Treasure hunt begins in England

Chapter 525 Elizabeth Bathory

"It feels like you suddenly have a lot of opportunities to face vampires in your life recently." After hearing Liang En's words, Joan showed a thoughtful expression. "I always find some things and places related to vampires inexplicably."

"This is mainly because there have been more activities in Eastern Europe recently." Liang En explained as soon as Joan finished speaking. "And the legend of vampires comes from Eastern Europe, so there will be more related relics here."

The earliest legend of vampires comes from the 14th century. At that time, a large-scale plague occurred in Europe. In order to avoid infection, people often buried patients in a hurry without carefully distinguishing whether they were really dead.

For some reason, when people open the tomb, they will find that the corpse has changed its posture and is still stained with blood.

At that time, areas such as East Prussia, Silesia, Bohemia and other places due to poverty and lack of education were passed on as vampires, which triggered a vampire superstition that lasted for hundreds of years.

But vampire in the modern sense actually originated in the 18th century, and there was no term vampire in the modern sense before that.The word first appeared in English in 1732, the period when the existence of vampires was generally accepted.

This is mainly related to the popularization of education and the accelerated flow of information. The plague re-emerged in 1710, and East Prussia was deeply affected. In order to eliminate the fear of the people, the authorities or the public agreed that the culprit of the plague was vampires.

The authorities used many horrific methods, such as opening all the graves in a cemetery to see which people's bodies did not rot or whether nails, hair, etc. continued to grow after death.

At the same time, the transportation in Europe at that time was much more convenient than it was hundreds of years ago, so these legends from East Prussia were not limited to the local area as they were hundreds of years ago, but spread to the whole of Europe.

Of course, some scientists now believe that some of those historically considered vampires were actually porphyria patients.This is a metabolic disease caused by genetic defects.

Patients with this disease are sensitive to light, are allergic to garlic, and have red eyes. Supplementing hemoglobin can help alleviate the condition.

A small number of extreme patients believed that drinking blood could replenish hemoglobin, which led to the legend of vampires that has been passed down to this day and has become an indispensable part of today's fantasy literature.

As for this Elizabeth Bathory, she is an important part of the vampire legend. According to the legend, she killed young girls and bathed in the blood of these victims to maintain her youth.

"Did you say that old woman just now was the prototype of that vampire countess? But I don't think so." Jeanne shook her head subconsciously and said. "Can you tell me the whole story?"

Joan of Arc in this world has indeed read a lot of books, but because the content of the vampire countess is generally regarded as legends rather than historical truth, she really doesn't know about it.

"Want to tell this story in its entirety?" Liang En gently tapped the cover of the book in his hand, "Let me think about where to start—by the way, let's start from the beginning of the story."

This Elizabeth Bathory is a member of the famous Bathory family. Starting from the family's ZTE ancestor, Stefan III, this family has dominated Hungary for nearly 200 years.

By Elizabeth's generation, the Bathory family already possessed huge wealth and high social status.

From an early age, she studied classics and mathematics, and knew four languages: Latin, German, Hungarian and Greek.

Unlike Joan, who became masculine only after she joined the army, she asked others to treat her like a boy from childhood.She often dressed in boys' clothes, learned fencing and horsemanship, and played boys' games.

It was common for aristocrats of that era to get engaged as children and live with their future husbands.In 1571, 11-year-old Elizabeth was engaged to 16-year-old Ferenc II Nadasdi, which was a well-matched marriage.Four years later, the two were officially married.

After marriage, Ferencz gave Elizabeth the gift he received from his mother - Chahtysburg in the Little Carpathian Mountains and seventeen surrounding villages as a wedding gift. Near the Eagle's Mouth Rock.

Although she is one of the few large landowners in Europe, she is still careful about her finances.In a letter she wrote to her subordinates, she even personally directed the purchase of three onion rings.

In terms of public welfare, she invested a lot of money to revitalize domestic education, build hospitals and Protestant schools, subsidize overseas students, and protect the rights and interests of farmers and churches. People spoke highly of her, and the king even ordered his daughter to learn from her.

But then things took a turn for the worse, and Elisabeth Bathory's husband died in 1603 in a battle with the Ottomans outside Buda in 1604.The war also deprived the Huabsburg family of any hope of retaking Buda and Pest.

Yes, Budapest, the capital of the Hungarians today, was two cities at that time, located on the two banks of the Danube, far away from each other. It was first called Pest-Buda, and it was not until 1873 that it was combined into one city and called Budapest.

After becoming a widow, fate did not let Elizabeth Bathory go. In March 1610, Prime Minister Georges Turso ordered an investigation into Elizabeth Bathory's case on the grounds that she was suspected of abusing and murdering servants.

That same month, Gabriel Bathory, Prince of Transylvania, Elizabeth's nephew, was assassinated but failed and is now believed to have involved Turso.

To make matters worse, the prime minister's actions were clearly tacit approval, and the relationship between Matthias, the then king of Hungary and the Holy Roman Emperor, was also tense with Gabriel.

In January 1611, the Prime Minister tried Elizabeth Bathory twice and accused her of murder, but it is strange that the witnesses and the servants accused of being an accomplice each gave different and far apart numbers of victims .

After being tortured to extract confessions, the four so-called felons were executed swiftly and swiftly.But Elizabeth was imprisoned in her own castle without a guilty verdict.

Although the then King Mathias repeatedly asked Turso to have a trial, he was not tried until Elizabeth's death.

On November 1614, 11, she was buried in the church in Chachtisberg.A year before her death, Gabriel Bathory was murdered by Gabriel Bertram, the next Prince of Transylvania, and the glory of the Bathory family came to an end.

After Liang En's last words fell, the surroundings became quiet, until five or six minutes later, Joan suddenly raised her head to look at Liang En and said.

"No, this situation is a bit wrong. At least in my opinion, this Elizabeth Barto should be involved in a political struggle. As for those notorious reputations, they should just be framed."

As the former Marshal of France, Joan of Arc still understood certain struggles, so after hearing Liang En tell the whole story, she quickly realized what was wrong.

(End of this chapter)