Vlad III, known as Vlad the Impaler (Romanian: Vlad Țepeș, pronunciation: [ˈvlad ˈt͡sepeʃ]) or Vlad Dracula (/ˈdrækjələ/; 1428/31 – 1476/77), was voivode (or prince) of Wallachia three times between 1448 and his death.
However, in many stories of Slavic origin and in his native Romania he
is a national and Christian hero, helping to save Europe from the Turks.
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.
Vlad moved to Târgoviște, Walachia, in 1436 when his father assumed leadership of the Walachian voivodate (principality).
In 1442 Vlad and his younger brother were sent to the court of Ottoman Sultan Murad II as collateral to assure the sultan
that their father, in a reversal of his previous position, would
support Ottoman policies.
Vlad returned in 1448, having been informed of
the assassination of his father and older brother at the hands of
Walachian boyars (nobles) the year before.
Vlad's father and eldest brother, Mircea, were murdered after John Hunyadi, regent-governor of Hungary, invaded Wallachia in 1447.
Hunyadi installed Vlad's second cousin, Vladislav II, as the new voivode.
Wallachian royalty and family background
The crown of Wallachia was not passed automatically from father to son; instead, the leader was elected by the boyars (nobles of the highest rank), with the requirement that the Prince-elect be of nominally Basarab princely lineage (os de domn—"of voivode bones," "of voivode marrow"), including out of wedlock births.
This elective monarchy often resulted in instability, family disputes and assassinations. Eventually, the princely house split between two factions: the descendants of Mircea the Elder, Vlad's grandfather; and those of another prince, Dan II (Dăneşti faction).
In addition to that, as in all feudal states, there was another struggle between the central administration (the prince) and the high nobility for control over the country.
To top it off, the two powerful neighbors of Wallachia, the Kingdom of Hungary and the Ottoman Empire, were at the peak of their rivalry for control of southeastern Europe, turning Wallachia into a battle ground.
Vlad's family had two factions, the Drăculeşti and the Dăneşti. His father, Vlad II Dracul, born around 1395, was an illegitimate son of Mircea the Elder, an important early Wallachian ruler.
As a young man, he had joined the court of Sigismund of Luxemburg, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Hungary, whose support for claiming the throne of Wallachia he eventually acquired.
A sign of this support was the fact that in 1431 Vlad II was inducted into the Order of the Dragon (Societas Draconis in Latin), along with the Jagiellion rulers of Poland and Serbia.
The purpose of the Order was to protect Eastern Europe and the Holy Roman Empire from Islamic expansion as embodied in the campaigns of the Ottoman Empire.
Wishing to assert his status, Vlad II displayed the symbol of the Order, a dragon, in all public appearances, (on flags, clothing, etc.)
Vlad II Dracul finally became prince of Wallachia in 1436. During his reign he tried to maneuver between his powerful neighbors, opposing various initiatives of war against the Ottoman, which finally attracted the irritation of the Hungarian side, who accused him of disloyalty and removed him in 1442.
With the help of the Turks (where he also had connections) he regained the throne in 1443 and until December 1447 when he was assassinated by means of scalping ("scalping," for the Turks, meant cutting the edges of the face and pulling the face's skin off, while the person was still alive and conscious on the orders of John Hunyadi, regent of Hungary.
The identity of Vlad Dracula’s mother is somewhat uncertain, the most likely variant being that she was a Moldavian princess, niece or daughter of Moldavian prince Alexandru cel Bun. In some sources she is named Chiajna—Princess.
Vlad seems to have had a very close relationship with Moldavia: he spent several years there after his father’s death; he left with his presumed cousin Stephen the Great to Transylvania, and helped the latter gain the crown as Prince of Moldavia in 1457 and was later helped by Stephen to return to the throne of Wallachia in 1476.
Vlad III seems to have had three brothers. The oldest was Mircea II, born before 1430, and who briefly held his father's throne in 1442, and who was sent by Vlad Dracul in 1444 to fight in his place during the crusade against the Turks that ended with the Varna defeat. Mircea II was an able military leader, and fought some successful yet small campaigns against the Ottomans prior to his capture along with his father in 1447.
