70 Fun Facts About Vampire

Which pungent plant is the classic folk ward against vampires?

Wild rose and hawthorn branches were also said to harm vampires in European folklore.

Which actor played the Count in Universal's 1931 film Dracula?

He had already played the role on Broadway in 1927, and his Hungarian accent became the template for every cape-wearing imitator since.

In Stephenie Meyer's Twilight novels, what do vampires do when the sun hits them?

It is one of the series' most-mocked and most-loved inventions, and the reason the Cullens keep to the perpetually overcast Pacific Northwest.

Which Sesame Street Muppet is a purple vampire obsessed with numbers?

He debuted in 1972 tallying six blocks with Bert and Ernie, and thunder still rolls whenever he reaches his final total.

Vampire bats are the only mammals that feed exclusively on what?

They do not suck it; they make a small incision with their teeth and lap it up like a cat at a saucer.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer is set in which fictional California town?

Its high school sits on top of a gateway to demon realms, which is why so much goes wrong at graduation.

In which year was Bram Stoker's Dracula first published?

Archibald Constable put it out in May, three years after Stoker started writing it between shifts managing a London theatre.

Which real 15th-century ruler is often cited as the inspiration for the name Dracula?

His patronymic simply meant 'son of the Dragon'; the connection to blood-drinking came centuries later from novelists, not chroniclers.

Who played the vampire Lestat in the 1994 film Interview with the Vampire?

Anne Rice publicly objected to the casting, then took out a two-page ad praising his performance after seeing the film.

True Blood, based on Charlaine Harris's Southern Vampire Mysteries, aired on which network?

It ran seven seasons from 2008 to 2014, following telepathic waitress Sookie Stackhouse in small-town Louisiana.

Kiefer Sutherland led a gang of teenage vampires in which 1987 film?

The title nods to Peter Pan's gang who never grow up, and the boardwalk scenes were shot in Santa Cruz.

In Stoker's novel, Count Dracula's castle stands in which mountain range?

Stoker never visited the region; he built it from library books and travel accounts.

The Vampire Diaries is set in which fictional Virginia town?

The CW series ran 171 episodes across eight seasons and spawned The Originals.

In Twilight, Bella Swan moves to which rainy Washington town?

Meyer chose it after searching for the rainiest place in the United States, and the real town now runs on Twilight tourism.

The 1922 German silent film Nosferatu renamed the vampire Dracula as what?

Renaming the characters did not fool anyone; Stoker's widow sued and a court ordered every print destroyed.

The 2014 mockumentary What We Do in the Shadows follows vampire flatmates in which city?

Taika Waititi and Jemaine Clement wrote, directed and starred, and the film later spawned an American TV series.

Which anti-hero, played by Wesley Snipes in 1998, is a human-vampire hybrid without vampire weaknesses?

The film quietly launched Marvel's cinematic run two years before X-Men, and Stephen Dorff's Deacon Frost was its upstart villain.

Who directed the 1992 film Bram Stoker's Dracula starring Gary Oldman?

He banned computer effects and made his crew use in-camera tricks from cinema's earliest days; the film still won three Oscars.

In Anne Rice's Interview with the Vampire, which vampire narrates his life story to a reporter?

Rice wrote the novel shortly after her young daughter died of leukaemia, and the child vampire Claudia was inspired by her.

How many living species of vampire bat exist?

The common, hairy-legged and white-winged vampire bats all live in Central and South America; none are found in Transylvania.

In Stoker's Dracula, the Count arrives in England aboard a ship named after which Greek goddess?

The ship runs aground on the Yorkshire coast with a dead crew, and a large dog is seen leaping ashore.

Which studio's 1958 Dracula first paired Christopher Lee with Peter Cushing's Van Helsing?

Made for about £81,000, it broke box-office records and was released in the United States as Horror of Dracula.

In the FX series What We Do in the Shadows, what unusual type of undead is Colin Robinson?

He feeds by boring and irritating people, and lives in the basement of the Staten Island house.

Stephen King's 1975 vampire novel 'Salem's Lot is set in which US state?

It was only his second published novel, written after teaching Dracula to high-school students.

Which 'Blood Countess' was accused of killing hundreds of girls between 1590 and 1610?

