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A Short Reference to the Origin of Prince Dracula
A Short Reference to the Origin of Prince Dracula
Lajos Szászdi
The Rumanians claim that Vlad Tepes was one of them, as if he was a modern-day Wallachian. In fact, being born in Segesvár Vlad Tepes was simply a Magyarized Wallachian prince who was a vassal of the King of Hungary. It should be said that Vlad Tepes was born in Hungary, raised on Hungarian soil at least for about the first five years of his life, and no doubt was throughout his earthly existence under the cultural influence of Hungary, its patron state, for when Wallachia was not under Ottoman suzerainty, it was part of Hungary’s sphere of influence in the region. And Prince Vlad Tepes was a vassal of the King of Hungary. According to the late historian Engel Pal:
"In 1462 Ottoman troops invaded Wallachia and drove out Vlad Tepes, a protégé of the Hungarians. The prince, who was widely known for his cruelty (and was later to be the model for Bram Stoker's Dracula), first sought refuge in Transylvania, then lived in the castle of Visegrád as Matthias' [King Matthias Corvinus] prisoner. Wallachia was henceforth one of the sultan's faithful vassal states."(1)
Engel refers to the predecessors of Vlad Tepes:
"The situation in Wallachia after the death of Mircea in 1418 was in many respects similar to that in Bosnia. In the next few years the principality was kept under constant pressure by the Ottomans, who tried to put their own candidates on the throne, while their opponents were unable to hold out without help from Hungary. Problems had begun to arise during Mircea's lifetime. In 1417 Sultan Mehmed I led a retaliatory campaign against him, forced him to pay a tax, captured three of his sons and occupied Szörényvár [in the book Turnu Severin; border town at the southeastern tip of medieval Temes county] and other castles along the Danube. The situation seemed so dangerous that, on arriving from Constance, Sigismund [King of Hungary] decided to intervene immediately. In November 1419 he recovered Szörényvár [in the book Turnu Severin] with the help of Michael, Mircea's successor, and put it under Hungarian control. At the same time he ordered the strengthening of the frontier between Szörényvár [in the book Turnu Severin] and Galambóc [in the book Golubac], the section that was most exposed to Ottoman attacks. In the summer of 1420 Michael died whilst fighting the Ottomans. The latter then placed one of their hostages, Radu II, on the throne of Wallachia, and after 26 years of relative calm resumed their incursions into Transylvania. In September 1420 they defeated the voivode, Nicholas Csaki, near Hátszeg [in the book Hateg; Transylvanian town of Hunyad county], and in 1421devastated the area surrounding Brassó [in the book Brasov; Transylvanian city]. The following year Mircea's nephew, Dan II, seized power, but he was unable to proceed without help from Hungary and needed several years to consolidate his authority. Every year from 1423 to 1426 Pipo ["Pipo of Ozora (Filippo Scholari)," who was count of Temes - in the book Timis] and Csaki marched to Wallachia to support Dan against Radu and his Turkish allies. In the end Sigismund himself intervened. He went to Brassó [in the book Brasov] in December 1426, and for several months directed the military operations in person. His army - of which, curiously enough, one of the commanders was Prince Peter of Portugal - won a decisive winter victory over Radu's troops. Dan's position was thereby stabilized, so that in April 1427 he was able to receive Sigismund in his own residence in Hosszúmezo [in the book Campulung; town in Wallachia]. The relative calm lasted for five years. In June 1432 Ottoman troops invaded Wallachia, forced the new prince, Alexander Aldea, to become the Sultan's vassal, and, proceeding into Transylvania, devastated the environs of Brassó [in the book Brasov] and Nagyszeben [in the book Sibiu; Transylvanian city also known as Hermannstadt]. The situation remained critical until 1436, when another Hungarian army managed to put Vlad, called `Dracul', in charge of the principality. He had been brought up in the Hungarian court, where he became a member of the Order of the Dragon - hence his sobriquet."(2)
Prince Vlad Tepes received his later-day nickname “Dracula” after his father, who was known as Vlad “Dracul” and who was put in the throne of the Principality of Wallachia in 1436 by order of King Sigismund of Hungary, for he was a vassal of this King. Vlad Tepes, son of Prince Vlad “Dracul,” was born in 1431 in the town of Segesvár,(3) of Hungary’s Transylvanian county of Szászföld, while his father was being groomed by King Sigismund, perhaps being “Magyarized” in the process, to become an ally of Hungary as the King’s vassal. Thus Prince Vlad “Dracul” was waiting inside Hungarian territory, under the protection of his feudal lord King Sigismund, for an opportunity to arise, as it did in 1436 - five years after his son’s birth in Hungary – to be put in charge of the Principality of Wallachia by the Hungarians. It is then no surprise that as his father was before him, “Dracula” was also a vassal of the King of Hungary, who guaranteed his stay as ruler of Wallachia under Hungarian suzerainty. The moment the Ottomans took his principality away from him, clearly when Hungary could not prevent this, Vlad Tepes went to Hungary as an exile, under the tutelage of then King Matthias Corvinus.
On the royal Order of the Dragon, Engel wrote:
"It was only natural in the early years after the revolt that influence and offices were reserved for those who had actively helped Sigismund to defeat his enemies. In 1408, on the occasion of the victory against Bosnia, the king bound them together in a formal league, founding the Order of the Dragon (Societas Draconica), the members of which made an oath of fidelity to one another to perpetuate their alliance. The order, which was named after its symbol, was in the beginning composed of the king himself, Queen Barbara and 22 barons - mainly those who had played an outstanding role in the suppression of the revolt. (Naturally, new members were adopted later on.)"(4)
So even the name "Dracula," which today serves to identify a historical figure, Vlad Tepes, who is widely regarded by today’s Wallachians as one of their national heroes, is based on the name of a Hungarian heraldic royal order, the Order of the Dragon.
Notes:
(1) Pal Engel, The Realm of St Stephen: A History of Medieval Hungary, 895-1526, trans. Tamas Palosfalvi, ed. Andrew Ayton (London: I.B. Tauris, 2001), 301.
(2) Ibid., 236-37. On Pipo of Ozora, see page 445.
(3) ”Prince opposes Dracula park,” BBC News, 6 May 2002 [news agency on-line]; available from http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/europe/newsid_1971000/1971271.stm; Internet; accessed 21 November 2003.
(4) Engel, 210.
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