Let's Talk Vampires

Let's Talk Vampires Monday, October 16, 2017 <img alt="Vampire image wikipedia.jpg" data-entity-type="" data-entity-uuid="" height="865" src="/sites/default/files/2017-10/Vampire%20image%20wikipedia.jpg" width="570" /> So you were saying that folklore isn't really relevant to the modern world? Just keep an eye on the world news for a while and you'll think differently. Take the recent outbreak of violence from reports of--yes--vampires. <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-malawi-un-vampires/vampire-scare-prompts-u-n-pullout-from-southern-malawi-idUSKBN1CE25E">https://www.reuters.com/article/us-malawi-un-vampires/vampire-scare-prompts-u-n-pullout-from-southern-malawi-idUSKBN1CE25E</a> Revenants existed in the Pontos, though there's only one folktale that I've come across so far that refers to them. It was told to an Oxford professor in the summer of 1914 in the Pontic village of Imera, which lay in the mountains south of Trebizond.  Three brigands were sitting under the stars. Two of them insisted, saying that, as educated men, they know that there are no such things as vampires. One of them disagreed, because he knew quite a few people who claimed to have seen them. They argued until one of the doubters took himself to a Turkish cemetery to dig up proof (the Pontic Christians averred that only Moslem dead turned to vampires). He uncovered a head, wrapped it in a kerchief to take back to his fellows. On his return, he noticed the head moving around in his hand, which scared him rather badly, so that he barely made it back to his fellows. They found a mouse in the skull, and ridiculed him for becoming frightened for no reason.  Even though rational people know that vampires don't and can't exist--a lot of us find it hard not to believe in them on some level.  Like the recent fascination with zombies, they signal stresses in the social fabric--but more on that at a later date.