00:16:45.929 --> 00:16:48.029 gruesome form of professional courtesy. You could 00:16:48.029 --> 00:16:50.950 say that. Then things escalate very, very fast. 00:16:51.210 --> 00:16:53.470 This isn't just a border skirmish anymore. No. 00:16:53.629 --> 00:16:58.610 In the winter of 1461 -62. Vlad crosses the frozen 00:16:58.610 --> 00:17:02.370 Danube River and goes on an absolute rampage 00:17:02.370 --> 00:17:05.009 in Ottoman territory. He devastates the region. 00:17:05.109 --> 00:17:07.569 And this is where we see his obsession with data. 00:17:07.750 --> 00:17:10.569 He writes a letter to Matthias Corvinus, the 00:17:10.569 --> 00:17:12.930 king of Hungary, and he tallies his kills. He 00:17:12.930 --> 00:17:14.730 was obsessed with the numbers. He kept a scorecard. 00:17:14.890 --> 00:17:17.289 He writes, and I'm quoting the number here, I 00:17:17.289 --> 00:17:21.390 have killed 23 ,884 Turks and Bulgarians. 23 00:17:21.390 --> 00:17:25.839 ,884. Not about 20 ,000. That specificity is 00:17:25.839 --> 00:17:28.119 chilling. He even noted that this count did not 00:17:28.119 --> 00:17:30.039 include those he burned alive in their homes. 00:17:30.240 --> 00:17:33.019 And to prove his numbers, he sent sacks of noses 00:17:33.019 --> 00:17:35.559 and ears to the King of Hungary. Sacks of noses 00:17:35.559 --> 00:17:37.240 and ears. Can you imagine being the courier for 00:17:37.240 --> 00:17:39.920 that particular package? This forced Mehmed's 00:17:39.920 --> 00:17:43.119 hand. The Sultan gathers an enormous army. The 00:17:43.119 --> 00:17:46.079 sources vary, but they say upwards of 150 ,000 00:17:46.079 --> 00:17:49.339 men. Wow. It was an invasion force second only 00:17:49.339 --> 00:17:51.640 to the one that took Constantinople a few years 00:17:51.640 --> 00:17:54.380 earlier. He is coming to wipe Wallachia off the 00:17:54.380 --> 00:17:58.200 map. And Vlad has, what's his army size? Maybe 00:17:58.200 --> 00:18:00.640 30 ,000 men. And that's being generous, mostly 00:18:00.640 --> 00:18:03.720 peasants, mercenaries, and light cavalry. He 00:18:03.720 --> 00:18:06.140 is outnumbered at least five to one. So he can't 00:18:06.140 --> 00:18:08.539 stand and fight. If he meets them in an open 00:18:08.539 --> 00:18:11.059 field, it's just... It's game over. Correct. 00:18:11.180 --> 00:18:13.940 It would be a slaughter. So he uses a scorched 00:18:13.940 --> 00:18:16.559 earth strategy. This is a strategy of total denial. 00:18:16.559 --> 00:18:19.220 Okay. As the massive Ottoman army marches north 00:18:19.220 --> 00:18:22.490 into Wallachia, Vlad retreats. But as he goes, 00:18:22.589 --> 00:18:24.930 he burns his own villages, he poisons the wells, 00:18:25.130 --> 00:18:27.190 he kills all the livestock. He turns his own 00:18:27.190 --> 00:18:29.250 country into a wasteland to starve the enemy. 00:18:29.349 --> 00:18:31.569 Exactly. Imagine marching through that. It's 00:18:31.569 --> 00:18:34.029 June, it's sweltering hot, you're wearing heavy 00:18:34.029 --> 00:18:36.890 armor, you're thirsty, but the water gives you 00:18:36.890 --> 00:18:39.269 dysentery. There is no food to forage. And all 00:18:39.269 --> 00:18:41.670 the while, Vlad's men are probably harassing 00:18:41.670 --> 00:18:44.849 them. Day and night, Vlad's light cavalry is 00:18:44.849 --> 00:18:47.529 hitting their flanks, firing arrows from the 00:18:47.529 --> 00:18:50.470 woods, and then just... disappearing the ottoman 00:18:50.470 --> 00:18:53.089 soldiers are demoralized they're terrified and 00:18:53.089 --> 00:18:55.150 they're starving and