The story that she bathed in virgins' blood to stay young was only written down as fact more than a century after her death.

In the HBO series about Sookie Stackhouse, what drink lets vampires 'come out of the coffin'?

The show's premise begins two years after its invention, when vampires reveal themselves and lobby for equal rights.

According to Stephenie Meyer, the Twilight vampire idea came to her in what form?

She dates it precisely to 2 June 2003, and the meadow scene she saw became chapter 13 of the first book.

Which family member of Vlad III earned the name 'Dracul' through the Order of the Dragon?

Dracula is simply the Slavonic genitive of Dracul, meaning 'son of the Dragon'; the surname was inherited, not earned.

In What We Do in the Shadows (2014), how old is the Nosferatu-like vampire Petyr?

He is the only flatmate who does not bother with chore charts, and Ben Fransham played him under heavy prosthetics.

Bram Stoker was born in which city?

He was bedridden with an unknown illness until age seven, then went on to be a barrister and a theatre manager for 27 years.

The 2004 vampire novel Let the Right One In comes from which country?

John Ajvide Lindqvist set it in a Stockholm suburb in the 1980s; the 2010 American remake was titled Let Me In.

Vlad III ruled which historical principality?

He was probably born in Transylvania but ruled the land south of the mountains, in three separate reigns.

In What We Do in the Shadows (TV), which vampire is the self-appointed leader of the Staten Island house?

Kayvan Novak plays the former Ottoman warrior, whose familiar Guillermo waits years for the promised bite.

Who wrote The Vampyre (1819), the tale that introduced the aristocratic vampire Lord Ruthven?

It was born from the same 1816 ghost-story contest at Villa Diodati that produced Frankenstein, and was first printed under Byron's name by mistake.

The 1872 vampire novella Carmilla is set in which region of Austria?

Le Fanu's Irish gothic tale beat Dracula into print by 25 years and its vampire keeps changing her name to anagrams of the original.

Which folk practice was meant to keep a vampire busy all night counting?

Poppy seeds, millet or sand were used; the same compulsion is why Sesame Street's Count cannot stop tallying.

The most famous American 'vampire' exhumation, in 1892, took place in which state?

Nineteen-year-old Mercy Brown had died of tuberculosis; her heart was burned and the ashes fed to her sick brother as a cure.

Nosferatu (1922) is credited as the first film to show a vampire destroyed by what?

Stoker's Count could walk about by day, weakened; the cinema invented the fatal sunrise.

In Dracula, Lucy Westenra receives proposals from Arthur Holmwood, Quincey Morris and which doctor?

He runs the asylum next to Carfax whose patient Renfield eats flies and spiders while awaiting his master.

On which network did Buffy the Vampire Slayer air for its final two seasons?

The show jumped networks in 2001 after five seasons, and the move came with a bigger licence fee and a resurrected heroine.

Robert Eggers's 2024 Nosferatu cast which actor as its title vampire?

He also played Pennywise in It, giving him two of horror's most famous monsters; Dafoe plays the occultist von Franz.

Decomposing corpses were mistaken for vampires partly because receding gums made what seem to grow?

Bloating from gases also pushed blood from the nose and mouth, so a 'plump, well-fed' corpse looked freshly fed.

The star of the 1931 Dracula played the Count on film only once more, in which 1948 comedy?

He was buried in his Dracula cape and ring in 1956, and Martin Landau won an Oscar for playing him in Ed Wood.

The name of the vampire in Le Fanu's Carmilla is an anagram of her original name. What was it?

Countess Karnstein reshuffles her letters each generation; the anagram trick was borrowed by countless later vampires.

The 'Blood Countess' spent her final years confined in a castle in which present-day country?

Csejte, now Čachtice, is where she was found dead in 1614; despite the 'walled up' legend, priests recorded her moving freely inside.

Bram Stoker did much of his research for Dracula in the library of which English seaside town in 1890?

He returned the favour by having the Count come ashore there as a large dog leaping from a wrecked ship.

In 1985 biochemist David Dolphin linked vampire folklore to which rare blood disorder?

The theory got huge press coverage but is now widely dismissed; folkloric vampires were corpses, not light-shy patients.

The vampire panic that gave English its word 'vampire' erupted in the 1720s-30s in which country?