Mircea II, captured by the boyars, had his eyes burned out, after which he was buried alive.
Vlad IV, also known as Vlad Călugarul (Vlad the Monk), was born around 1425 to 1430, and was Vlad's half-brother. Vlad the Monk spent many years in Transylvania waiting for a chance to get the throne of Wallachia, trying a religious career in the meantime, until he became prince of Wallachia (1482).
Radu, known as Radu cel Frumos (Radu the Handsome), the youngest brother, was also Vlad’s rival as he continuously tried to replace Vlad with the support of the Turks, to which he had very strong connections. Radu seems to have been also favored by the Turkish Sultan Mehmed II.
From his first marriage, to a Wallachian noble woman, Vlad III apparently had a son, later prince of Wallachia as Mihnea cel Rău (Mihnea the Evil), and another two with his second wife, a relative of Matthias Corvinus of Hungary.
Early years
Vlad was very likely born in the citadel (a military fortress) of Sighişoara, Transylvania in 1431. He was born as the second son to his father Vlad Dracul and his mother Princess Cneajna of Moldavia. He had an older brother named Mircea and a younger brother named Radu the Handsome. Although his native country was Wallachia to the south, the family lived in exile in Transylvania as his father had been ousted by pro-Ottoman boyars. In the same year as his birth, his father, Vlad Dracul, could be found in Nuremberg, where he was vested into the Order of the Dragon. At the age of five, young "Vlad" was also initiated into the Order of the Dragon.
Hostage of the Ottoman Empire
Vlad's father was under considerable political pressure from the Ottoman sultan.
Threatened with invasion, he gave a promise to be the vassal of the Sultan and gave up his two younger sons as hostages so that he would keep his promise.
These years were influential in shaping Vlad's character; he was often whipped by his Ottoman captors for being stubborn and rude. Here is where he learned his torture tactics.
He developed a well-known hatred for Radu and for Mehmed, who would later become the sultan. According to Florescu and McNally, he also distrusted his own father for trading him to the Turks and betraying the Order of the Dragon oath to fight them.
1st reign 1448
Predecessor Vladislav II
Successor Vladislav II
2nd reign 1456–1462
Predecessor Vladislav II
Successor Radu cel Frumos
3rd reign 1476
Predecessor Basarab Laiotă cel Bătrân
Successor Basarab Laiotă cel Bătrân
Born 1428–1431
Died December 1476 – January 1477
Mother Eupraxia of Moldavia
Hunyadi launched a military campaign against the Ottomans in the autumn of 1448, and Vladislav accompanied him.
Vlad broke into Wallachia with Ottoman support in October, but Vladislav returned and Vlad sought refuge in the Ottoman Empire before the end of the year.
Vlad went to Moldavia in 1449 or 1450, and later to Hungary. He invaded Wallachia with Hungarian support in 1456. Vladislav died fighting against him. Vlad began a purge among the Wallachian boyars to strengthen his position.
He came into conflict with the Transylvanian Saxons, who supported his opponents, Dan and Basarab Laiotă(who were Vladislav's brothers), and Vlad's illegitimate half-brother, Vlad the Monk.
Vlad plundered the Saxon villages, taking the captured people to Wallachia where he had them impaled(which inspired his cognomen). Peace was restored in 1460.
The Ottoman Sultan, Mehmed II, ordered Vlad to pay homage to him personally, but Vlad had the Sultan's two envoys captured and impaled.
In February 1462, he attacked Ottoman territory, massacring tens of thousands of Turks and Bulgarians.
Mehmed launched a campaign against Wallachia to replace Vlad with Vlad's younger brother, Radu. Vlad attempted to capture the sultan at Târgovişte during the night of 16–17 June 1462.
The sultan and the main Ottoman army left Wallachia, but more and more Wallachians deserted to Radu. Vlad went to Transylvania to seek assistance from Matthias Corvinus, King of Hungary, in late 1462, but Corvinus had him imprisoned.
Vlad was held in captivity in Visegrád from 1463 to 1475.
During this period, anecdotes about his cruelty started to spread in Germany and Italy. He was released at the request of Stephen III of Moldavia in the summer of 1475. He fought in Corvinus's army against the Ottomans in Bosnia in early 1476.
