The Ultimate Vampire Resource and Directory

The other thread about sunlight brought this idea to my mind.

Albino humans have natural traits that are the same traits as the mythical vampire. The light skin, the red eyes, and not being able to go out in the sun safely. Also taking into account the fact that in that time period anyone that wasn't healthy was shunned from the main villages. Forced to sneak around in fear of being persecuted.

My question is, do you think that Albino humans can be considered a modern version of a vampire, or could they be the cause of most of the myths surrounding vampires?

In a word no....there has never been any mention in any stories I ever heard about vampires and recognised Albino traites.

I'm talking mainly about hair and eyes here.

This link www.Albinism.org should help anyone wishing to understand the medical condition more.

you might want to re read the opening thread i dont think thats what the topic was actually asking

if you look down the road along myths and legends of vampires this actually has a lot of interesting food for thought

vampire in older myths taking hollywood away before movies of any form

they had always been thought of as night walkers there is a disease sprouted from albinos where some cases of a disease can cause sickness and death from just walking in the sun
also albinos have red eyes
and well lets face it the religious people of that day would have shunted and outcasted them relaying their disease to be of satan of some form I think there could be some possiblity to the connections of albinos and vampires but thats my thought

I feel that they would be shuned for several reasons one that they were different in their appearances and second that they were/are sensitive to the sunlight. They were ignorant to the facts of certain disoreders, yet even in this day and age people look at an albino differently also. it is sad to say.

lol.....I checked....my answer remains the same.

Certainly words like outcast could be used to describe anyone who does not fit the stereotype of the time.

But if you look at it, a common misconception could be the main cause of myths.

Take the Salem Witch trials. They saw young girls out having fun at night and turned it into a big deal.

Perhaps....but I don't think Albinoism was ever that common....have yet to finnish reading about it .

xeroderma pigmentosum

look up that genetic disease maybe not so common now as then due to bad medical practice.

and with medicine like it is now not so common anymore hard to say

Many aspects of the Vampire legend involve those percieved as "different" from the so called main stream. Albinism does indeed seem to be something that could and probably still does perpetuate the legend by mixing fact and fiction quite well.

Of course there are links, and it would seem like a plausible idea. But i havn't heard any kind of description of a vampire with out any pigment in their hair. Quite the opposite, they usually have dark, richly coloured hair.
Plus i dont think someone with genetic make up would sprout fangs out of no where.

well for the fangs, it could come from poor dental care.

as for the dark hair, if these people were sneaking around they could have a cloak over their heads.

that would give the illusion of dark hair

wow um thats very much enlightening how is it wrong ?

it is a simple question about the possibility of something

I would thing the thread on hitler is rather wrong myself
this has very good potential

Only because they are grasping at straws now. Back the and even now, becomming albino was a 1 in a million chance that a child would be born that way. I have a coworker whos child is albino. Yes they would have been seen as freaks and very different back then. But I have never heard of anything that would remotly link albinos and vampires. Hell if you put together four traits from four different people you have a vampire. All you need is a raver, a person with ocd, an albino, and an athiest. There you go, a vampire. So that would make pretty much any albino that sleeps all day and goes out at night with ocd and hates church would be concidered a vampire. So what do you think the statistics would be on that happening? Thats about how likely it would be that albinoism is linked to vampires.

Absolulutely not. That is like asking if the symptom is the disease.
Is Edgar Winter a vampire? Nope, but he is a damn fine musician and songwriter.

well, look at it this way
it was brought up as a possibility not a fact

not putting those characteristics in only using those of say physical

pale skin red eyes dislike or comfort for sunlight

then add in the other area's say socialisms

outcasted due to being different sick or with something that doctors or no one else could figure out.

they wouldnt be allowed around church due to the possibility of spreading a sickness.
and they would have to sneak about simply to keep from being persecuted.

add in possible myths of vampire having ocd or dislike of churches and such things and yes that could be anyone

however looking at the core and how health issues were back then

maybe then when medicine wasnt so high tech albinism was a bit more common

I don't doubt that in the past albinoism was sometimes mistaken as a sign of the vampire, and it would not take much for some societies to punish the albino out of fear.

Medical technology is not the problem, Albinoism is not a disease in any form. Its a genetic oddity, much like dwarfism. It cant be treated or prevented. So once again. I doubt there were near as many then as there are now. And that only because the populations is so vastly larger now.

keep in mind back then genetics wasnt around so it was all medical or herbal
or alchemy

so back then it could have been thought a disease or a sickness.

