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Wallachia first emerged as a political entity during the late thirteenth century from the weltering confusion left behind in the Balkans as the East Roman Empire slowly crumbled. Among the rulers of Wallachia, an important name was Basarab the Great (1310-1352), an ancestor of Dracula. Despite the splintering of the family into two rival clans, some member of the House of Basarab continued to govern Wallachia from that time until well after the Ottomans reduced the principality to the status of a client state. Dracula was among the voivodes of Wallachia who fought to retain a real measure of independence. In order to understand the life of Vlad Dracula it is first necessary to understand something about the nature of Wallachian society and politics. The throne of Wallachia was hereditary but not by the law of primogeniture; the boyars or great nobles had the right to elect the voivode from among the various eligible members of the royal family. As with most elective monarchies during the Middle Ages the power of the central government tended to be dissipated among the nobility as various members of the ruling family vied for the throne. Wallachian politics also tended to be very bloody. Assassination was a common means of eliminating rivals and many of the voivodes ended their lives violently and prematurely. By the late fifteenth century the House of Basarab had split into two rival clans; the descendants of Prince Dan and those of Prince Mircea the Old (Dracula's grandfather). These two branches of the royal house were bitter rivals. Both Dracula and his father, Vlad II Dracul, murdered rivals from the Danesti upon reaching the throne. The second ascendant fact of the fifteenth century Wallachian political life was the influence of powerful neighbors. In 1453 Constantinople and the last vestiges of the Byzantine or East Roman Empire, which had blocked the Islam's access to Europe for nearly one thousand years, succumbed to the armed might of the Ottoman Turks under Sultan Mohammed the Conqueror. Long before the fall of the Imperial City the Ottomans had penetrated deep into the Balkans. Dracula's grandfather, Mircea the Old, was forced to pay tribute to the sultan early in the fifteenth century. The Hungarian Kingdom to the north and west of Wallachia reached the zenith of its power during the fifteenth century and was a target for the powerful Ottoman Empire. Wallachia was the first step for the Ottomans on their way to conquer the Christian world, so throughout the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the princes of Wallachia attempted to maintain a precarious independence by constantly shifting allegiances between the powerful neighbors. Dracula ruled as Prince of Wallachia on three separate occasions. He first claimed the throne with Turkish support in 1448. On this occasion he ruled for only two months (November-October ) before being driven out by a Danesti claimant supported by Hungary. Dracula dwelt in exile for several years before returning to Wallachia to kill the Danesti prince, Vladislav II, and reclaim the Wallachian throne with Hungarian support. Dracula's second regal period stretched from 1456 to 1462. It was during this time that Dracula carried out his most famous military exploits against the Turks and also committed his most gruesome atrocities. In 1462 Dracula fled to Transylvania to seek the aid of the King of Hungary when a Turkish army overwhelmed Wallachia. Instead of receiving the assistance he expected, Dracula was imprisoned by the Hungarian king. He remained a prisoner of Matthius Corvinus of Hungary ( he himself of Romanian origin) for several years. For most of the period of Dracula's incarceration his brother, Radu the Handsome, ruled Wallachia as a puppet of the Ottoman sultan. When Radu died (ca. 1474-1475) the sultan appointed Basarab the Old, a member of the Danesti clan, as prince. Eventually, Dracula regained the favor and support of the Hungarian king. In 1476 he once again invaded Wallachia. His small force consisted of a few loyal Wallachians, a contingent of Moldavians sent by his cousin Prince Stephen the Great of Moldavia, and a contingent of Transylvanians under their prince, Stephen Bathory. The allies succeeded in driving Basarab out of the country and placing Dracula on the throne (November 1476). However, after Dracula was once again in control, Stephen Bathory returned to Transylvania taking most of Dracula's army with him. The Turk's soon counterattacked with overwhelming force. Dracula was killed fighting the Turks near Bucharest in December of 1476. His head was sent to Constantinople where the Sultan had it displayed on a stake to prove that the terrible Impaler was really dead. |
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[[Elisabeth Miller's Dracula Page]
