Vlad the Earplug: biography, achievements, government and interesting facts

There is no other ruler in the history of medieval Europe whose life would have acquired so many myths as Vlad III, the ruler of the tiny and unknown Wallachia. However, his peculiar methods of management and reprisal over the disobedient earned him unkind fame, even among contemporaries, who were used to everything. Much has been embellished, much has been invented, but Vlad The Earlier, whose biography is very bizarre, remained in the mass consciousness as an ominous vampire graph.

Confusion with nicknames

The future Lord Valachia was born in 1430, the exact date is in question. Then he still wore the short name of Vlad III. Tsepe - nickname, which he was awarded afterwards. In Romanian it means "count", and he was awarded it for the wonderful habit of executing criminals in this way.

At that time, his father Vlad II lived in Tighisoara, in Transylvania. His mother was the Moldavian princess Vasilika.

The nickname "Dracula", under which he will become known, the future Tepes has inherited from his father. "Dracula" Vlad II was nicknamed because he was part of the Order of the Dragon, founded by the Hungarian monarch Sigismund. Already becoming a gentleman, he began to actively use the image of a mythical beast on coins, heraldic shields, arms. After that, he received the name Dracula.

Childhood

Up to seven years, the future Vlad Earplighter, whose family subsequently increased after the birth of another son, Radu, lived with his father, mother and brothers in Tighisoara, in Transylvania. Then Vlad II received the liberated throne of the sovereign and moved to Wallachia.

The political situation in the region in those years was very difficult. Little Walachia in those years was balancing between Catholic Hungary and Muslim Turkey. Vlad II was inclined towards Turkey, for which he was imprisoned by the Hungarian ruler Janos Hunyadi.

After a series of military clashes, Vlad II returned to the Wallachian throne with the consent of the Turks, but in order to guarantee his loyalty, he was forced to send two of his sons - Vlad and Red - to the court of the Sultan.

The Formation of Tepesh

So, at the age of 14, Vlad went with his brother to the rate of the Turkish sultan, where he spent several years. According to the chroniclers of those years, he changed very much during the time spent away from home. Extreme cruelty, emotional imbalance - all this is the result of forced vacations in the palace of the Sultans, where besides he could observe numerous executions of criminals in a sophisticated way. Perhaps, it was there that the personality of Vlad the Earplighter emerged. Who is this, now known to almost everyone.

While the son was in the status of a hostage, his father was on the hot throne of the ruler of Wallachia. Father Dracula Vlad II then concluded military alliances with the Hungarians, then departed from them. This resulted in the fact that Janos Hunyadi in 1446 organized the overthrow of the obstinate vassal. Vlad II was chopped off, and Dracula's elder brother Mircea was buried alive.

The first coming to power

Vlad Earlier, when he reached adulthood, he decided to avenge the death of his relatives. With the support of the Turkish troops, he entered Wallachia and displaced the Hungarian protege Vladislav.

Immediately the investigation of the reasons for the coup was launched, as a result of which his father was executed. In a short time he brought to account the seven boyars.

However, the thirst for revenge at that time remained unsatisfied. The Hungarian monarch Janos Hunyadi declared Dracula to be the illegal ruler of Wallachia and in 1448 again organized the overthrow of the prince disliked by him.

Wanderings in Eastern Europe

The disgraced Gentleman was forced to leave Wallachia. Vlad Kolosazhatel wandered a lot in the yards of various small princes. He spent several years in Moldova. There he established friendly relations with the governor of the Moldovan throne Stefan. Subsequently, he will help him to ascend to the throne.

Vlad Dracula The Earlier continued to be very nervous on the Hungarian monarch, even being in exile status and an adoptive parent in insignificant provinces. Janos Hunyadi sent out angry letters demanding that he not have any business with Dracula to all his vassals.

The situation was defused by another war with Turkey. In 1456, Western Europe began to collect a crusade against the Ottomans in order to repel Constantinople from them. At this time, the Hungarian king is not up to small svar with former subjects, and Vlad The captain quietly comes to Transylvania.

Just at this time Franciscan monks recruited volunteers to march on Constantinople among the local population. For ideological reasons, they closed the way to their army to adherents of the Orthodox faith. Vlad Tsepesh, being a believer in the Romanian Orthodox Church, took advantage of this circumstance and invited the outcast warriors to join his squad and go to Wallachia.