I'm not at all going aginst that part of it, :) I'm just saying that they were probably even more scarce back then than they are now. I could just see the vampire myth being more liked to .... hell people with hang overs after being in the local pub all night and comming out and being blinded by the sun. :)

The white skin of vampires is attributed to the fact that they are undead (and the dead have a pale skin)... so I see no connection there.
Just coincidence.
;)

Dragonrouge, you are absolutely correct. Though I don't doubt that the coincidence was used as an excuse to profile.

I admit that both the vampires and the albinos share the same sensitivity to sun, which has to do with their DNA.
Yet, I wouldn't say that any albino is a vampire... There are too many other things to someone a Vampire, other than a sun-sensitivity.

it doesnt look like it was a question if they were vampires but rather could their condition be some of what sprouted a good portion of the myths of olden days

The link is unlikly. Most accounts of Vampires in folk lore involve a member of a community dieing first, then returning from the grave. I have yet to read any accounts of those accused of being Vampires where they were seen living with such physicl attributes before thier death. But such attributes may have lead to people with such medical conditions being persicuted as Vampires by scared and ignorent people of the time.

OKay there are many conditions that you can find simularities to vampirism. This does not mean anything.

all things are truely possible given the right circumstances, but the folk lore of vampires came from drinking blood...

As stated above, no I don't think albinos can be considered a version of a vampire. The main defining characteristic of a vampire, modern or otherwise, is that taking of something from others, whether blood or energy or the like. Albinos do not do this. They have a rare genetic condition which removes all pigmentation from their bodies, which results in them being white skinned, red eyed, and unable to bear direct sunlight for very long.

I'd be more inclined to state that the condition of porphyria is what can be called a version of vampirism.

In a lot of the legends there was no proof of the dead having taken anything, there was only the perception and the fear. A pale being who shunned the sun would have drawn suspicion. That certainly didn't make him a vampire, but just like in Salem, suspicion didn't mean you were a witch, just that you were executed as a witch.

Drella
its a combination of dracula and cinderella - Lou Reeds nickname for Andy warhol. maybe it's the pale, translucent skin and the eerie eyes, but i have heard people say that a certain albino "looks like a vampire" and there have been quite a few albino vampires in fiction. there is an albino in my old town who wore a long black coat with a high collar that made him look so much like Klaus Kinski's Nosferatu that it was quite creepy. so i can see why such an association might come about. in less enlightened times, albinoism was thought to be a blood deficiency and i'm sure some ignorant peasants would be superstitious about such people.

Exactly, many myths and legends depend more upon perception that any activity.

And having a perception of someone that in a shadow that looked like a vampire would cause more myths to sprout out.

Like it was stated, during the Salem Witch trials the girls weren't witches, but it didn't stop people from thinking they were and persecuting them. Same thing could go with this. If they didn't know what it was hundreds of years ago then they would make an assumption based on what they saw.

That may be. But what they saw was not the basis for the assumption. They saw something that fit the idea of what they feared. The fear itself was not based on what they saw in the albinos.

People are not reading the freaking question.


My question is, do you think that Albino humans can be considered a modern version of a vampire, or could they be the cause of most of the myths surrounding vampires?


I think that Albinos could be considered as the modern day vampire, by the way they look and act.


Not sure about the myths though. They could be mostly surrounded around them...but then again maybe not. Myths have been thrown off-course too much...so I'm not sure on that one.

I think it maybe where holly wood got the idea to make vampires pale skinned and unable to go out in the sun they don't care about the people who really suffer with that condition.

HA!Maybe in the dark-ages they might have been mistaken for vampires or some-kind of walking ghost of the dead of vampires.
HEY..Ive seen a human albino with redish pink eyes he died young..cause albinos dont have the right antibodies in there blood to keep fighting off bad bugs that may enter there body..he just had the flu..and could not fight it off.I even seen an albino african american.Now..thats was cool!
I've heard of vampire being boren albino..but they are very rare.

I don't know about albinos being modern day versions of vampires, I think hollywood is continually reinventing the vampire myth; But I suppose with development being what it was back then they considered most anything as being demonic.

i don't think they are connected in anyway. With the loss of blood your skin becomes pale.(vampires) Albinos are just born without any skin pigmentation.