then comes the night attack 00:18:55.150 --> 00:18:59.210 yeah june 17 1462 this is the scene that should 00:18:59.210 --> 00:19:02.690 be in the blockbuster movie it is pure unadulterated 00:19:02.690 --> 00:19:06.130 chaos vlad realizes he can't win a battle of 00:19:06.130 --> 00:19:08.589 attrition so he tries to cut the head off the 00:19:08.589 --> 00:19:11.140 snake In the middle of the night, he takes a 00:19:11.140 --> 00:19:14.420 small elite force, maybe a few thousand men, 00:19:14.619 --> 00:19:17.599 and charges directly into the center of the Ottoman 00:19:17.599 --> 00:19:20.039 camp. That's a suicide mission. It's an assassination 00:19:20.039 --> 00:19:23.019 mission. His one and only goal is to kill Sultan 00:19:23.019 --> 00:19:26.039 Mehmed in his tent. If the sultan dies, the army 00:19:26.039 --> 00:19:28.599 likely disintegrates. So what happens? They tear 00:19:28.599 --> 00:19:30.900 through the camp, torching tents, slaughtering 00:19:30.900 --> 00:19:33.160 anyone in their path. The Ottomans are completely 00:19:33.160 --> 00:19:34.880 confused. They're fighting each other in the 00:19:34.880 --> 00:19:36.660 dark, thinking they're surrounded. They miss 00:19:36.660 --> 00:19:38.740 the sultan, right? They do. They mistook the 00:19:38.740 --> 00:19:40.809 vis - Sears tents for the Sultans. They miss 00:19:40.809 --> 00:19:43.390 Mehmed by just a few hundred yards. The dawn, 00:19:43.529 --> 00:19:46.049 Vlad had to retreat, but the message was sent. 00:19:46.230 --> 00:19:49.150 The message being that he's crazy enough to run 00:19:49.150 --> 00:19:51.930 into an army of 150 ,000 men just to take a shot 00:19:51.930 --> 00:19:54.490 at the king. Precisely. But Mehmed keeps marching. 00:19:54.650 --> 00:19:57.250 He reaches the capital, Targoviyet. He's expecting 00:19:57.250 --> 00:20:00.309 a siege. He's expecting a final glorious stand. 00:20:00.630 --> 00:20:03.849 Instead, he finds the city gates wide open. The 00:20:03.849 --> 00:20:06.369 city is deserted, but as he rides through the 00:20:06.369 --> 00:20:08.710 valley leading up to the city walls, he sees 00:20:08.710 --> 00:20:12.049 it, the forest of the impaled. This is the image 00:20:12.049 --> 00:20:15.130 that haunts history. Can you describe it for 00:20:15.130 --> 00:20:17.970 us? It was a tableau of horror designed specifically 00:20:17.970 --> 00:20:21.750 for the sultan. 20 ,000 rotting corpses on stakes. 00:20:22.029 --> 00:20:24.170 These were the Turkish and Bulgarian prisoners 00:20:24.170 --> 00:20:27.049 from the earlier raids. 20 ,000. Men, women, 00:20:27.190 --> 00:20:30.349 and children arranged in a vast, silent forest 00:20:30.349 --> 00:20:34.180 of death. 20 ,000 bodies. That is a stadium full 00:20:34.180 --> 00:20:36.599 of people displayed like some kind of macabre 00:20:36.599 --> 00:20:39.240 art installation. The chroniclers say birds were 00:20:39.240 --> 00:20:41.700 nesting in their rib cages. The smell of death 00:20:41.700 --> 00:20:44.160 was overpowering. It reportedly stretched for 00:20:44.160 --> 00:20:47.220 miles. How does the sultan react? I mean, this 00:20:47.220 --> 00:20:50.420 is a man who has seen war. He conquered Constantinople. 00:20:50.579 --> 00:20:54.339 Even he was shaken to his core. The Greek historian 00:20:54.339 --> 00:20:58.440 Chalk Kondiles writes that the sultan was seized 00:20:58.440 --> 00:21:01.460 with amazement. Mehmed reportedly said, It is 00:21:01.460 --> 00:21:03.359 not possible to take the country of a man who 00:21:03.359 --> 00:21:05.960 does such great deeds, who has such a diabolical 00:21:05.960 --> 00:21:09.119 understanding of how to govern. He was. Impressed. 