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Post by dany on Jun 6, 2009 19:41:36 GMT
OK, I was reading a book on vampires right and then I saw the ad for the new Twilight movie and what really bugs me is...
Why do vampires and werewolves hate each other so much?
I mean, is it a power struggle or something?
I know it's totally random and all, but I'm curious as to what you make of it.
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Nessie Vaile
Dream Being
The Maiden
oh she was shy, oh she was bashful, what's to hide? how much I cried~~~played by MARK
Posts: 29
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Post by Nessie Vaile on Jun 6, 2009 20:25:06 GMT
Don't take my word for it, 'cause I know nothing about- *is crushed by hoard of twilight fans flocking to answer the Question, stand up, dusts self off, and continues* -t vampires, but I vaguel;y rember that vampires and werewovles are each others weaknesses. Or at least, a vampire can be killed by a werewof without all the fancy stakes and holy icons business, I remember correctly. Or it could be the immortality. Or it could just be that some guy thought: Hey! Who would win in a fight- a werewolf or a vampire?' and it just caught on. I could be completely wrong xD
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Post by dany on Jun 6, 2009 23:03:16 GMT
Hmmm, to be honest I did think about some of those ideas and I'm not a very big fan of Twilight *pulls face at the word and thought* but I do like fantasy and vampires has to be in my top three best fantasy characters. But I've just thought, who actually came up with the idea of a blood sucking creature that looked human, but wasn't human? I mean, the person might have got the idea off a Vampire Bat but was the bat named after the vampire, or the vampire after the bat? hmmmmm.
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Post by Serinthel Haberin on Jun 6, 2009 23:16:04 GMT
Vampires and werewolves fight for a bunch of reasons depending on what you read, but generally it's the whole matter of vampires lording over them and trying to enslave them. Vampires are refined and they steal life, while werewolves are very feral. It's just a matter of how different they are.
And the idea of vampires popped up everywhere. A lot of it is linked back to illnesses and random things that couldn't be explained. I don't know if I recall this correctly but people ooze blood from the mouth after they die. People thought this was a sign that the person had gotten back up and taken blood from something else. Sometimes it was a cae of diabetes too. If diabetes can go untreated, the person who has it can look somewhat...vampiric. Gums recede, their tastes change, they can go into a coma, sunlight bothers them etc.
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Post by dany on Jun 6, 2009 23:24:44 GMT
Yeah, was Dracula the very first book about vampires? I mean, there's so much about it that I can't get my head around. I mean, were vampire bats named after vampires? I read somewhere that the first record of a vampire was in Russia in 1047 AD. I think it was this book of psalms or something. I wonder...I wonder if vampires are real? Could people actually develop a taste for blood and have to live on blood to stay alive? I mean, I quite like the taste of blood, but I'm just weird, but if we evolved from eating simple berries and fruits, to eating meat and such, could we evolve to like the taste of blood?
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Post by Serinthel Haberin on Jun 7, 2009 5:22:30 GMT
Dracula was the first fictional book published about vampires, it was a big folklore thing up until then. He got the idea from somewhere, that somewher being the villaged and oral tales passed down in various places in the world. It was published... 1800's sometime I think. I have a copy stashed in my closet but I'm too lazy to find it.
I'm pretty sure the bats were named after the once-human vampires, not the other way around.
And yes, people can develop a taste for blood. Scientifically speaking, there's a blood disorder where people can lack a certain type of cell and they feel an intense craving to drink blood. Realistically, I have a lot of friends who have a taste for blood and they won't date anyone that can't take intense biting o.o
I find that painful, but to each their own I suppose.
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Post by Sen.Ghost on Jun 7, 2009 14:20:23 GMT
I believe stories of vampires or vampire like creatures date back to early civilization. Remember that the Aztec gods required blood sacrifice. I don't recall if the Aztecs or other Mesoamerican tribes actually drank blood but their actions could be seen as pretty vampyric.
But they weren't the only ones with such tales. There's a primitive (and well, even now a modern) fasination with blood and blood sacrifice. It is, after all, the 'life force,' so many cultures have lots of tales about blood and taking in blood in order to achieve power.
Really, I think that's what vampires are about anyway. Power through blood. Whether or not they exist, or had existed at some point, or could be rationalized off as ignorance of illness people didn't understand, I think the stores were more developed as a fascination with the power blood could supposedly give.
All the sacrifice in olden times to olden gods make blood suckers in human form very probable in the minds that grew up with such tales. Gods like Odin required I believe 7 or nine sacrifices. The first being couple animal, the very last one being human. They were hung upside down on trees and then pierced in the side to let the blood out.
If nothing else, when Christianity came about they tried to get ride of these old traditions and perhaps created 'vampires' in order to drive fear into pagan hearts. If you believe this [and not to be blasphemous] Jesus hanging on the cross incorporates many of the old myths and continues [but not as gruesomely or literally] the old blood sacrifices. I mean, seriously, in a Catholic Church you drink the Blood of Christ [wine].
Also, some tales claim that vampires come from Lilith, Adam's first wife. But others say that fairies come from her.
The most interesting vampire origins myth that I know is that vampires come from Judas Iscariot (who betrayed Christ) and his followers. They are marked by the XXX (which is said to look like top and bottom fangs) as that is the amount of money (30 silver coins) Judas was paid to betray Christ. Judas couldn't return the coins and God cursed him and his family. He committed suicide and came back as a vampire.
That's my favorite, but keep in mind, the myth of vampires predates the Bible. And so if vampire were to exist, it is unlikely that they come for Judas. Though, it is interesting.
And I'm also pretty sure that the vampire myth came long before the naming of the vampire bat.
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Post by dany on Jun 7, 2009 16:22:10 GMT
I know Odin, the pagan god, had to have a sacrifice of a man (usually a hostage), horse (they're most prized beast), pig, ox, cattle and hound or something like that, and they had to dig a trench and do the sacrifices there and let the blood seep in to the ground to Corpse-Ripper, an evil god. (don't tell me how I know this, I've been reading a lot about pagans in books and it's just common knowledge about me.)
About Judas and the fact he betrayed Jesus, I've never heard of that part, but it really makes me curious. I mean, don't all humans have fangs, or like fangs teeth that aren't really sharp but used for ripping meat before knifes and forks. I guess if Judas betrayed Jesus and became a vampire, then that would explain why Vampires supposedly can't come on holy ground, which I think is silly. I mean, I believe stuff about fire and the steak in the heart stuff, since that can kill any normal person, as does beheading people. I wonder if beheading people came from the myth of killing vampires, and they used that just to make sure the person didn't came back as a vampire?
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Post by michael on Jun 7, 2009 16:23:02 GMT
If I could only come close to being as cultured and intelligent as you Sen *dreamy look* I cant think of anything to add to the whole origins bit, but I'm 99.99999999999% sure that it would be impossible to live on blood alone as you suggested, because it consists of pretty much just oxygen, CO 2, plasma, white blood cells, iron, and other bits i wont bother eleborating on. There's the blood sugar I guess, but with no carbohydrates you wouldnt last for too long. And you need protein too, so your growth would be stunted I think.
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Post by michael on Jun 7, 2009 16:24:20 GMT
Oh no, I think beheading came just because it was effecient and quick
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