Hungarian and Moldavian troops helped him to force Basarab Laiotă (who had dethroned Vlad's brother, Radu) to flee from Wallachia in November. Basarab returned with Ottoman support before the end of the year
Vlad's actions after 1456 are well documented. He seems to have led the life of all the other princes of Wallachia, spending most of his time at the court of Târgovişte, occasionally in other important cities, such as Bucharest, drafting laws, meeting foreign envoys and presiding over important judicial trials. He probably made public appearances on relevant occasions, such as religious holidays and major fairs. As a pastime he probably enjoyed hunting on the vast princely domain, with his friends. He made some additions to the palace in Târgovişte (out of which Chindia Tower is today the most notable remainder), reinforced some castles, like the one at Poienari, where he also had a personal house built nearby. He also made donations to various churches and monasteries, one such place being the monastery at Lake Snagov where he is supposed to have been buried.
Since the death of Vlad's grandfather (Mircea the Elder) in 1418, Wallachia had fallen into a somewhat anarchical situation. A constant state of war had led to rampant crime, falling agricultural production, and the virtual disappearance of trade. Vlad used severe methods to restore some order, as he needed an economically stable country if he was to have any chance against his external enemies.
The early part of Vlad’s reign was dominated by the idea of eliminating all possible threats to his power, mainly the rival nobility groups, i.e. the boyars. This was done mainly by physical elimination, but also by reducing the economic role of the nobility: the key positions in the Prince’s Council, traditionally belonging to the country’s greatest boyars, were handed to obscure individuals, some of them of foreign origin, but who manifested loyalty towards Vlad. For the less important functions, Vlad also ignored the old boyars, preferring to knight and appoint men from the free peasantry. A key element of the power of the Wallachian nobility was their connections in the Saxon-populated autonomous towns of Transylvania, so Vlad acted against these cities by eliminating their trade privileges in relation with Wallachia and by organizing raids against them. In 1459, he had 30,000 of the German settlers (Saxons) and officials of the Transylvanian city of Kronstadt who were transgressing his authority impaled.
Vlad III was also constantly on guard against the adherents of the Dăneşti clan. Some of his raids into Transylvania may have been efforts to capture would-be princes of the Dăneşti. Several members of the Dăneşti clan died at Vlad's hands. Vladislav II of Wallachia was murdered soon after Vlad came to power in 1456. Another Dăneşti prince, suspected to have taken part in burying his brother Mircea alive, was captured during one of Vlad's forays into Transylvania. Rumors (spread by his enemies) say thousands of citizens of the town that had sheltered his rival were impaled by Vlad. The captured Dăneşti prince was forced to read his own funeral oration while kneeling before an open grave before his execution.
Personal crusade
Following family traditions and due to his old hatred towards the Ottomans, Vlad decided to side with the Hungarians. To the end of the 1450s there was once again talk about a war against the Turks, in which the king of Hungary Matthias Corvinus would play the main role. Knowing this, Vlad stopped paying tribute to the Ottomans in 1459 and around 1460 made a new alliance with Corvinus. This angered the Turks, who attempted to remove him. They failed, however; later in the winter of 1461 to 1462 Vlad crossed south of the Danube and devastated the area between Serbia and the Black Sea.
In response to this, Sultan Mehmed II, the recent conqueror of Constantinople, raised an army of around 60,000 troops and 30,000 irregulars and in the spring of 1462 headed towards Wallachia. Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror was greeted by the sight of a veritable forest of stakes on which Vlad the Impaler had impaled 20,000 Turkish prisoners. With his army of 20,000–30,000 men Vlad was unable to stop the Turks from entering Wallachia and occupying the capital Târgovişte (June 4, 1462), so he resorted to guerrilla war, constantly organizing small attacks and ambushes on the Turks. The most important of these attacks took place on the nights of June 16–17, when Vlad and some of his men allegedly entered the main Turkish camp (wearing Ottoman disguises) and attempted to assassinate Mehmed. Unable to subdue Vlad, the Turks left the country, leaving Radu the Handsome to continue fighting. Despite Vlad achieving military victories, he had alienated himself from the nobility, which sided with Radu the Handsome. By August 1462 Radu had struck a deal with the Hungarian Crown. Consequently, Vlad was imprisoned by Matthias Corvinus.