00:21:09.119 --> 00:21:12.500 In a horrified way, yes. He recognized that Vlad 00:21:12.500 --> 00:21:15.180 was willing to go to lengths that no civilized 00:21:15.180 --> 00:21:18.359 ruler would even contemplate. It broke the Ottoman 00:21:18.359 --> 00:21:20.980 army's spirit. How could it not? They couldn't 00:21:20.980 --> 00:21:23.019 fight a ghost who left forests of dead bodies 00:21:23.019 --> 00:21:25.480 behind him. They were sickened. Mehmed turned 00:21:25.480 --> 00:21:27.819 his army around and went home. So tactically, 00:21:27.900 --> 00:21:31.130 Vlad won. He repelled a superpower using psychological 00:21:31.130 --> 00:21:33.829 warfare. Tactically, yes, a stunning victory. 00:21:34.069 --> 00:21:37.089 But strategically, he lost. Because Mehmed was 00:21:37.089 --> 00:21:39.309 smart. He realized he couldn't beat Vlad on the 00:21:39.309 --> 00:21:41.509 battlefield, so he beat him with politics. What 00:21:41.509 --> 00:21:43.589 did he do? He left behind something more dangerous 00:21:43.589 --> 00:21:46.589 than an army. He left behind Radu. The handsome 00:21:46.589 --> 00:21:49.430 brother. The one who played the game. Radu stayed 00:21:49.430 --> 00:21:51.849 behind with a contingent of Ottoman troops and 00:21:51.849 --> 00:21:55.089 a simple political message. He went to the Wallachian 00:21:55.089 --> 00:21:58.259 nobles. the ones Vlad hadn't killed yet. And 00:21:58.259 --> 00:22:02.500 he said, look, my brother is a maniac. He's going 00:22:02.500 --> 00:22:05.359 to get us all killed. He's burning your fields. 00:22:05.440 --> 00:22:07.559 He's poisoning your water. I am friends with 00:22:07.559 --> 00:22:10.019 the sultan. If you support me, the war ends. 00:22:10.359 --> 00:22:13.220 Trade resumes. No more stakes. And the people 00:22:13.220 --> 00:22:16.119 were exhausted. They were starving because of 00:22:16.119 --> 00:22:18.960 the scorched earth campaign. Exactly. Vlad had 00:22:18.960 --> 00:22:20.819 saved the country, but he had destroyed it in 00:22:20.819 --> 00:22:23.480 the process. The nobles flipped. They chose the 00:22:23.480 --> 00:22:25.980 comfortable puppet over the dangerous hero. Vlad 00:22:25.980 --> 00:22:28.000 was forced to flee to the mountains. And this 00:22:28.000 --> 00:22:29.880 is where the betrayal goes to another level entirely. 00:22:30.259 --> 00:22:33.500 He runs to his ally, the king of Hungary, Matthias 00:22:33.500 --> 00:22:36.000 Corvinus. He must be thinking, I just fought 00:22:36.000 --> 00:22:38.380 off the Turks for you. I held the line for Christendom. 00:22:38.400 --> 00:22:40.920 Help me retake my throne. Instead, Corvinus arrests 00:22:40.920 --> 00:22:43.609 him, puts him in handcuffs. Why? Why would he 00:22:43.609 --> 00:22:46.369 do that? Vlad is the best weapon he has against 00:22:46.369 --> 00:22:49.769 the Turks. It was about money and politics. Corvinus 00:22:49.769 --> 00:22:51.950 had taken a whole lot of money from the Pope 00:22:51.950 --> 00:22:54.509 to lead a new crusade, but he didn't really want 00:22:54.509 --> 00:22:56.630 to fight the Ottomans anymore. It was too expensive, 00:22:56.829 --> 00:23:00.309 too dangerous. So he needed an excuse. He needed 00:23:00.309 --> 00:23:03.109 a reason to explain to the Pope and the Venetians 00:23:03.109 --> 00:23:05.450 why he wasn't fighting. He needed a scapegoat. 00:23:05.549 --> 00:23:08.569 And he frames Vlad. He produces forged letters. 