Currently listening to: The Biggest Dreamer - Digimon Tamers opening theme. Yeah, it's Digimon, I know, but it's the best out of the other themes. It's really catchy, and it has rhythm - that matters a lot in my song reviews, but not always. Digimon Tamers was perhaps the decentest of all Digimon seasons, and I'm refering to the German dub version, because that's all I saw out of Tamers.
Dinner: A cup of milk and another sandwich.
Quote of the Day: "If your name is fake, so is your existance, isn't it so, Alex Dino... no, Athrun Zala?" Chairman Dullindal, Gundam Seed Destiny. - nothing new, but I'll comment it on another occasion.
First of all, there's something I see in common for everyone who asks about Romania. They say either that it's where Dracula is from, and I whack'em over the head, or that it's where the blood-thirsty Vlad the Impaler ruled and I still whack'em. I know this is their only known thing about Romania, next to Hagi, Ceausescu and "Numa Numa", but I'm getting sick of this confusion. I wanna make this clear: Vlad the Impaler wasn't a monster.
He lived in an era when the Turks were attempting to conquer Wallachia (one of the three principalities forming today's Romania; by the way, Vlad wasn't ruler of Transylvania) and were appointing some of our Voivods (a term for Prince - in Romanian, voievod [voh-ee-eh-voh-d]), but from time to time, there was a ruler who'd fight back. In the end, our only direct victory against a sultan on battlefield was about a century before Vlad ruled, and that was the battle of Rovine [Roh-vee-neh] in 1396, due to the fact that it was a swampy place. However, under that same ruler, Mircea the Great, we were forced to pay the tribute. Well, this Vlad guy was just one of those few Princes who stood up. You do realize he couldn't afford to have criminals and bandits roaming the streets in addition to the existent chaos caused by the Turks. We were at the geographical northern limit of the Empire, and from getting us to getting Vienna was just a step. Just that we were stubborn bastards.
Now, Vlad's methods were condemnable, yes, but had he not been a lot harsher, then this would have made us an easy target. Also, there was a problem: during his father's reign, Vlad had been emprisoned by the Turks along with his brother. It's then that he got a pesimistic view on life, and this became even worse when he returned and found out that the noblemen, under the rival prince's (Vladislav) command, but with their support, killed Vlad's father (Vlad II Dracul, _not_ Dracula) as well as his own eldest son, Mircea. When the Turks got bored with Vladislav, they sent Vlad, Dracul's son, to take over. Of course, he got his vengeance on all the noblemen that had killed two persons he prized, his father and his son, and killed the older ones through impalement (that is, he had them be dropped in a giant spike, not having them fall right on the heart or the head, but making the spike go through their asses, which meant they would get some pretty painful and long suffering). The younger ones were forced to march for 100 km, during which many died, and the survivors were never left to rest a second. When they reached their destination, they had to build a fortress. This way, Vlad got his vengeance in full AND had a new fortress.
Beyond the vengeance, yes, he killed many criminals and the like, in the most sadistic of ways, by cutting off noses, genitals, tongues or ears, or other pleasant tortures. Many accuse him of mercilessly killing German (well, Saxon, since they are called "sasi" [sahsh], which is different from "germani" or the popular form of "germani", "nemti" [nemtzi]) merchants. But they seem to ignore the minor detail that they weren't respecting the commerce laws. He also dared refuse to pay Mehmed II (a.k.a. the conqueror of Constantinople) the tribute, and killed his emissaries. Mehmed launched an all-out attack on Wallachia with an army thrice bigger than that of Vlad. Vlad burned everything that would've been in Mehmed's path, and on top of that, left a huge amount of spikes impaling clothes of 20000 captured Turks in the Capital. Now, the Ottoman forces were exhausted, and now they saw THIS scary sight. It seems they retreated in shame.
However, Mehmed sent Vlad's brother against him, and all of Vlad's internal enemies sabotaged him, forcing him to retreat to a castle. Some people say he committed suicide there, but in fact he ran to Hungary (which had Transylvania under it's control), where king Matthias Corvin emprisoned him. Vlad returned for a short period as Prince, but he was caught, beheaded, then impaled as proof of his death.
By the way, "Dracula"'s ethymology has nothing to do with vampires and such. Vlad the Impaler's father, Vlad II Dracul, bore the name of Dracul from the fact that he was part of the Order of the Dragon. "Drac" had the meaning of "dragon" (cf German "drachen"), and, extending the meaning, of "demon". However, the demon definition is much more recent. "Dracula" comes from "Draculea", showing the fact that he was his son. Kinda like the Norse name technique: Andersson = son of Anders.
The purpose of this history lesson is to make sure that the few people who read this blog will know WHO the ever-so-demonic Vlad the Impaler really was.
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