The night of that memorable day was spent in festivities. Bonfires were lit, bunting adorned the small upper-floor openings of the tall wood-framed houses of the merchants along the narrow cobblestoned streets and covered bridges along the Pegnitz River, which winds its way tortuously through the city. There were fairs, public dancing, open-air plays with mimes and jugglers, hundreds of street performers. Dense crowds feasted in the public square facing the Gothic church of St. Sebald at the bottom of the Kaiserburg (the castle hill). It seemed as if the gaudily attired merchants — and even the populace at large in this imperial capital of all the Germanies — understood the importance of this feast day, even though they were only dimly aware of its true significance. The presence of the Wallachian boyars certainly did not pass unnoticed: the alien mode of dress, their rich furs and Byzantine garb, was stared at as an object of curiosity, raising quite a few hopes among the merchants who sought new avenues for trade with the German townships of Transylvania.
Additional evening festivities were witnessed only in seclusion by the mighty. With more bonfires lit, a mock tourney was organized late at night near the Tiergarten Gate on the outskirts of town in the presence of the emperor and the whole court. The most skilled knights of the empire, each bearing his family banner, were to display their prowess and equestrian style under their heavy armor. Among them was Vlad, riding an Arabian stallion, enrobed in his Dragon cape and also proudly exhibiting the Wallachian eagle, the emblem of his newly acquired throne. Following several sallies, lance in hand, Dracul displayed his unusual skills by unhorsing his well-armored opponent. An unnamed lady admirer watching from the imperial tribune hurled at the Romanian prince's feet a golden buckle marked with uncial characters. He cherished this trophy to the end of his life and bequeathed it to his son Dracula shortly before his death. In 1931 this trophy was identified among a few surviving objects found when Dracula's tomb was opened by two well-known archaeologists, Dinu Rosetti and the co-author's uncle George Florescu, who were able to trace the inscription to that memorable event. The buckle still bore the name of the well-known Nuremberg craftsman who had designed it.
CHAPTER 2
The Education of a Prince 1431–1448
VLAD'S dreams of swiftly regaining the Wallachian throne were not immediately realized. The emperor Sigismund, as was his wont, practiced the politics of expediency and decided that despite the Dragon ceremonies, it was in his interest to continue to recognize Vlad's half-brother Alexandru Aldea, because the latter supported the prince of Moldavia, Alexandru the Good, an opponent of King Ladislas II Jagiello, who, in spite of his Dragon Order brotherhood was, as king of Poland, a rival of the emperor. Vlad's consolation was an appointment as military governor of Transylvania with the task of “watching the border area,” since Aldea allowed his Wallachian territory to be used by the Turks as a base for inroads into Transylvania. The new governor decided in the spring of 1431 to establish his headquarters in the fortress of Sighioara because of its central strategic location. The hillside fortress, with unusually thick defensive walls of stone and brick, three thousand feet long, had recently been rebuilt to withstand the most powerful artillery the Turks could muster. In addition, the fourteen battlement-capped donjons (massive inner towers), each named for the guild that bore its cost — the tailors, jewelers, furriers, butchers, goldsmiths, blacksmiths, barbers, ropemakers — made the fortress virtually impregnable. The old city is still dominated by the quaint Councilmen's Tower, where the local prison used to be located. To this day, both the chimes striking the hours of the day and the miniature figurines that strut out of their porticoes every hour are a tribute to the ingenuity of the Swiss clockmakers who originally designed it.
Given his new mission of protecting Catholicism, Vlad was well served in terms of the number of religious orders that had established houses in this partially German city: the Benedictines, Cistercians, Premonstratensians, Franciscans, and Dominicans. (Even today, as soon as the visitor emerges on the main square beyond the Councilmen's Tower, he can admire the elegant Renaissance lines of the principal Dominican monastery.) Among these church and monastic foundations, elaborate three-story homes, built of masonry and stone in a variety of gaudy colors, reflected the presence of a prosperous German mercantile community, which traded with Nuremberg and other western German cities. Like other Transylvanian cities such as Braov and Sibiu, Sighioara served as an entrepôt for goods moving from the German west to the Balkans and Constantinople and the Black Sea. In addition, it served western merchants taking the northeastern route to Poland and the Baltic Sea.