00:23:09.099 --> 00:23:11.420 These letters allegedly showed Vlad writing to 00:23:11.420 --> 00:23:13.940 the sultan, offering to switch sides and betray 00:23:13.940 --> 00:23:16.880 Hungary. Wait, the guy who just impaled 20 ,000 00:23:16.880 --> 00:23:19.119 Turks is now offering to join them? That makes 00:23:19.119 --> 00:23:22.079 zero sense. It made no sense at all. And modern 00:23:22.079 --> 00:23:24.460 historians have analyzed the Latin in these letters 00:23:24.460 --> 00:23:27.140 and found it to be clumsy and submissive, completely 00:23:27.140 --> 00:23:30.480 unlike Vlad's known writing style. It was a clear 00:23:30.480 --> 00:23:32.799 forgery. But it was enough. It was enough for 00:23:32.799 --> 00:23:35.220 Corvinus. He used it as an excuse and he threw 00:23:35.220 --> 00:23:39.319 Vlad in prison at Wiesgrad for 14 years. 14 years. 00:23:39.660 --> 00:23:42.779 So Vlad sits in a cell for a decade and a half. 00:23:42.960 --> 00:23:45.240 And while he's sitting there, something fascinating 00:23:45.240 --> 00:23:48.200 happens. The world starts talking about him. 00:23:48.559 --> 00:23:52.160 This brings us to what might be the first instance 00:23:52.160 --> 00:23:55.309 of viral fake news in history. The timing is 00:23:55.309 --> 00:23:57.950 incredible. Johannes Gutenberg had just developed 00:23:57.950 --> 00:24:00.710 the movable type printing press in the 1450s. 00:24:00.750 --> 00:24:03.890 The entire media landscape of Europe was changing 00:24:03.890 --> 00:24:06.269 forever. Right. And what was one of the first 00:24:06.269 --> 00:24:09.190 bestsellers in Europe? The Bible, sure, but also 00:24:09.190 --> 00:24:11.829 pamphlets about the horror stories of Vlad Dracula. 00:24:12.619 --> 00:24:15.220 The Saxons got their revenge in print. They absolutely 00:24:15.220 --> 00:24:18.180 did. They printed these pamphlets in Nuremberg, 00:24:18.180 --> 00:24:20.880 in Bamberg, all over the German -speaking lands. 00:24:21.079 --> 00:24:23.519 And they were like horror comics. They featured 00:24:23.519 --> 00:24:26.680 these graphic woodcut illustrations of Vlad dining 00:24:26.680 --> 00:24:29.339 among the steaks with severed heads on his table. 00:24:29.559 --> 00:24:31.759 There's that famous detail about him dipping 00:24:31.759 --> 00:24:34.500 his bread in blood. That's from these, isn't 00:24:34.500 --> 00:24:37.039 it? That specific detail appears in these pamphlets. 00:24:37.200 --> 00:24:39.400 He liked to dip his bread in the warm blood of 00:24:39.400 --> 00:24:42.180 his victims. Is it true? Probably not. It sounds 00:24:42.180 --> 00:24:45.619 like pure folklore. But it stuck. Wow. It became 00:24:45.619 --> 00:24:48.180 the defining image of him for the entire Western 00:24:48.180 --> 00:24:51.140 world. A mindless, sadistic butcher. But there 00:24:51.140 --> 00:24:53.180 was another narrative, right? A competing story. 00:24:53.319 --> 00:24:55.759 If you go east, the story changes completely. 00:24:56.299 --> 00:24:59.430 Yes, it does. The Russian and Slavic narratives, 00:24:59.690 --> 00:25:02.190 like a text called the Skazani, they paint a 00:25:02.190 --> 00:25:04.589 very different picture. They don't deny the cruelty. 00:25:04.690 --> 00:25:07.730 They absolutely admit he impaled people. But 00:25:07.730 --> 00:25:10.289 they call him zlamadry. Zlamadry. What does that 00:25:10.289 --> 00:25:13.349 mean? It means evil wise. Evil wise. That's a 00:25:13.349 --> 00:25:15.750 complex concept. It sounds like an oxymoron. 