Official Austrian reports on the corpses of Petar Blagojević and Arnold Paole were reprinted across Europe and made the word a sensation.

In 1901 a heavily altered version of Dracula appeared under the title Makt Myrkranna. In which language?

'Powers of Darkness' was assumed to be a plain translation until 2014, when scholars discovered it was almost a different novel.

The 1931 Universal Dracula was based on a 1924 stage play by John L. Balderston and which actor-manager?

The play is where the Count acquired his evening dress and opera cape; Stoker's novel never mentions either.

What is the name of the anticoagulant found in vampire bat saliva?

It stops clotting by blocking factors IX and X, and researchers have studied it as a possible stroke treatment.

Which ancient Greek creature, said to suck children's blood, is among the earliest vampire-like figures?

Alongside her were the bronze-footed Empusa, daughter of Hecate, and Mesopotamia's baby-blood-drinking Lilitu.

In 1462 Vlad III launched a night raid on the camp of which Ottoman sultan?

The attack failed to kill him, but the 'forest of the impaled' he found on the road to Târgoviște did more to break Ottoman morale.

Roughly how long can a vampire bat survive without a blood meal?

Which is why well-fed roostmates regurgitate blood for hungry neighbours, one of the best-studied examples of animal reciprocity.

Who designed the Oscar-winning costumes for Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992)?

The film's three Academy Awards were all technical: costume, makeup and sound effects editing.

Stoker's typescript for Dracula carried a different title. What was it?

His early notes had a Count Wampyr and a German professor called Max Windshoeffel before Van Helsing was born.

In the 1998 film Blade, who plays Whistler, Blade's mentor and weaponsmith?

The country singer's gravel-voiced hunter survived into two sequels despite apparently dying at the end of the first.

Stoker found the name Dracula in William Wilkinson's 1820 history of which two principalities?

A footnote in the book noted that 'Dracula' meant devil in the local tongue, and Stoker crossed out Wampyr for good.

The 1970 British film The Vampire Lovers, based on Carmilla, starred which Polish-born actress?

She returned the next year as the Blood Countess in Countess Dracula, cementing her as the studio's queen of the undead.

The Vampyre (1819) was first published with a false attribution to which poet?

Polidori was the poet's personal physician, and Lord Ruthven is a fairly unflattering portrait of his employer.

In 1970 the London press spread rumours of a vampire haunting which cemetery?

Rival amateur vampire hunters turned up with stakes and crucifixes, and one was later prosecuted for damaging tombs.

In the 1931 Dracula, who played the fly-eating Renfield?

His unhinged laugh made him Universal's go-to lunatic; he was Fritz the hunchback in Frankenstein the same year.

After his defeat, Vlad III was imprisoned by Hungary's Matthias Corvinus at which fortress from 1463?

He was held for about twelve years, married into the Hungarian royal family, and was released for a final short reign in 1476.

The novel Let the Right One In takes its title from a song by which singer?

It doubles as a nod to the folklore rule that a vampire must be invited across a threshold, which the book takes gruesomely literally.

On Sesame Street, the Count shares his castle with bats, a cat named Fatatita and a wolf named what?

Jerry Nelson voiced the Count from his 1972 debut, and each finished count still summons indoor thunder.

In True Blood, Eric Northman holds the title of Sheriff over which numbered vampire district?

Alexander Skarsgård's 1,000-year-old Viking runs the vampire bar Fangtasia in Shreveport.

Which scholar duo's 1972 book popularised the claim that Ármin Vámbéry fed Stoker his Dracula lore?

They also produced the 1979 edition that first bundled the 'missing chapter' Dracula's Guest with the novel.

Which empress sent her physician Gerard van Swieten to investigate vampire claims, then banned grave-opening?

Van Swieten concluded vampires did not exist, and the new laws against desecrating bodies ended the 18th-century Austrian vampire panic.

The jiangshi of Chinese folklore, sometimes called 'Chinese vampires', move around how?

These mindless reanimated corpses drain life essence, or qi, and their greenish-white furry skin may come from mould on corpses.

Varney the Vampire, the 1845–47 gothic serial by Rymer and Prest, appeared in what cheap format?

Collected in 1847, the story runs to 868 double-columned pages and helped give the vampire its protruding fangs.