The concept of the vampire has changed throughout the years. There is a huge difference between how the vampire was perceived during the 19th and 20th centuries and how the vampire is perceived and thus presented nowadays throughout literature. Joseph Campbell, a scholar, suggests that the way in which we view vampires and mythology and how it changes over time is there to meet the needs of society and how we internalize the world around us (Campbell, 1973). As society has changed throughout the years, so too have we been viewing vampires and what they mean to us in different ways throughout time.
In the past, vampires were surrounded in mystery and in fear. They were believed to morph and change into different animals like wolves, rats and spiders. They were thought to have no soul and therefore could not see themselves in the mirror or cast any shadows. Once they drank the blood of humans, some thought that they were capable of animating the dead bodies and making them do what the vampires wanted.
Some people believed that unless invited into the home, vampires were not capable of entering. They also were believed to be incapable of entering holy places since they were servants of the devil. It isn’t entirely certain where the word vampire came about; either from the Turkish uber – witch, the Greek word ‘to drink’, a Slavic beginning from the word bamiup or perhaps from the Hungarian vampir (Wilson, 1985).