00:25:16.059 --> 00:25:19.019 It implies that his cruelty had a purpose. It 00:25:19.019 --> 00:25:21.700 wasn't random sadism. It was a form of brutal 00:25:21.700 --> 00:25:24.819 justice. There is a famous legend in these Russian 00:25:24.819 --> 00:25:28.259 texts about a golden cup. Tell me. It says Vlad 00:25:28.259 --> 00:25:31.099 placed a solid gold cup at a public fountain 00:25:31.099 --> 00:25:33.819 in the town square of Targovye for anyone to 00:25:33.819 --> 00:25:37.160 drink from. And nobody stole it. It stayed there 00:25:37.160 --> 00:25:39.660 for his entire reign. because the people were 00:25:39.660 --> 00:25:41.880 so utterly terrified of the consequences of stealing 00:25:41.880 --> 00:25:44.079 it. To the Russian chroniclers, this was proof 00:25:44.079 --> 00:25:46.859 of his greatness. He established absolute order. 00:25:47.000 --> 00:25:49.079 You could leave gold in the street and no one 00:25:49.079 --> 00:25:51.339 would touch it. That's a powerful idea. To a 00:25:51.339 --> 00:25:53.759 medieval peasant living in constant chaos and 00:25:53.759 --> 00:25:56.220 danger, that kind of security might have been 00:25:56.220 --> 00:25:58.259 worth the terror. So you have these two competing 00:25:58.259 --> 00:26:00.799 versions. To the Germans, he's a psychopath. 00:26:01.200 --> 00:26:03.599 To many of the locals and the Russians, he's 00:26:03.599 --> 00:26:05.940 a harsh but effective sheriff. Precisely. And 00:26:05.940 --> 00:26:08.119 history is written by the victors, but it's also 00:26:08.119 --> 00:26:09.720 written by the people who own the printing presses. 00:26:09.940 --> 00:26:12.519 The Saxons won the PR war because they had the 00:26:12.519 --> 00:26:15.140 technology. So he rots in prison for 14 years. 00:26:15.319 --> 00:26:18.920 Does he ever get out? He does. In 1476, the political 00:26:18.920 --> 00:26:22.799 winds shift again. A new powerful prince of Moldavia, 00:26:23.079 --> 00:26:25.559 Stephen the Great, argues that they need Vlad 00:26:25.559 --> 00:26:28.119 back on the wall to stop the Turks. The threat 00:26:28.119 --> 00:26:30.759 is rising again. So Corvinus lets him go. He 00:26:30.759 --> 00:26:33.559 releases him, but there's a condition. Vlad has 00:26:33.559 --> 00:26:36.480 to convert to Catholicism. Giving up his Orthodox 00:26:36.480 --> 00:26:39.400 faith, that must have been a bitter pill for 00:26:39.400 --> 00:26:41.660 a man who saw himself as a crusader for his faith. 00:26:41.859 --> 00:26:45.039 It was pure political necessity. He marries Corvinus' 00:26:45.099 --> 00:26:47.759 cousin to seal the deal, and he marches back 00:26:47.759 --> 00:26:50.579 into Wallachia for a third reign. But he's a 00:26:50.579 --> 00:26:53.180 man out of time. The world has moved on. He isn't 00:26:53.180 --> 00:26:55.079 the young dragon anymore. And his final reign 00:26:55.079 --> 00:26:57.779 is very short. Less than two months. He is killed 00:26:57.779 --> 00:27:00.200 in battle near a place called Snagov in late 00:27:00.200 --> 00:27:04.650 1476. But even his death is a mystery. What are 00:27:04.650 --> 00:27:07.150 the theories? Some sources say he was assassinated 00:27:07.150 --> 00:27:10.509 by a Turk in disguise. Others, citing the Russian 00:27:10.509 --> 00:27:13.569 sources, say his own men mistook him for a Turk 00:27:13.569 --> 00:27:15.809 in the confusion of battle and killed him. Killed 00:27:15.809 --> 00:27:18.349 by friendly fire. After everything. Potentially. 