present day 'to send vampires to Santorini[1]' is a proverbial expression synonymous with 'owls to Athens' or 'coals to Newcastle'; and the inhabitants of the island enjoyed so wide a reputation as experts in dealing with them, that two stories recently published[2], one from Myconos and the other from Sphakiá in Crete, actually end with the despatch of a vampire's body to Santorini for effective treatment there. The justice of this reputation will shortly appear; for one of the best accounts of the superstition was written by a Jesuit residing in the island, to whom the resurrection of these vampires seemed an unquestionable, if also inexplicable, phenomenon of by no means rare occurrence. Nowadays cases of suspected vampirism are much less common, and I can count myself very fortunate to have once witnessed the sequel of such a case. But of that more anon.
The most common form of the Greek name for this species of vampire is [Greek: brykolakas][3], and in order to avoid on the one hand continual qualification of the word 'vampire' (which I have used hitherto as the nearest though not exact equivalent) and on the other hand confusion of the Greek with the Slavonic species from which in certain traits it differs, I prefer henceforth to adopt a transliteration of the Greek word, and, save where I have occasion to speak of the purely Slavonic form of vampire, to employ the name vrykólakas (plural vrykólakes[4]).
The first of those writers of the seventeenth century whose accounts deserve attention is one to whose treatise on various Greek superstitions reference has already frequently been made, Leo Allatius. 'The vrykolakas,' he writes[5], 'is the body of a man of evil and immoral life—very often of one who has been excommunicated by his bishop. Such bodies do not like those of other dead men suffer decomposition after burial nor turn to dust,, [Greek: Paradoseis], I. pp. 573 and 593.]. To these may be added [Greek: barbalakas] from Syme ([Greek: Politês, Paradoseis], I. 601), [Greek: bourdoulakas], from Cythnos ([Greek: Ballêndas, Kythniaka], p. 125), and an occasional diminutive form such as [Greek: brykolaki]. The [Greek: k] is often doubled in spelling.], with accent either paroxytone or proparoxytone, also occurs.]
- ↑ Heard by me from a fisherman of Myconos.
- ↑ [Greek: Politês
- ↑ The list of dialectic forms compiled by Bern. Schmidt (das Volksleben der Neugriechen, p. 158) comprises, besides that which I have adopted as in my experience the most general, the following: [Greek: bourkolakas, broukolakas, bourkoulakas, boulkolakas, bouthrolakas, bourdolakas, borbolakas
- ↑ A plural in [Greek: -oi, -ous
- ↑ De quorumdam Graecorum opinationibus, cap. 12 sqq.
