Vampirebus! Trivia Quiz

Answer: Transylvania

Train + Seal + Vein + Ja

The vampire's connection with Transylvania is an odd one. One school of thought, which includes most modern Romanian folklorists, holds that Transylvania has no real vampire folklore of its own, and that the region's connection to the undead is strictly due to Bram Stoker's use of the euphoneous name in the novel "Dracula". Others, however, including folklorist Harry Senn, have demonstrated a remarkably diverse corpus of vampire beliefs throughout Romania, including Transylvania. Most likely, this is a matter about which intelligent people can disagree.

Answer: Nosferatu

Nose + Ferret + U (Thant)

This is another term popularized by "Dracula" author Bram Stoker, who gleaned the word from travel writer Emily Gerard's "The Land Beyond the Forest". The term is unknown to Romanian lexiographers, though some maintain that it may be derived from a Slavonic term for "plague carrier". The word served as the title for director F. W. Murnau's unauthorized filming of "Dracula" in 1922; the resulting work made the Vatican's short list of recommended films in 1995.

Answer: Dracula

Drake + Ewe + La

In leafing through survey works on Romanian history and culture, Bram Stoker happened upon a reference to Vlad Dracula, a fifteenth-century Wallacian prince deposed by the Ottoman Empire. Given the name's sinister-romantic sound and it's intriguing etymology ("Son of the Dragon" or "Son of the Devil", referring to the anti-Ottoman Order of the Dragon), Stoker rightly assumed that the name would be memorable. Some 77 years after the novel's 1897 publication, historians Raymond McNally and Radu Florescu published "In Search of Dracula" which revealed that the historical Dracula was one of the most sadistic rulers of his time. This added to the Dracula mystique, and today no Dracula movie is complete without a dose of medieval Balkan history.

Answer: Coffin

Cough + Inn

As Brad Pitt says in the film "Interview with the Vampire": 'Coffins are, unfortunately, a necessity' in most contemporary portrayals of the vampire. One notable exception is Stephanie Meyer's "Twilight" series of novels. As she puts it: "I didn't cut out fangs and coffins and so forth as a way to distinguish my vampires; that's just how they came to me."

On a more technical note, leading vampire scholar Paul Barber suggests that burial WITHOUT coffins - which would have been the standard in many premodern villages - may have contributed to vampiric ideas, as various natural forces (digging animals, frost heaving, and so forth) tend to push un-coffined bodies toward the surface. The sight of hands extending from the grave is an eerie one no matter what the circumstances!

Answer: Edward Cullen

"Ed" + Ward + Cull + In

Edward Cullen is the lead vampire character in Stephanie Meyer's "Twilight" series, as well as the successful 2008 movie of that name. Unlike the vampires of older conventions, he is not destroyed by sunlight--he only "glistens" in it--and he is a "vegetarian" in that he only drinks animal blood. Interestingly enough, Meyer's conception of the vampire harkens back to some folkloric concepts of the vampire. In a Serbian Romani tale, a dead man returns from the grave help someone who had repaid the corpse's perimortum debts. This entirely sympathetic vampire opens a butcher shop--in broad daylight--to repay his benefactor; the vampire sells all the muscle meat, but holds back the blood-rich liver for himself. This vampire isn't a romantic figure like Edward Cullen, though. Rather, he plays matchmaker for his partner, securing a marriage to the local pasha's daughter.

Answer: garlic

Gar + Lick

The connection with vampires and garlic probably dates back to the days of the black plague. A popular belief was that "bad air" caused the deadly disease, and that strong aromas could overpower it. As anyone who has ever used a bit too much garlic can attest, the term "overpowering" is probably accurate.

Answer: wooden stake

Would + Den + Steak

The wooden stake is ubiquitous in vampire lore, both traditional and media-driven. In his 1852 "Dictionary" of the Serbian language (which in many ways was also a very comprehensive ethnographic work), the great scholar Vuk Stefanovic Karadzic specified that the stake should be white thorn or hawthorn. Of course, folktales being what they are, the stake didn't always work. One Bohemian story has a staked vampire merely thanking his assailants for giving him a stick; it seems he'd been having a problem with vicious dogs, and a sharp hawthorn stake would come in very handy!

Answer: crucifix

Crew + Suffix

The image of the vampire cowering before the crucifix is essentially a product of Bram Stoker's "Dracula", but it is not without folkloric precedent. One Bulgarian ritual for killing a vampire involves herding it into a bottle using the power of a holy icon--though it must be emphasized that an icon in Eastern Orthodox theology is invested with prayer and fasting, as opposed to the simpler holy symbol of most contemporary vampire stories. On a somewhat ironic note, the great ethnographer William Lockwood once told me that Bosnian gypsies, ostensibly Muslim, would embroider crosses on their clothing to ward off vampires. As Professor Lockwood has not published on this subject, I leave any deeper meaning of this to the reader.

Answer: holy water

Ho + Lee + What + Ur

Use of holy water as a weapon against vampires dates all the way back...to 1960. That year, Britain's Hammer Studios released their version of "Dracula" (titled "Horror of Dracula" across the pond), making good use of new visuals, including the burning effects of holy water on the film's protagonist. This motif was even more prevalent in Hammer's 1960 "Brides of Dracula". As is the case of many traditions, it was soon assumed that holy water as a weapon against vampires dated to time immemorial. All this talk should not trivialize the sacred place that holy water has in many Christian traditions, of course, where it is specially prepared with formal blessings, and is used for baptisms, blessings, and as a sacramental by the laity.

Answer: cemetery

Semi + Tear + Rhee

It should be mentioned here that a reputation for fostering vampires is one of the worst things that can happen to any cemetery. London's historic Highgate Cemetery, resting place of Michael Faraday, Karl Marx, and Douglas Adams, was repeatedly vandalized in the 1970s by would-be vampire hunters. Chestnut Hill Cemetery and West Greenwitch Plain Meeting House Burying Grounds, both in rural Rhode Island, have not fared much better. A word to vampire enthusiasts: show some respect.