Born: August 7, 1560 at the Ecsed Castle, her family estate in Hungary.
Married at 11. Wedding Gift: Čachtice Castle (Chakh-tee-tseh)
Gives birth to first child at 15 years old.
Her uncle was voivod (Chief official) of Transylvania.
Niece of the King of Poland.
Her family fought for Hungary against the Ottoman Turks.
She spent most of her adult life at Čachtice Castle.
Countess Elizabeth Bathory has been purported to be a witch, a vampire, the victim of political circumstances and even a werewolf. Many rumors and innuendos fly in regards to Elizabeth's life. That she bathed in blood and she sometimes drank it. Possibly, she worshipped the devil. Others claim she was mentally ill or simply sadistic. Whatever the reasons may be, countless websites and books deal with our fasincation for her life.
Raymond T. McNally, a former Boston college professor, now deceased, researched Dracula from a historic perspective. In one of his books, Dracula was A Woman," McNally makes a claim that with her lust for blood, possibly she was the Dracula character of Bram's infamous book. McNally’s book sheds some interesting light on her life. Elizabeth was the child of the intermarrying, dwindling Hungarian royalty. The Bathory family was a rich, powerful Protestant family. But, possibly the interbreeding took its toll on them. Elizabeth’s uncle purportedly worshipped Satan, her aunt Klara was a well-known bi-sexual and lesbian who enjoyed torturing servants, and Elizabeth's brother, Stephan, was a drunk. McNally also suggests that there is evidence that Bathory was related to Vlad, Dracula, the Imapler.
Crime:
Torturing and killing young women. Putting pins in their lips and faces. Dousing them with cold water while they stood outside naked in the winter air. Biting chunks of flesh from their body (hence, the rumor of werewolf).
Accomplices:
Ficzko -manservent
Helena Jo -wet nurse
Dorothea Szentes (Dorka)
Katarina Beneczky -washerwoman
Anna Darvulia -friend and possible lover. She kept Elizabeth in line assuring she only chose servant girls as her victims. Once she passed on, Elizabeth turned her sights to lower noble girls.
One reported victim:
Pola:
forced into a cage and ripped to shred with spikes.
Word reaches her cousin Count Thurzo. He raids the castle and arrests all except Elizabeth.
Punishment:
The accomplishes are brought to trial and confess to killing between 30-60 girls. A mysterious book is supposedly found written in Elizabeth’s handwriting claiming over 600 victims.
Helena Jo and Dorothea sentenced to death. Their fingers from ripped from their sockets with a red-hot polka by the public executioner because they caused so much pain with them to their victims. Then, they were burned alive.
Ficzko, because of his young age, was decapitated, his body drained of blood and then he was burned with Helena Jo and Dorothea.
Ersi was missing at the time of the trial and later captured and executed.
Elizabeth was boarded up in a room in her own castle. A slit was allowed for the passage of food and a few air vents. She died a few years later at the age of fifty-four.
***Please note that rumors had been abound for years in regards to Elizabeth’s murderous indiscretions. However, it was not until she tried to collect a huge debt in the name of her deceased husband from King Matthias II, when action was finally taken to investigate the rumors.
Sources:
Dracula Was a Woman: In Search of the Blood Countess of Transylvania (1987)
Author: Raymond T. McNally