I think it could be possible that maybe a few traits of an albino human could have been taken as a vampire, i mean back when these "myths" were talked about their could not have been that many people who seen an albino person walking around and they could have mixed the legends of the vampire and albino people together...

there seems to be degrees of albinoism. some just look quite pale and light haired, whilst others seem almost ghost-like. i did see a movie once where an albino was persecuted and suspected of being a vampire by ignorant neighbours - can't remember what it was called though. cruel people will use anything as a way to be derogatory, so i'm guessing a lot of albinos get nicknamed "dracula" because they have piercing eyes and white skin.

I am pretty sure this condition is caused by a gene mutation. Unless, this gene mutation was around when some of the lore about vampires started many mooms ago, I doubt if they were a direct cause of the stories and legends.

Vampires being to do with Albino's....Thats a very interesting theory I never thought of.

With what I've read about Vampires, there supposed to be very pale yes, but not tansparent? I have a friend who is an Albino, & you can see every vein in his body.

Also vampires are usually prefered to be viewed as brunettes, dark eyes...

Exactly!

Many vampire characters in the XVIII-XIX century are depicted with dark hair and black eyes.Not the case with albinos that have red or white eyes and white hair.

The 1990-2007 Hollywood vampires are the only ones who have white color lens :P



The vampires wakes from the dead (so are pale but not white), so they crave blood and when they drink it regain their rosy cheeks and some regain their youth.

Nice idea, but I think you are one of the first (if not the first) who made this association.

My biggest thought was back hundreds of years ago if someone saw an albino person walking around at night because of fear of persecution they could be thought of as being a possible vampire. If they were in the dark and all they saw was someone with a dark cloak, pale skin, and red eyes wouldn't they make the assumption that they could be a vampire. Back then they didn't really know what albinism really was so they could just assume it was being a vampire.

I've thought for a long time that Albino people were part of the cause for the myth and still do. And if you think about it, there aren't too many albino people, at least, not in my town. So anyone seeing one may think they've seen a vampire hence the "vampire sightings".

I dont think so, all that is is a skin pigment disorder.

albinism doesnt have to be full fledge it can be just the skin and eyes or skin or eyes or parts. Ive had a few friends who wasnt fully albino.there is different variants of it and different degree

the fact that albino is a genetic disorder was not the question.

what the question was(in lame men terms) for those who dont seem to follow

could albino be a cause for some of the myths behind vampires and their legends could albino have some how due to thier genetic disorder which back then in those times wasnt known yet.could they have been mistaken as a vampire and helped feed modern myth and legend was the question.

(sorry for any rude way of typing this)

I understand what the question is, & why it's being asked. They didn't have the knowledge or the means to know what an Albino is, they went off what they saw & pretty much made up ridiculous assumptions because thats all they had.

in times past, I believe there were many elelments the went together to create the myths.
One might've related to the albino.. another is the ammount of being supposedy ressurected, after premature burial. there's gum recession amd photosensitivity, like me.. all of these elements combined could shed a light on the origins of the mythos.

I have to agree that it's just a skin disorder in certain people. I never heard of an albino drinkin blood

Well in reading up on the similarities of vampires and Albino's they are very different sure rumors have spread about albino's that had people skeptical on the idea and for a time they were actually convinced especially the local kids but again it's just a story!

The idea seems silly
Reasons why:

Albino's have
-pale skin
-red eyes
-really really blond hair
sometimes orange like
pigment will show instead of blond!

but No albino that i know about has ever
-claimed to be a vampire!
-nor have they been known to drink blood
-and they are human!
-nor have i read any accounts of them having supernatural abilities
But... this is just what i've read! and what i havn't seen but lookied for!

Not saying it couldn't be
again no evidence to prove it is
yet no evidence ot prove that it isn't TRUE!

guess i'm just talking from personal experinces and what i've read and heard about!

Not necessarily a modern version of a vampire. But the idea of people that are Albino being the cause of myths of vampire sounds reasonable. Albinos do have similar traits to the fabled vampire. But Albinos can go out in the sun safely. It all depends on the degree of the disease. I personally know an Albino and he has no problem with the sun, he just doesn't gain any pigment. As for the idea of those that weren't healthy in that time period, they were mainly rounded up and kept together in quarantine houses and such. But those not caught did sneak around. You've given a very good point and shed a different light on the idea of this.

I didn`t heard of an albino being confounded in the middle ages or ancient time with a vampire.

The part with photosensibility is a modern invention about the vampire characters in literature and folklore.

In Malleus Malleficarum (the main book used by Inquisition to identify the witches) they are no references about any albino witches (in fact about no albino at all).
No albino either in the romanian myths about the living or dead strigoi (vampires).
Not a reference in Sumerianand Egyptian myths too. At least I didn`t heard about one.Sorry.
I guess we should search more sources about that.
Interesting thread!

