Vampires, bloodbaths, and historical smear campaigns: why the legends you know are dead wrong.
Think you know the story of Elizabeth Báthory, the \"Blood Countess\" who bathed in the blood of virgins to stay forever young? Think again. In this episode of History Rage, host Paul Bavill sits down with former professor and author Shelley Puhak to tear down four centuries of myth and reveal the real woman behind the monster.
The canonical legend has cemented Báthory as the world's most prolific female serial killer, a creature walled up in a tower after being caught red-handed. But the reality has nothing to do with horror tropes and everything to do with early modern witch trials, immense wealth, and a cutthroat political turf war against the Habsburg Empire.
Shelley exposes how a powerful, literate, and politically inconvenient widow was systematically dismantled by ambitious, paranoid men who used the era's raging satanic panics to launch a massive land grab. If you love true history, political intrigue, and watching legendary myths get turned to ash, this rage is exactly what you need.
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