00:27:18.710 --> 00:27:21.309 But the aftermath was very clear. His head was 00:27:21.309 --> 00:27:23.509 cut off, it was preserved in honey to stop the 00:27:23.509 --> 00:27:26.630 rot, and it was sent to Constantinople. Mehmed 00:27:26.630 --> 00:27:28.750 displayed it on a high state for all to see. 00:27:28.890 --> 00:27:32.440 The impaler gets impaled post -mortem. Talk about 00:27:32.440 --> 00:27:36.160 ironic justice. A grim end. And his body, we 00:27:36.160 --> 00:27:38.599 don't really know. Wow. Legend says he was buried 00:27:38.599 --> 00:27:41.740 at Snagov Monastery on an island. But archaeological 00:27:41.740 --> 00:27:45.299 excavations there in the 1930s, they found no 00:27:45.299 --> 00:27:48.670 body. Only horse bones. He just vanished. He 00:27:48.670 --> 00:27:51.210 simply vanished from the historical record. Which, 00:27:51.269 --> 00:27:53.109 of course, leaves plenty of room for the vampire 00:27:53.109 --> 00:27:55.750 myths to creep in. Speaking of which, we have 00:27:55.750 --> 00:27:57.349 to address the Bram Stoker connection directly. 00:27:57.750 --> 00:28:00.490 Did Stoker know all of this? Was he reading these 00:28:00.490 --> 00:28:02.829 German pamphlets about the blood dipping? Surprisingly, 00:28:02.890 --> 00:28:05.509 no. Stoker's research was, well, it was thin, 00:28:05.690 --> 00:28:08.210 to be polite. He was sitting in the British Museum 00:28:08.210 --> 00:28:12.069 in the 1890s, and he found the name Dracula in 00:28:12.069 --> 00:28:14.869 a book by a British diplomat named William Wilkinson. 00:28:15.579 --> 00:28:18.180 The book just had a footnote. A single footnote 00:28:18.180 --> 00:28:21.500 that said Dracula meant devil in the Wallachian 00:28:21.500 --> 00:28:24.319 language. So Stoker just thought, cool name, 00:28:24.440 --> 00:28:26.680 I'll take it. Pretty much. His working title 00:28:26.680 --> 00:28:29.759 for the book was Count Wampire. Count Wampire? 00:28:29.819 --> 00:28:32.240 Can you imagine if he hadn't found that one footnote 00:28:32.240 --> 00:28:34.299 you'd all be dressing up as Count Wampire for 00:28:34.299 --> 00:28:37.190 Halloween? Stoker didn't know about the Order 00:28:37.190 --> 00:28:39.750 of the Dragon or the Night Attack or the Brother 00:28:39.750 --> 00:28:43.009 Radu. The historical connection is almost completely 00:28:43.009 --> 00:28:45.450 accidental. That's incredible. He took the name 00:28:45.450 --> 00:28:47.589 and he took the general location of Transylvania 00:28:47.589 --> 00:28:50.470 and he just made up the rest. That is wild. The 00:28:50.470 --> 00:28:52.869 most famous monster in all of literature is based 00:28:52.869 --> 00:28:55.329 on a footnote. But before we wrap up, you sent 00:28:55.329 --> 00:28:57.630 me a link to a scientific study from August 2023 00:28:57.630 --> 00:29:00.750 that absolutely blew my mind. Oh, yes. We have 00:29:00.750 --> 00:29:02.589 to talk about the tears. This is just fascinating. 00:29:02.710 --> 00:29:05.049 This is where modern science meets medieval history. 00:29:05.289 --> 00:29:07.910 A team of scientists from the University of Catania 00:29:07.910 --> 00:29:11.170 analyzed three letters written by Vlad from 1457 00:29:11.170 --> 00:29:15.559 and 1475. OK. They used a technique called mass 00:29:15.559 --> 00:29:18.539 spectrometry to basically harvest peptides and 00:29:18.539 --> 00:29:20.779 proteins from the surface of the paper residue 00:29:20.779 --> 00:29:23.680 left by his skin and sweat 500 years ago. So 00:29:23.680 --> 00:29:26.319 they extracted his biology from a piece of paper 00:29:26.319 --> 00:29:30.170 that is basically CSI, Transylvania. It is. And 00:29:30.170 --> 00:29:32.509 they found peptides that are associated with 00:29:32.509 --> 00:29:35.170 the retina and with tear fluid. But specifically, 00:29:35.390 --> 00:29:37.769 they found markers of a condition called hemolacria. 