Killing the dead : vampire epidemics from Mesopotamia to the New World

Blair, John, 1955- author.

Book

Princeton, New Jersey : Princeton University Press, [2025]

©2025

xiii, 519 pages : illustrations (some color), color maps ; 24 cm

illustration map

"Killing the Dead provides the first in-depth, global account of one of the world's most widespread yet misunderstood forms of mass hysteria -- the vampire epidemic. In a spellbinding narrative, John Blair takes readers from ancient Mesopotamia to present-day Haiti to explore a macabre frontier of life and death where corpses are believed to wander or do harm from the grave, and where the vampire is a physical expression of society's inexplicable terrors and anxieties. In 1732, the British public opened their morning papers to read of lurid happenings in eastern Europe. Serbian villagers had dug up several corpses and had found them to be undecayed and bloated with blood. Recognizing the marks of vampirism, they mutilated and burned them. Centuries earlier, the English themselves engaged in the same behavior. In fact, vampire epidemics have flared up throughout history -- in ancient Assyria, China, and Rome, medieval and early modern Europe, and the Americas. Blair blends the latest findings in archaeology, anthropology, and psychology with vampire lore from literature and popular culture to show how these episodes occur at traumatic moments in societies that upend all sense of security, and how the European vampire is just one species in a larger family of predatory supernatural entities that includes the female flying demons of Southeast Asia and the lustful yoginīs of India. Richly illustrated, Killing the Dead provocatively argues that corpse-killing, far from being pathological or unhealthy, served as a therapeutic and largely harmless outlet for fear, hatred, and paranoia that would otherwise result in violence against marginalized groups and individuals."-- Provided by publisher.

Vampires -- History.

Preface and acknowledgements -- Introduction -- Part I: Approaches. 1. Who Were the Dangerous Dead? ; 2. Fearing Dead Friends, Killing Dead Enemies : Are Animated Corpses a Human Constant? ; 3. The Dangerous Dead in Society ; 4. Rest in Peace (and Don't Come Back) : Hovering on the Threshold of Death's Door ; 5. Understanding Stories (1) : The Spoken and Written Word ; 6. Understanding Stories (2) : Vampires in Print ; 7. Understanding Corpses : The Evidence of Burial Archaeology -- Part II: Dynamics. 8. The Circumpolar World and Northern Asia : Corpses and Life-Forces ; 9. India and China : Lumpen Corpses and Lustful Hyena-Women ; 10. Flying Demons and Dangerous Women ; 11. The 'Carmilla Template' in China and the Eastern Roman Empire ; 12. Wonder-Working Women : The Power and the Danger -- Part III: From the Ancient Middle East to the Early Medieval North. 13. Mesopotamia, Greece, and Rome before Christ ; 14. The Later Roman World and Christianity ; 15. The British Isles and Northern Francia, 200-600 : Social Trauma, Wise-Women, and Mortuary Theatre ; 16. The Christian English, 600-700 (1) : Saintly Women and Holy Incorrupt Bodies ; 17. The Christian English, 600-700 (2) : Sinister Women and Dangerous Incorrupt Bodies ; 18. Francia, England, and Scandinavia, 700-1000 -- Part IV: Europe in the High Middle Ages. 19. Motifs Taking Shape : The Making of the 'European Vampire' ; 20. An Icelandic Epidemic? ; 21. The English Walking Dead, 1000-1200 (1) : Stories and Corpses ; 22. The English Walking Dead, 1000-1200 (2) : Breaking God's Law and the King's ; 23. Central and Southern Europe, 1000-1400 -- Part V: Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe. 24. The Eurasian Reservoir of Beliefs : Night-Battlers, Damned Huntsmen, and Bloodsucking Corpses ; 25. Life-Forces, Shape-Shifters, and Dangerous Corpses : Eastern Europe, 1400-1750 ; 26. The Dead Retreat Northward Again : England and Scotland, 1200-1750 ; 27. Noxious Corpses and Noisy Shroud-Eaters : The German-Speaking Lands in the Age of Reformation ; 28. Movers and Shakers : Active Corpses in Bohemia and Silesia, 1330-1600 ; 29. The Dangerous Dead between Witchcraft and the Enlightenment : East-Central Europe, 1550-1700 ; 30. From Moravia to Transylvania : The Carpathian Arc, 1700-25 ; 31. Vampires in the News, 1725-57 -- Part VI: The Modern World : Towards Folklore and Fiction. 32. Vampires for a Scientific Age : Pennsylvania and New England ; 33. 'The Horrible Scenes of Old Time' : Europe after 1750 ; 34. Vampires of Colonialism and Slavery -- Conclusion: The Dangerous Dead as Mirrors of Reality.

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