Indigenous Transylvania Invaded

'"When Tas, Szabolcs, and Tétény reached a depopulated region, they remained there for a few days and fortified its borders with mighty ramparts. They had been there for some time when Tétény, father of Horka, learned from the local people that there was a good land lying beyond the forests, ruled by some Blak named Gyalu.

"Tétény sent ahead a ... spy, scouting around like a fox, (who) took note of that land's richness and inhabitants ... spoke often with its master ... and learned that the land was irrigated by fine rivers, rich in alluvial gold deposits, that there was much salt to be mined, and that the inhabitants were the vilest people in the world. They are contemptible because they are Blas and Slav people, they have only bows and arrows for weapons ...

"Leaving his companions behind, Tétény headed eastward, to the land beyond the forests, to confront the Blak leader Gyalu... Gyalu rode out to meet him and halt his advance at the Meszes passes. But Tétény, having crossed the forest in a day, reached the waters of the Almás ... There ensued a fierce struggle in which Gyalu's warriors were defeated, and many of them were killed, while many others were taken prisoner..."

The middle ages saw further invasion of Transylvania by Mongolia and Turkey. This ruthless colonisation of Transylvania's indigenous peoples over hundreds of years resulted in transgenerational abuse and the warping of native social structures and values. This in turn produced people like Vlad The Impaler, also known as Drac, and today remembered as Count Dracula.

Transylvania is a good place to observe the process by which colonists seek to transform indigenous people into monsters in the popular consciousness, painting us as "the vilest people in the world" to justify their theft of land and resources in order to sustain their greedy economies.