00:29:38.069 --> 00:29:40.289 Yeah, that means. It means he cried tears of 00:29:40.289 --> 00:29:43.269 blood. No way. You're kidding me. It's a real 00:29:43.269 --> 00:29:46.509 but very rare condition where blood mixes with 00:29:46.509 --> 00:29:49.630 tear fluid. It can be caused by infections, inflammation, 00:29:49.950 --> 00:29:52.269 or just extreme physical or emotional stress. 00:29:52.690 --> 00:29:55.890 So when Vlad wept, whether from rage or grief 00:29:55.890 --> 00:29:58.769 or the smoke of battle, it is chemically possible 00:29:58.769 --> 00:30:01.369 that. Red tears rolled down his face. That is 00:30:01.369 --> 00:30:03.829 the most metal fact I think I have ever heard. 00:30:03.910 --> 00:30:06.470 Yeah. The man who inspired Dracula literally 00:30:06.470 --> 00:30:09.049 cried blood. You cannot write fiction that good. 00:30:09.170 --> 00:30:11.750 It certainly adds a visceral biological layer 00:30:11.750 --> 00:30:13.529 to the legend, doesn't it? And it makes you wonder 00:30:13.529 --> 00:30:15.210 if people saw that back then and thought he was 00:30:15.210 --> 00:30:18.009 genuinely supernatural. How could you not? So 00:30:18.009 --> 00:30:20.450 bringing it all together, we have a hostage child, 00:30:20.690 --> 00:30:24.990 a vengeful prince, a mass murderer. By any modern 00:30:24.990 --> 00:30:28.269 standard. A defender of Christendom by medieval 00:30:28.269 --> 00:30:31.049 standards. And finally, a pop culture vampire 00:30:31.049 --> 00:30:35.309 icon is a messy, messy legacy. It's deeply complex. 00:30:35.369 --> 00:30:37.210 If you look at him through the lens of the Geneva 00:30:37.210 --> 00:30:39.509 Convention, he is a war criminal who committed 00:30:39.509 --> 00:30:42.170 genocide. There is no getting around the 20 ,000 00:30:42.170 --> 00:30:44.670 stakes. That is horror, pure and simple. Right. 00:30:44.750 --> 00:30:46.289 But if you look at him through the lens of a 00:30:46.289 --> 00:30:49.089 tiny country trying to survive against a massive 00:30:49.089 --> 00:30:52.839 invading empire. Well, then he's a tragic hero 00:30:52.839 --> 00:30:55.500 who did the unthinkable to preserve his nation's 00:30:55.500 --> 00:30:57.859 independence. He was a monster, but maybe he 00:30:57.859 --> 00:31:00.119 was the monster Wallachia needed at that specific 00:31:00.119 --> 00:31:02.480 moment in history. That is the central question, 00:31:02.619 --> 00:31:04.140 isn't it? And you have to remember the version 00:31:04.140 --> 00:31:07.140 of him we all know, the sadistic madman. That's 00:31:07.140 --> 00:31:10.000 the version his enemies paid to print. We view 00:31:10.000 --> 00:31:12.400 him through the lens of Saxon propaganda. That 00:31:12.400 --> 00:31:14.920 is a lot to process. The next time you see a 00:31:14.920 --> 00:31:17.180 plastic set of vampire teeth at a Halloween store. 00:31:17.930 --> 00:31:20.990 Just remember the 15th century geopolitics behind 00:31:20.990 --> 00:31:24.549 them. And maybe check if the person wearing them 00:31:24.549 --> 00:31:26.569 is crying blood. The terrifying thought to end 00:31:26.569 --> 00:31:30.329 on. So to you listening, think about the monsters 00:31:30.329 --> 00:31:33.509 in your history books. Ask yourself, who wrote 00:31:33.509 --> 00:31:35.490 the chapter? And what were they trying to sell 00:31:35.490 --> 00:31:37.410 you? Thanks for diving deep with us. We'll see 00:31:37.410 --> 00:31:38.130 you on the next one.