The house where Vlad took up his headquarters, in the main square near the Councilmen's Tower, was essentially not very different from the wealthy merchants' homes surrounding it. Today it is distinguished from similar neighboring houses only by a small plaque that indicates that Vlad Dracul lived there from 1431 to 1435. It is a massive three-story stone construction of dark yellowish hue, with a tiled roof and small window openings for defensive purposes, such as were customary in the Middle Ages, when street brawls were frequent. It probably dates back to the beginning of the fifteenth century. The three entrances are located on the western side of the building — one leading to the ground floor, presumably the headquarters of a small garrison assigned to Vlad's person, and the other two emerging via a narrow stairway at the upper levels, where Dracul held his mini-court.
The house was restored in 1976 on the occasion of the five hundredth anniversary of Dracula's death. In pulling down a partition, workers uncovered a fascinating mural, depicting three men and a woman, painted in neo-Renaissance style. The central figure was that of a somewhat rotund man with a double chin, long well-waxed mustaches, an olive complexion, oval-shaped eyes, arched eyebrows, and a finely chiseled nose. He wore a white Oriental turban and a loosely fitting gown of central European style, with wide sleeves fastened by a multitude of cruciform clasps. Significantly, he carried in his left hand a staff of office such as Vlad Dracul might have carried as governor, while his right clasped a golden cup, offered by a woman — possibly a reference to Dracul's unidentified lady admirer from Nuremberg, or else simply a boyar lady of his court. The uncanny similarity of the oval almond-colored eyes to those in the famous portrait we possess of Dracul's son Dracula suggests that the remains of that mural (now exhibited in the local-history museum of Sighioara) may well represent the only surviving portrait of Dracul, even though it would have to have been painted posthumously from an original that no longer exists.
In the early history of Romania, chroniclers rarely mentioned women — partly because princes shared the “harem philosophy” of the Ottomans and made little distinction between concubines and legitimate wives. Insofar as the heir to the throne was concerned, the only thing that really mattered was, to use a local expression, to be “of the male royal bone.” This fact explains the debates over who the real mother of Dracula was. Most historians believe that Dracul married Princess Cneajna, the eldest daughter of Alexandru the Good, Prince of Moldavia (1400–1431), a member of the Muatin family. She was the sister of two succeeding Moldavian rulers, the princes Ilia and Bogdan II, father of the illustrious Stephen the Great. The marriage probably took place in 1425 after Vlad's return from Constantinople. Such a dynastic alliance with the sister Romanian principality made good sense, particularly in view of the Muatins' close relations with the Polish king, an invaluable ally on the road to Vlad's ascension to the throne. This marriage bond also provides an explanation for the amity existing from this time onward between some members of the Moldavian and Wallachian ruling families. Both Prince Ilia and Prince Bogdan II were, after all, Dracul's brothers-in-law. Stephen the Great was Dracula's cousin, a relationship that forms an important part of our story.
The eldest legitimate son of Dracul was Prince Mircea, born in 1428; the second was Vlad Dracula, born in Sighioara, under the sign of Sagittarius, in November or, more likely, December 1431. By far the most beautiful child of Dracul's was Radu, four
years younger than Dracula, who was born in 1435.
In addition to his wife, Vlad Dracul, like his predecessors, had a number of mistresses; one of these was a Wallachian boyar lady known simply as Cluna. She later took the veil and adopted the name of Mother Eupraxia when she became the abbess of a monastery. It was Cluna who mothered Vlad the Monk, one of Dracula's half-brothers and later a bitter foe, who eventually became prince of the land. There were undoubtedly other illegitimate offspring, including yet another Prince Mircea of whom little is known. (Mircea was evidently a favorite name in the family, because of the illustrious grandfather.)
