Vampires of the Enlightenment Trivia Game | European

Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts

1. Though the roots of vampire belief almost certainly run into antiquity, the first well-documented episodes of vampire hunts come from the 18th-century European Enlightenment.

Answer: True

Though there are accounts of harmful bodies returning from the grave in Medieval English chronicles and stories of bloodthirsty spirits in the waning Roman literature of late antiquity, these early vampiric mentions are few and far between, and detail is rarely given.

It has even been argued by folklorist David Keyworth that the iconic vampire archetype - a corpse that menaces the living and subsists on blood - did not properly form until the 18th century. Though this may be a harsh view - this description actually fits the shades in Homer's "Odyssey" quite well, and rituals identical to traditional vampire hunts were outlawed by Serbian Tsar Stephen Dusan in the 14th century - it is indisputable that the vampire accounts of the Enlightenment period far outweigh those of previous centuries.

2. Many historians and folklorists believe that vampires first became popular in Western Europe because of a widely-published 1732 account by Austrian military surgeon Johannes Fluckinger. This report detailed Fluckinger's observation of a vampire hunt and how he and four colleagues were convinced that vampires were real. In what present-day country did Fluckinger find these vampires?

Answer: Serbia

The focus of Fluckinger's report was Arnold Pavle, a bandit who had died from a fall and returned from the grave in 1727. Though he and four other suspected vampires had been dealt with at that time by the villagers of local Medvegia, by 1732 most of the people in the area were convinced that people and animals he had attacked had subsequently become vampires, leading to mass opening of graves. All told, sixteen more bodies were destroyed in the hunt observed by the distinguished Austrians.

3. Fluckinger's popular article reminded many people of an earlier account by naturalist Pitton de Tournefort. One of the pioneering figures in plant and animal classification, Tournefort did not believe that what he had seen was actually a vampire (or "vrykolakas", as his account reads), but this did not stop later audiences from making these assumptions. Where did Tournefort have this encounter?

Answer: Greece

Tournefort had been dispatched to the Ottoman Empire by French King Louis XIV in 1699 to study local customs and natural conditions. He saw the vrykolakas being destroyed on the island of Mykonos. Though convinced that the locals were just mutilating an ordinary corpse, Tournefort realized that they took the situation quite seriously and he kept his opinions to himself until he got back to France. Among scientists today, Tournefort is remembered as one of first to use the "genus" level of classification that is now standard in biology, as well as one of the first botanists to postulate the significance of xylem and phloem in plants.

4. One of the great believers in vampires during the Enlightenment was Dom Augustin Calmet, a Biblical scholar and a great exponent of a Medieval brand of rational thought. In his thorough study, "Treatise on Ghosts and Vampires", Calmet builds his case for the reality of vampires by citing the reality of magic and the supernatural as verified by the Bible and by the saints of Catholic canon. He then extends that reasoning to "reliable" reports of vampires. To what Roman Catholic order did Calmet belong?

Answer: The Benedictine Order

Calmet's reasoning was actually quite in line with Benedictine thought of the time, but was ridiculed by the more skeptical Enlightenment "philosophes" who heeded Descartes' dictum that as few assumptions as possible should go into an argument. Assuming that figures like the notorious inquisitor Torquemada were generally truthful drastically weakened Calmet's argument outside of Church circles.

It should be noted that Calmet did not say that all vampire stories were true or anything of the sort; he earnestly tries to be even-handed. However, he did acknowledge that vampires were possible, as was consistent with his literalist theology. This contention set him at odds with most thinkers of his (and our) time.

5. Vampire belief in the eighteenth century was wholeheartedly embraced by a sizeable minority, but rejected without reflection by most notable commentators. In the words of one observer: "If there is a well-attested history in the world, it is that of the vampires. Nothing is missing from it: interrogations, certifications by Notables, Surgeons, Parish Priests, Magistrates. The judicial proof is one of the most complete. And with all that, who believes in vampires?" What well-known author of "The Social Contract" and "Emile" summed up the paradoxical situation of the Enlightenment vampire with these examples?

Answer: Jean-Jacques Rousseau

This quote, taken from Rousseau's published 1763 letter to Archbishop of Paris Christophe de Beaumont, supports Rousseau's broader argument that human testimonies may be evidence for human facts, but people should not be condemned for disbelieving those testimonies. Whether through bias or simple error, human attestations are often not a reliable source of evidence, and even the most respectable authorities should be examined critically.

6. As vampire tales grew more popular during the 18th century, even the most learned of people began to incorporate them into their everyday speech. What great figure of English letters compared himself to "the vampires in Germany - such a terror to all sober and innocent people that many wish a stake were drove through him to keep him quiet in his grave"?

