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Vampires, Demons of the Night

© Linda Casselman

Here we are in October. The days grow shorter and shorter as the nights stretch out with a growing chill in the air. A gnarled, leafless tree reaches up to the moonlight providing a perfect backdrop for that frightful eve, soon to be upon us - Halloween!

The scene described above also makes a good setting for tales of my favourite Halloween ghoul, the vampire. Tales of vampires have been with us for a long, long time, and I don't mean since Bram Stoker penned his famous creepy novel Dracula. Indeed, the first mention of a vampire goes back to the Epic of Gilgamesh, the epic tale of a renowned hero from ancient Mesopotamia, king of Uruk in around 2700 BCE. Written between 3000-2000 BCE in the early Bronze Age, the vampire found in this tale is a terrifying creature with fangs, identified as the "bringer of death".

Vampires or vampire-like creatures can be found in just about every mythology from every culture around the world, creatures that one way or another would drink their victim's blood and/or drain them of their life energy.

We find them even in the Old Testament with the story of Lilith, Adam's first wife. Lilith saw herself as Adam's equal and wanted to have sexual relations lying side-by-side to reflect this. She was punished for this and sent away to live in the desert where she mated with demons. Her offspring from these sexual encounters where the lilim, who were believed to attack unprotected children and suck the life breath from their sleeping bodies.

The lilim are similar to what the ancient Greeks called, the lamia. The lamia were evil spirits in the form of a serpent/bird with the face and breasts of a beautiful woman. These evil beings would seduce men, usually in bed, and drink their blood. Like the lilim, they too would attack children, devouring their entrails. Anyone with red hair, blue eyes, or a birthmark would be a suspected lamia, as would a seventh son or someone born on December 25th.

In the Middle Ages, the populous continued to fear vampires. This time they came in the form of the incubus and the succubus. Of course, these took on the form of a beautiful woman (succubus) or a handsome man (incubus) in order to have sexual relations with humans, draining them of their life's energy. It was believed that these demon creatures were the cause of erotic dreams, especially those resulting in climax. The succubus was supposed to collect the bodily fluids released by her male victim and bring it back so that the incubus could use it to impregnate his female victims with demon children.

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