His first wife, whose name is not recorded, died during the siege of his castle in 1462. The Turkish army surrounded Poienari Castle, led by his half-brother Radu the Handsome.
An archer shot an arrow through a window into Vlad's main quarters, with a message warning him that Radu's army was approaching.
Florescu and McNally explain that the archer was a former servant of Vlad who sent the warning out of loyalty despite having converted to Islam to get out of enslavement by the Turks.
Upon reading the message, Vlad's wife flung herself off the tower into a tributary of the Argeş River flowing below the castle.
According to legend, she remarked that she "would rather have her body rot and be eaten by the fish of the Argeş than be led into captivity by the Turks."
Today, the tributary is called Râul Doamnei (the Lady's River).
In captivity
The exact length of Vlad's period of captivity is open to some debate. The Russian pamphlets indicate that he was a prisoner from 1462 until 1474.
Apparently his imprisonment was none too onerous.
He was able to gradually win his way back into the graces of Hungary's monarch; so much so that he was able to meet and marry a member of the royal family (the cousin of Matthias) and have two sons who were about ten years old when he reconquered Wallachia in 1476.
Florescu and McNally place Vlad III the Impaler's actual period of confinement at about four years from 1462 to 1466. It is unlikely that a prisoner would have been allowed to marry into the royal family.
Diplomatic correspondence from Buda during the period in question also seems to support the claim that Vlad's actual period of confinement was relatively short.
The openly pro-Turkish policy of Vlad's brother, Radu (who was prince of Wallachia during most of Vlad's captivity), was a probable factor in Vlad's rehabilitation.
During his captivity, Vlad also adopted Catholicism.
Apparently in the years before his final release in 1474 (when he began preparations for the reconquest of Wallachia), Vlad resided with his new wife in a house in the Hungarian capital (the setting of the thief anecdote).
Vlad had a son from an earlier marriage, Mihnea cel Rău.
Return to Wallachia and death
Around 1475 Vlad the Impaler was again ready to make another bid for power. Vlad and voivode Stefan Báthory of Transylvania invaded Wallachia with a mixed force of Transylvanians, a few dissatisfied Wallachian boyars, and a contingent of Moldavians sent by Vlad's cousin, Prince Stephen III of Moldavia.
Vlad's brother, Radu the Handsome, had died a couple of years earlier and had been replaced on the Wallachian throne by another Ottoman candidate, Basarab the Elder, a member of the Dăneşti clan.
At the approach of Vlad's army, Basarab and his cohorts fled, some to the protection of the Turks, others to the shelter of the Transylvanian Alps.
After placing Vlad Ţepeş on the throne, Stephen Báthory and the bulk of Vlad's forces returned to Transylvania, leaving Vlad in a very weak position.
Vlad had little time to gather support before a large Ottoman army entered Wallachia determined to return Basarab to the throne.
Vlad's cruelties over the years had alienated the boyars who felt they had a better chance of surviving under Prince Basarab. Apparently, even the peasants, tired of the depredations of Vlad, abandoned him to his fate. Vlad was forced to march to meet the Turks with the small forces at his disposal, somewhat less than four thousand men. There are several variants of Vlad III the Impaler's death.
It is generally believed that he was killed in battle against the Ottoman Empire near Bucharest in December of 1476.
Others say he was assassinated by disloyal Wallachian boyars just as he was about to sweep the Turks from the field or during a hunt.
Other accounts have Vlad falling in defeat, surrounded by the bodies of his loyal Moldavian bodyguards (the troops loaned by Prince Stephen III of Moldavia remained with Vlad after Stephen Báthory returned to Transylvania).
Still other reports claim that Vlad, at the moment of victory, was struck down by one of his own men.
However 'one undisputed fact' is in the end Vlad's body was decapitated by the Turks and his head was sent to Istanbul and preserved in honey, where the sultan had it displayed on a stake as proof that Kazıklı Bey was finally dead
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