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Vlad II (Romanian: Vlad al II-lea), also known as Vlad Dracul (Vlad al II-lea Dracul) or Vlad the Dragon (before 1395 – November 1447), was Voivode of Wallachia from 1436 to 1442, and again from 1443 to 1447. He is internationally known as the father of Vlad the Impaler, or Dracula.
- Vlad III The Impaler
Vlad was the second legitimate son of Vlad II Dracul, who...
- Mircea I of Wallachia
Mircea the Elder (Romanian: Mircea cel Bătrân, pronounced...
- Alexander I Aldea
However, in the winter of 1436 he died, most probably from...
- Vlad III The Impaler
Vlad was the second of four brothers born into the noble family of Vlad II Dracul. His sobriquet Dracula (meaning “son of Dracul”) was derived from the Latin draco (“dragon”) after his father’s induction into the Order of the Dragon, created by Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund for the defense of Christian Europe against the Ottoman Empire .
- Richard Pallardy
- How did Vlad the Impaler become famous?Vlad was a voivode (prince) of Walachia (part of modern Romania). Surrounded by enemies that included the Hungarians, the Ottomans, his younger bro...
- What was Vlad the Impaler’s childhood like?Vlad was the second son of Vlad II Dracul. When he was 11 years old, Vlad was sent to the court of the Ottoman sultan Murad II as a hostage. His fa...
- How did Vlad the Impaler change the world?Vlad was a minor player during the early period of Ottoman domination of what is today Romania. He likely would have remained a historical curiosit...
- How did Vlad the Impaler die?In 1476 Vlad was ambushed by an Ottoman patrol and killed. He was reportedly decapitated, and his head was sent to the sultan in Constantinople as...
His sobriquet Dracula (meaning “son of Dracul”) was derived from the Latin draco (“dragon”) after his father’s induction into the Order of the Dragon, created by Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund for the defense of Christian Europe against the Ottoman Empire. Vlad moved…
People also ask
Why is Vlad called Dracula?
Who was Vlad III Dracula?
Why did Vlad II become Dracul?
Who was Vlad Dracul?
- His family name means “dragon” The name Dracul was given to Vlad’s father Vlad II by his fellow knights who belonged to a Christian crusading order known as the Order of the Dragon.
- He was born in Wallachia, present-day Romania. Vlad III was born in 1431 in the state of Wallachia, now the southern portion of present-day Romania. It was one of the three principalities that made up Romania at the time, along with Transylvania and Moldova.
- He was held hostage for 5 years. In 1442, Vlad accompanied his father and his 7-year-old brother Radu on a diplomatic mission in the heart of the Ottoman Empire.
- His father and brother were both killed. Upon his return, Vlad II was overthrown in a coup orchestrated by local war lords known as the boyar. He was killed in the marshes behind his house while his oldest son, Mircea II, was tortured, blinded and buried alive.
Bram Stoker’s Dracula is popularly associated with Vlad the Impaler, and some scholars do believe that the literary bloodsucker is derived in part from the historical Walachian prince. If Stoker did indeed base the archetypal vampire on Vlad, what led him to do so?
Vlad the Impaler more than lived up to his fearsome surname—Dracula—during his long and tumultuous reign of terror. This article appears in: April 2006. By Mark S. Longo. To millions of people, the name Dracula is synonymous with horror. The mere mention of Dracula invokes terrifying images of bats, Gothic castles and, of course, vampires.