The early, impressionable years of Dracula's childhood at the exiguous court of Sighioara were dominated by the women of the household, by lowly midwives, and by wet nurses. Princess Cneajna and the wives of a few exiled boyars were in charge of drilling into the minds of the young heirs the lesson that they were different from ordinary mortals and, depending upon fate, might someday be destined to hold an exalted station in life. As such, the heirs were the object of a great deal of adulation and love, the center of attention. Their rank also entailed that certain modes of behavior be instilled into them: how to dress correctly, mind basic manners, order about their child peers — lessons that were not soon forgotten in a very protocol-conscious society. The court ladies also taught the princes their native Romanian tongue (the language of command in the army).
From the tenderest age, a great deal of emphasis was placed on physical fitness — even at court, children were exposed to the elements on stormy days in true Spartan tradition; should they survive the chills and fevers of the accompanying colds, they were considered to have strong physical and moral character, essential traits of good warriors. For physical exercise, even a five-year-old tot had to be able to ride an unsaddled horse at a gallop to the local fountain or grazing field. Inevitably, since they lived in a trading center, the heirs were allowed to play truant with the sons of local merchants. There were, of course, the usual distractions that followed the feast days: puppet theaters, an old tradition of eastern Europe, with the manikins playing the roles of biblical or historical figures; ambulant artists, acrobats, minnesingers, and other street performers. In summer there were ball games, running and jumping contests, and games on quadrilateral swings made of red cloth and fastened in the form of a pyramid. In the winter they hunted eagles with slingshots, slid down the Sighioara slopes on primitive double-runner sleds, trapped hares, and used the bow and arrow to sharpen the acuity of their eyes, all in preparation for the serious training in the handling of more sophisticated weapons that was to follow at a more mature age.
We are ignorant of the religious affiliations of Dracula and his brothers, but since both their parents were Catholics, it is more than likely that they were initially brought up in the teachings of the western church. Mircea, born in a German land, was almost certainly baptized a Roman Catholic. It is conceivable that Dracula and Radu, who spent their early years on Romanian territory, where Orthodox churches were handy, may have been secretly baptized in the Romanian church, though perhaps for diplomatic reasons they attended mass at first in the chapel of the Dominican monastery in the vicinity of their Sighioara court. On the one hand, Dracul could hardly afford offending Emperor Sigismund, who had specifically requested that he support Catholic institutions in his country. On the other, he must have known that conversion to Orthodoxy was a necessity for a future prince, required by the fundamental laws of Wallachia.
There is an ominous sidelight that could easily have been dismissed as harmless child's curiosity, were it not for Vlad's awesome future reputation for impaling. Local tradition insists that the young boy showed, even at that early stage in life, a morbid curiosity in watching, from his first floor bedroom, criminals being led from the small jail in the Councilmen's Square to the Jewelers' Donjon, the usual place of execution by hanging.
The late medieval painters of the scions of the upper nobility and princely houses invariably depicted boys even as young as five or six as “little men” indistinguishable from their elders. In this respect, these painters showed remarkable acuity, since the children of fifteenth-century noblemen, even within the small confines of this Sighioara court, were much more mature than their tender age would imply. They would occasionally escape from the women's quarters and eavesdrop on the more sophisticated conversation of the adults, even though the young princes were not able to understand the complexity of conversations that centered on immediate political objectives. Dracul's most pressing need was to consolidate his power in Transylvania, by forming alliances with and gaining the military support of neighboring German cities such as Braov and Sibiu. “Know ye,” he wrote to the head of the city council of Braov, “that my Master the Emperor has entrusted me with the protection of this region, and pray do not without my consent make peace with my enemies in Wallachia.” Again he wrote to the Braovians: “I pray that like good brethren and friends you will follow me and give me your assistance.” In addition, Dracul sought volunteers for his army from the two duchies of Fgra and Amla, traditional fiefs of the Wallachian princes, which had been placed under his jurisdiction by the emperor. He also obtained the right to mint coins (many of which have survived to the present day) in Sighioara, bearing the effigy of the Dragon and the princely eagle of Wallachia, golden ducats that were legal tender all over Transylvania and Hungary and gradually replaced the currency that had been in circulation earlier. This was an enormous privilege, which contributed to Dracul's considerable personal fortune, money obviously needed not only for the luxuries entailed in court life but to raise armies and buy weapons with which to regain his throne.