Answer: Alexander Pope

Pope, of course, means this as a figure of speech. When he made these remarks in a letter written in February, 1740, he had been ill for some time, yet continued to pester the stonecutters working on his Twickenham Grotto. In a fine turn of events, Alexander Pope's translation of Homer's 'Odyssey' was quoted in Bram Stoker's 'Dracula'.

7. One Enlightenment figure who was particularly mortified by the vampire craze of his time wrote the following: "What! Is it in our eighteenth century that vampires exist? Is it after the reigns of Locke, Shaftesbury, Trenchard, and Collins [all well-known rationalists of the past]? Is it under those of d'Alembert, Diderot, St. Lambert, and Duclos, that we believe in vampires, and that the reverend father Dom Calmet...has printed and reprinted the history of vampires with the approbation of the Sorbonne?" What author of "Candide" was so chafed that vampire belief had gained such currency under his watch?

Answer: Voltaire

Voltaire concluded his dismissal of vampires in his 1768 "Philosophical Dictionary" by saying that: "A great part of Europe has been infested with vampires for five or six years, and there are no more; we have had convulsionaries in France for twenty years, we have them no longer; we have had demoniacs for seventeen hundred years, but we have them no longer; the dead have been raised ever since the days of Hippolytus, but they are raised no longer; and lastly, we have had Jesuits in Spain, Portugal, France, and the two Sicilies, but we have them no longer." The Jesuits had been suppressed in France as of 1764, and were dissolved by Pope Clement XIV in 1773.

They were not reinstated until 1814.

8. For the Enlightenment's cornerstone work, the "Encyclop�die", contributor Louis de Jaucourt offered this analysis of vampire folklore: "Father Calmet has written an absurd, unbelievable work on the subject, but one that is useful in showing how the human spirit can be carried away by superstition." Who was the editor-in-chief of this work?

Answer: Denis Diderot

Compiling the contributions of many of the Enlightenment's greatest figures, "L'Encyclop�die" is often cited as the prime example of the era's energy for rationalism and empiricism. On commission from publisher Andr� Le Breton, Diderot began work on the project in 1747, collaborating with Jean le Rond d'Alembert and many others.

He would continue work on the "Encyclop�die" and its revisions for 25 years.

9. In 1751, chief physician of the Holy Roman Empire Gerard van Swieten gave a scathing report on the vampire exhumations and mutilations common in Central Europe at the time, stating bluntly that those hunting the vampires had no idea what a dead body ought to look like, and thus could not tell a "vampire" from any other mortal remains. In response, the Holy Roman Empress officially banned vampire hunts in 1755. Who was this long-reigning Habsburg Empress?

Answer: Maria Theresa

Hungarian historian Gabor Klaniczay hypothesizes that the "scandalous" surge in 18th-century vampire hunts prompted the official abolition of witch trials along with the undead exhumations; vampires, it seems, shared the witches' "supernatural scapegoat" niche in the collective mentality.

It bears repeating that, unlike the case with witches, there is essentially no historical incidence of any government ever sanctioning vampire hunts, at least not above the very local level. It is also worth noting that, although she was not thought of quite as highly as her Prussian counterpart Frederick the Great, Maria Theresa is often placed in the company of the "enlightened despots" that were heralded by writers like Voltaire as ideal rulers. Though an absolute monarch and ultimately a pious Catholic, she was also a reformer who embraced reason and science.

In an age where large-scale democracy was unknown (although gradually forming in Great Britain), this seemed as fair a government as a reasonable Continenal thinker could conceive.

10. A latecomer to the Enlightenment, this seminal German Renaissance man (to mix historical metaphors) produced one of the first substantial works of vampire literature in his fine 1797 poem "The Bride of Corinth". Who was this towering writer who was no stranger to dealing with the devil?

Answer: Goethe

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) is best known for his epic poem "Faust", a landmark reworking of the classic plot involving the sacrifice of a soul for love. In addition to his great literary output (usually ranked as the greatest in German letters), Goethe also made substantial contributions in physiology (he is credited with discovering the intermaxillary bone), botany, optics, and social thought.

Many historians do not classify him as part of the Enlightenment, but he certainly exemplifies that spirit of rational inquiry.

Indeed, in his cultural curiousity - he was one of the first major Western writers to make a detailed study of the Quran, for example - Goethe may well have been among the most enlightened of all.

Source: Author stuthehistoryguy

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor bloomsby before going online.
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Vampires of the Enlightenment Trivia Quiz

Paradoxical as it may seem, the proudly rational era of the 18th century was also the heyday of popular belief in vampires.

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