Of all the things that go bump in the night, few monsters haunt our dreams like the dreaded vampire. Almost every culture around the world has its own version of vampires in its folklore, but the version most of us are familiar with originates in Eastern Europe.
This region is full of vampire tales, like the story of Petar Blagojevic, also known as the “vampire of Kisiljevo.” In this 18th-century Serbian village, Blagojevic’s death sparked fear and hysteria as locals believed he returned from the grave to prey on the living.
Legends recount the macabre events of his exhumation, revealing a community’s desperate attempt to rid themselves of a suspected vampire. Cases like this led to vampire hysteria spreading across much of Europe until it caught the attention of writers like Bram Stoker, who gave us the infamous Dracula.
The Tale of Petar Blagojevic
Petar Blagojevic was a Serbian peasant born in 1662. He spent most of his life in the Serbian village of Kisilova (thought to be modern-day Kisiljevo) and lived a perfectly unremarkable life until his death (of unknown causes) in 1725.
Following his death, Blagojevic’s small village was hit by a spate of mysterious deaths. Within eight days, nine people had perished. Each of them had suddenly been struck down by a mysterious illness twenty-four hours before their deaths.
