Freak369's Full Review: Barbara Knox - Castle Dracula: Romania's Vampire H...
Being someone that has always been fascinated with Dracula, vampires, occult history and things off the beaten path, I didn’t really think much when I came across the title of this book when I was searching an online database. I was looking for some books about historic Romania; more to the point, about the true history of Dracula’s castle. There were more than a few books on the subject but when I started to look at them in depth, most of them were long winded and didn’t have ‘face based’ information in them; they were written from the author’s standpoint on the subject and some of them were just downright ludicrous. After reading the brief excerpt about this book I decided to see if my local library had it; I could have ordered it online for about ten dollars but I wasn’t sure what to make of this - it was classified juvenile book so I didn’t know how much information it would have in it. After getting it and reading it several times my opinion of it has changed - drastically. It has a ton of practical information to it, a glossary, timeline of events and some amazing photographs. If you have a child that wants to learn more about the history of Castle Dracula, this is one book that you can count on to give them solid information to work with.
Castle Dracula: Romania's Vampire Home
The book does an amazing job of mixing old world lore with facts about the castle and family history. It shows you the different eras in which the castle has existed and how it has changed over the years, it even includes information about how it has been updated and how it is a hot tourist spot. What good is a book about a castle such as this if it doesn’t tell you some of the darker things like the secret rooms, mazes of passages designed to confused enemies that might make their way inside and one of the most sinister things - “murder holes”! If the name sounds ominous, it should; much like the ‘oil tureens’ used in castles in England, these murder holes were used to pour boiling hot water on to the enemy as they made their way through the castle or up steps. As you could imagine, when rumors of this spread amongst the ranks, everyone quickly fought to bring up the rear instead of being the first on line.
Castle Dracula wasn’t built, hey, now, let me explain that. It didn’t just materialize out of thin air. In 1377 the king took an old abandoned castle and rebuilt sections of it. This was done to protect the village of Brasov and named Bran Castle. It wasn’t until much later, in fact, after the Bram Stoker book “Dracula” and subsequent movies were released that most people associated Bran Castle with Vlad and Dracula. In 1931 the castle was renamed Castle Dracula, ever since then it has been a tourist attraction and a place that some people still say vampires lurk in the cover of darkness. What still amazes me is that people don’t look at the place as a beautiful building, they see it as a place where thousands died - yes, death did happen there but after all these years, the place is still amazing to look at.
The book does an excellent job at presenting the facts about Prince Vlad; rising to power in 1456 he was feared by almost everyone, including his own people. Three short years later he ordered 20,000 men in the Turkish army to be impaled, some say that all twenty thousand weren’t in the army and some of that number was made up of commoners. Vlad was killed in 1476 however when his body was found, his head was gone. Now, while you are reading the book there are small text entries to add to what you are reading, one that had me really amused was this one, “Visitors once forgot to take off their hats in front of Vlad. The angry prince nailed their hats to their heads”. That should give you an indication of just how cruel he could be but you have to admit, if someone nailed your hat to your head, I bet you’d never forget to take it off again.
Outside of the older facts that you will learn from this book, you also get some nice stuff about how it was turned into a trading post in the 1600’s. It turned into a port for traders from India and China to stop at while on their way to Europe. In 1920 the people of the village of Brasov gave Bran castle to Queen Marie and Romania’s royal family. This didn’t last long though, in 1956 the castle was given back to the people of Brasov who then decided that it would be best if it were turned into a museum of sorts. Not just to show the darker times that the castle had been through but to let others see the beauty of it. The timeline that is provided shows you how things progressed for the castle, this helps to put things into perspective and aids in helping kids understand some of the important events that they may have missed if they skipped over a few sections.
I mentioned that there are text boxes on most of the pages; these add to what you are reading about and give you some lesser known facts about castles, Vlad, weapons and when glass windows were originally introduced in castles. While you are reading the book there are words that are in bold; these are words that can be looked up in the glossary in the back of the book to help further explain things. Some of the words include ‘fire holes’, ‘legends’, ‘fortress’, ‘coffin’ and ‘stakes’. If a child is reading this without help from a parent this glossary will help them understand the words as well as helping them pronounce them correctly. I wish all books like this had this type of lay out, it lets kids read on their own and gives them a real feeling of accomplishment when they can learn new words and their meanings without having someone else explain it to them.
The “Castles, Palaces & Tombs” Series
This book is part of an extremely fascinating series of book for the seven to eleven year old crowd. Enriched with amazing color photographs and engaging text about the places that are featured, these books are a must have for any child or adult that loves to read about historic places. Some other titles include “Taj Mahal: India’s Majestic Tomb”, “Palace of Versailles: France’s Royal Jewel”, “Windsor Castle: England’s Royal Fortress” and “Himeji Castle: Japan’s Samurai Past”. To learn about more books in this series, visit the publishers website at www.bearportpublishing.com.
The Bottom Line
To be completely honest, I didn’t expect this book to have a lot of meat to it. It was classified as a juvenile book in the library database so I was wholeheartedly expecting it to be some watered down version of things. This has easy to read text, color photographs and will give a child [or an adult for that matter] some very interesting information about the history of Castle Dracula. Granted, this might not be something that most kids will be interested in reading about but if they are, this is one of the best books to try and track down. This can be used as a supplement for history or as a tie in for world events from any of the eras that are covered in the book. Since this has a lot of information to it such as trading posts, wars, the Bram Stoker book and movies adapted from it and other topics - you can use this as a stepping stone for other areas of history. To me this was a well written book that taught me a thing or two about the castle, Vlad’s family and some of the common misconceptions about Romania. If you are into vampires, Dracula or just want something interesting to read then this is a book you should check out!
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