Board of the Earplaster

In 1456, Vlad Dracula once again captures the Wallachian throne and remains to rule here for six years. Indomitable in his desire for revenge, he resumes an investigation into the circumstances of the death of his father and elder brother. Numerous revealed facts of treason of local boyars became the reasons for their terrible execution.

Vlad Dracula The Earlier organized a big reception in his palace, where he invited all the doomed nobles. Unthinking boyars-traitors with peace of mind appeared at the feast, where mass extermination of the objectioners took place.

It was during the six-year reign in Wallachia that the demonic image of Vlad the Earlier was formed in many ways. During his stay in Turkey, he became addicted to the sophisticated method of execution through planting on a stake and actively used it against enemies.

Becoming the lord of Wallachia, Dracula brought a vassal oath of allegiance to the Hungarian monarch, but this did not prevent him from undertaking numerous raids on Transylvania.

During one of these campaigns an epic battle took place with the ruler of Brasov Dan. After breaking his army, Vlad organized mass executions of captured soldiers without the slightest tenderness. And at the same time with them he planted on the count and all the women who accompanied the army. Contemporaries described these events in color, adding that the soldiers of Tsepesh tied infants to their mothers during the execution.

However, the Middle Ages are a contradictory time. Along with the stories about Dracula's sophisticated cruelty, there are also evidences of his wise rule on his land. Numerous parables about Dracula Solomon's decisions to resolve disputes and the lack of theft in Wallachia remained written in the ancient Russian literary monument - "The Tale of the Dracula Voivode," compiled by the deacon of the Russian embassy in Hungary, Fedor Kuritsyn.

War with Turkey

Little Walachia with different rulers was inclined to Turkey, then to Hungary. In the end, Vlad Tepesh the Earplug made his final choice and began fighting against the Ottomans. This was preceded by an internal struggle with the boyars and the strengthening of their absolute power. Vlad armed the peasants, free people and gathered a fairly large army.

In 1461, Dracula announced his refusal to pay tribute to the Sultan and razrezal the entire Turkish administration on the banks of the Danube.

In response, Mehmed II introduced a huge 100 thousand army into the possession of Tsepesh. I must say that the cruel ruler was able to fight well. In history, there was the famous night attack, which he undertook in June, 1462. With a small army of only 15,000 people, he dealt a crushing blow to the 100,000th Armada of the Turks and forced those to retreat. During the fighting, Vlad acted extremely harshly and mercilessly. All the prisoners he sent to the stake, after which the fighting spirit of the proud Ottomans began to fall noticeably.

Mehmed II was forced to retreat and withdrew troops from Wallachia. However, the military victory turned into a political defeat of Vlad. Matyas Corwin, the King of Hungary, decided to isolate too strong a specific ruler and imprisoned Tepesh for a false accusation of betrayal.

The last years of Dracula

Vlad spent 12 years in prison, but this did not break his indomitable spirit. In 1475, he left the prison, as if nothing had happened to go to war as part of the army of the Hungarian king. As one of the commanders of the army, he took part in hostilities in Bosnia against the Turks, helped his old friend Stefan the Great to defend Moldova.

It was with the help of the latter that Vlad made another return to Wallachia, where he again took his throne, having displaced the Turkish protege Loyot Basarab.

However, after the departure of the Moldovan allies, he left too few loyal people. Less than a year, as Loyota organized the murder of an indomitable sovereign.

Reflection of the Earplot in Culture

The mystical image of Count Dracula, very far from reality, was formed almost five hundred years after Vlad's death. At the end of the sixties of the fifteenth century, an essay by a certain Michael Beheim - "The Story of a Villain" was published, in which "feats" and examples of Tepes's cruelty were described in colorful and detailed detail.

However, until the end of the 19th century, he remained a mere mortal until writer Bram Stoker did a brief introduction to the history of Eastern Europe. The phlegmatic British was struck by medieval passions, and especially the picturesque image of the Sorcerer with the equally colorful nickname Dracula. Thanks to Stoker's pen, the Wallachian ruler turned into a grim necromancer and a vampire with supernatural powers.

Countless screen versions only consolidated this image in the mass consciousness, and Count Dracula today is very little like his real prototype.