I can understand "why" one would think that there is some kind of association with albino and the vampires.. but I really don't think that there is anyway that this could the the "cause" of the thoughts for the vampires of today or the earlier vampires. It is just a skin abnormality and does not have to be associated with vampirism.

I think that albino are the source of some vampire tales. But so many stories are so different that you can't blame all the myths on them.

I know what albino is. Just to restate the question.

Do you think that albinos from the past could have contributed to the vampire myths? Or do you feel that they are the modern day vampire?

Back when if someone was a little too strange for their own good they could be called a witch and killed or exiled.
If someone looked a little too different they'd probably be called a monster or demon. Whether they were called vampire -- well the possibility exists.

1. Do you think that albinos from the past could have contributed to the vampire myths?

1. There is no proof for albinos from the past, unless they traveld back to the future.



2. Or do you feel that they are the modern day vampire?

2. I feel this part of the question is silly.

A wewy sweet link, with general info, and a yummy spiritual blue background.

http://www.compusmart.ab.ca/kbush/albino.htm


....

I don't think they fit the definition of a vampire. They may have played a part into it but old legends and myths came from things people didn't understand. Dinosaur bones played into the legends of dragons, elephant skulls are believed to have played a part into the legend of the cyclops, albinos may have helped the vampire legends along in the same manner.

My answer to the question is that any who is deemed different can start a rumor. Also there are many different types of diseases that could have help to develop the myth. There is one also known as clinical vampirism or renfield syndrome.

Again i suppose it is Possible Some Albinos could be Vampires But These folks have only some of the qualities of a Vampire does have one or two traits Make them immediately a Vampire? No it doesnt But Like in so many things Not everything or Everyone has to have Every single Aspect to be considered what we think it or they are what we think they or it is ...

I believe that it could be very feasible for people in ancient times may have seen albino's as undead and therefore vampires.

I seem to think that albinos, unless they chose to of course, could of stayed well hidden in that time period.

Think about it. Damn near the only truly CLEAN people were royal or noble at the least. You don't really stand out much covered in shit, sweat, dirt, soot, and god knows what else. Hoods were the comman mans head covering.

Now, barring them being in an area they were well known, and putting really minimal effort in it, they should easily be able to remain incognito.

TINY

Which is also called

polymorphic light eurption.

not sure if that's how it's spelt though.

well albino could be start of vampire with pale skin ,no sun exposer.. but think this to.. with the white hair maybe they dyed it jjet black which is also know to be alot of vampire myth as to blend in more with other.. i dont know .. im sleep deprived right now... off to sleep i go nite nite

It is possible I suppose that albinos added some to the stories, but then again it is also possible that such things just came to be on their own. Added with time traits from albinos could have been seen as related to vampirism...but I don't really think they would be the cause of anything.

I can see the connection here but I really think its a stretch. I think the light skin and eye color is just a coincidence. Nothing more, nothing less.

Something that needs to be pointed out in this case. Not all albinos show all the "symptoms". Some have the extreme case of no pigment to skin, eye, hair or anything. Others to have hair pigment and eye pigment. And some may not have either but skin pigment. Albino-ism is something that cannot be dealt with in absolutes.

wow thats some long ramblings of info on this blog. deathslust i've always thought (to myself) that albinos were most likely the cause of part of the myths. if anything else they were accused of being vampires because of the way they looked.

well I can see why they or even others that can be mistaken for Vampiric traits Yet regardless people in all societies have those whom are ignorant to the facts os things there fore mistreat or shun those who they do not understand.

Like most everyone else, I can see how it could happen, but I think people more than likely feared albinos back then, but not necessarily as vampires.

I'm sure at least one person back then made that assumption though.....

However, the communities were smaller back then, and when the child was born, it would have spread quickly that there was a different looking child. With all of the vampire myths, there isn't one that a vampire is born living of a living mother....so, those that knew the child from birth probably wouldn't make that assumption.

However, any babies born with albino traits, could have possibly been shunned or even killed if the people thought that it was something so bad or if they thought the child was a monster.

I believe that people are scared of Albino people because they are different and they tend to connect things with them such as vampirism to make them even scarier.

LadyKrystalynDarkstar, that makes a LOT of sense......people have a tendency to make scary things even scarier....probably to make others scared as well and to not make themselves look like fools....

Well there has never been any mention in any stories I ever heard about vampires and recognised Albino traites.
People tend to make things worst then they actually are when they do not understand them.