Elisabeth Bathory: The Blood Countess of Transylvania
Known as the Blood Countess, to be frank, I did not quite understand just how infamous Elizabeth Bathory was before I began to do some research for this article and saw that she was depicted on screen three times in the last two decades directly, while characters that were inspired by her on some loose form like Charlize Theron’s bloodthirsty Queen from the 2011 movie Snow White and the Hunstman are almost too numerous to count.
Yet, who was Elizabeth Bathory? And is her infamous reputation deserved?
Life
Born in 1560, the exact date of the Countess’s birth is not known, though she was born into the Ecsed branch of the illustrious Bathory family, one of the most influential noble clans of the late medieval and early modern history of Hungary whose members rose to the rank of Palatine and Voivode of Transylvania, some of the most important administrative positions of the kingdom after the King.
As her parents were cousins, coming from the different branches of the family and probably well within the lineage closeness that we would call incest, the Countess suffered the consequences biology has in store for such a union, and throughout her life, she reportedly suffered episodes of ill health.