Clearly Vlad's principal goal, from the very moment he set foot on Transylvanian soil, was to regain what he considered was his legitimate throne, promised to him by the emperor at Nuremberg and a reward implicit in his act of vassalage. Mainly preoccupied by the Hussite problem in Bohemia, in spite of frequent Turkish inroads across the border, Sigismund continued to support Alexandru Aldea. From Vlad's perspective at Sighioara, the emperor was certainly guilty of a breach of promise. It was only in 1434 that Sigismund, increasingly impatient with Aldea's closeness to the Turks, on the advice of Redvitz, the Grand Master of the Teutonic Order, instructed Dracul to buy from the Transylvanian townships the weaponry he needed and to gather an army composed of his boyar exiles, Romanians from the two duchies under his control, and whatever mercenaries he could afford. In buying weaponry, Dracul acknowledged the meaning and importance of the use of the cannon as a mobile offensive weapon. One of the cannons, engraved with the name of Master Leonardus, was so highly prized that Dracul gave this craftsman a bronze cup, still extant in the evangelical church at Sibiu.
Learning that his half-brother Alexandru Aldea lay on his deathbed, Dracul advanced toward Wallachia. In a number of skirmishes, he was able to repel the attack of various Turkish beys (leaders) on the Danube, who supported the dying cause of Aldea. Dracul and his army at last entered Tîrgovite, the princely capital, in December 1436. Thus, during the winter of 1436-1437, Dracul finally realized his dream, sanctioned by the emperor since 1431: he became de facto prince of Wallachia and took up residence at the palace. His Moldavian wife and his three sons — Mircea, Dracula, and Radu — later joined him.
For Vlad Dracula, life at his father's court marked an altogether new experience, very dissimilar from provincial existence in Sighioara, where he had been allowed at least sometimes to play truant. This new phase of his educational experience was to last six years. These years, even though he was only between the ages of five to eleven, seem to represent a formative stage in his upbringing. Both formal education and the accidents of politics were responsible for molding Dracula's complex personality. His apprenticeship for knighthood, patterned upon western precedent, began at Tîrgovite. He was taught swimming, fencing, jousting, archery, court etiquette, and the more refined aspects of horsemanship, in which he had been roughly initiated as a small boy and in which the young
prince excelled.
We know very little about the beginnings of his intellectual training. The first tutor engaged by his father was an elderly, highly educated boyar who had fought on the Christian side at the battle of Nicopolis. This man taught Dracula Italian and possibly a smattering of French and Hungarian, in addition to the rudiments of the humanities and world history. Monastic scribes also taught him the Cyrillic script and Old Church Slavonic, in use at the prince's chancellery, and Latin, the language of diplomatic correspondence. A new subject to which Dracula was almost certainly introduced and that was soon to be regularly taught to sons of princes was political science — in particular, the theory of the divine right of sovereigns and the politics of raison d' état. Both of these are reflected in the Teachings of Neagoe Basarab, political words of wisdom compiled in Wallachia between 1512 and 1521, after Dracula's time, but accurately reflecting the theory of government prevalent in fifteenth-century Wallachia. In essence these principles are not very different from the principles of Machiavelli's Prince, written in 1517. Some precepts in Machiavelli's text, such as “It is much better for you to be feared than to be loved,” accurately reflected Dracula's future political philosophy, probably because he was taught them at this stage.
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