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The article is given to considering semantics and recurrence of “Legendary creatures” names of the Germanic root within the English dialect. The creator looks at semantic implications of three lexemes of Germanic beginning designating legendary animals, analyzes standardizing recurrence of these lexemes in four corpuses, five sort sub-corpuses of the English dialect. The semantic implications of lexemes are distinguished; the lexemes are positioned agreeing to polysemy-monosemy feature and the recurrence within the present day English dialect. The paper considers the conceivable interrelations between the semantic, recurrence

BACKGROUND: A considerable amount of research has been put into the explanation of the origin of the vampire myth by focussing on possible symptoms of the vampire; however, very little attention has been given to the victims.AIMS: To elucidate whether the myth of vampire victims follows the course of disease of acute leukaemia.METHOD: We studied three classical vampire novels published 1819-1897, focusing on 8 victims and their symptoms. The novels were chosen based on their iconic status in classic vampire literature, which defined the vampire genre and the symptoms of the victims for many years. The symptoms and course of disease following vampire attacks described in these novels were then compared with symptoms commonly seen in untreated acute leukaemia and other contemporary disorders.RESULTS: The earliest novel (1819) did not provide a sufficient description of any symptoms in detail; however, the later novels (1872 and 1897) both provided elaborate portrayals of symptoms and course of the disease. The patients studied were all factitious-explaining the variation in symptoms; however, they share common features. One case, a young woman named Lucy Westenra, described by Bram Stoker, 1897, mirrors a textbook example of an acute leukaemia patient-despite being described before the time of common acknowledgment of the diagnosis.CONCLUSION: Victims in the gothic vampire novels from the nineteenth century could very likely be inspired by real-life acute leukaemia patients.

The years 2020–2021 have bordered on apocalyptic — environmentally, politically and medically. At such times, the world is at a heightened risk of a “vampiregeddon”, with recent attacks reported both in high1,2 and low income countries.3 Apart from the direct impact on victims, attacks can have a flow‐on effect on health systems and economic productivity; for example, with reductions in voluntary blood donations and reduced tourism.3 To minimise the public health impact of attacks, we believe it is timely to review the available interventions to deter vampires. In this article, we focus on the efficacy of one traditional preventive intervention: garlic.

BackgroundThe uterus is the location where multiple events occur that are required for the start of new life in mammals. The adult uterus contains endometrial or uterine glands that are essential for female fertility. In the mouse, uterine glands are located in the lateral and anti-mesometrial regions of the uterine horn. Previous 3D-imaging of the adult uterus, its glands, and implanting embryos has been performed by multiple groups, using fluorescent microscopy. Adenogenesis, the formation of uterine glands, initiates after birth. Recently, we created a 3D-staging system of mouse uterine gland development at postnatal time points, using light sheet fluorescent microscopy. Here, using a similar approach, we examine the morphological changes in the epithelium of the perinatal mouse uterus.ResultsThe uterine epithelium exhibits mesometrial-antimesometrial (dorsoventral) patterning as early as three days after birth (P3), marked by the presence of the mesometrially-positioned developing uterine rail. Uterine gland buds are present beginning at P4. Novel morphological epithelial structures, including a ventral ridge and uterine segments were identified.ConclusionsThe perinatal mouse uterine luminal epithelium develops mesometrial-antimesometrial (dorsal-ventral) morphologies at 3-4 days post-partum. Between 5-6 days post-partum uterine epithelial folds form, defining alternating left-right segments.Bullet pointsMorphological patterning events in the perinatal uterine epithelium are not well described.Light sheet microscopy was used to generate volumetric reconstructions of the perinatal mouse uterine epithelium.At postnatal day 3 (P3), the uterine epithelium shows the first signs of dorsoventral pattern, with the presence of the forming mesometrially-positioned uterine rail.The first morphological indication of uterine adenogenesis begins at P4.Novel morphological structures were identified from volumetric reconstructions, including the presence of a ventral ridge (another sign of dorsoventral pattern) and uterine segmentation.

Sardinian contemporary literature and films have recently recovered an extensive heritage of folk myths and legends taken from the oral tradition. Legendary figures, such as accabadoras (female figure who was enabled with the task of easing the sufferings of the dying people), and fantasy creatures, such as cogas, surbiles (‘vampire witches’), janas (‘fairies, pixies’), and panas (‘the ghosts of women who died in childbirth’) are being revived by writers and film directors with the purpose to bring their memory back to life and share it with a wide audience of readers and spectators. The analysis of imaginary and legendary creatures in Sardinian contemporary literature cannot overlook orality and its central role in shaping popular imagination over the centuries. Writing has replaced orality, whilst mass media and digital media are getting the upper hand over storytelling as a practice of community and family aggregation, meant to mark the long working hours and scare the children, amongst the most common functions of Sardinian oral storytelling. The literary corpus includes fairy tales, novels, tales and legends dealing with the Sardinian oral tradition, whilst on the cinematic side I will examine short films, feature films and documentaries made in Sardinia over the last fifteen years.

[No abstract available]

Background Historically, aquatic environments are linked to the worldview of many local people, where there is an interconnection between the natural world, the supernatural, and the social organization. In this study, we provided a discussion on how the supernatural beings that inhabit the freshwater systems interact with artisanal fishers and fishing resources in the riverine community of Parnaíba River middle course, in Mid North of Northeast Brazil. We also provided the implications of these interactions on the fisher’s behaviors and how the acculturation process (e.g., introduction of new religions) can affect the fishers’ worldview. Method The selection of participants was done through intentional sampling. The content qualitative analysis was carried out to interpret the data from semi-structured interviews with 29 artisanal fishers. Results The mythical representations that inhabit the aquatic environments in the surveyed area were as follows: Mãe d’ água, Cabeça de cuia, Muleque d’água, Visage, Piratinga, Sucuiuiu, and Luz e Arco-íris. These beings have distinctions regarding the form and attributions and can be associated with seasonality (temporal markers) and specific habitats (spatial markers). The respect and fear feeling of the mythical beings were striking among the fishers interviewed. For instance, we have record offering practices in order to obtain protection and success during the fisheries. These practices suggest that there may be local conservationist habits in fisheries management. However, the advancement of urbanization and the introduction of new religions that deny the existence of mythical entities are factors that can generate the acculturation process among the fishers. Conclusions It is therefore necessary to carry out more studies in the surveyed area in order to evaluate the existence of possible patterns in the relationship between fisher and mythical beings. This information could confirm the role of mythical beings as environmental regulators. Consequently, it could be considered in the conservationist policies of fishery resources, reinforcing the importance of local knowledge and cultural factors for fishing management approaches.

In 1990 in Griswold, Connecticut, archaeologists excavated a burial found in a &ldquo, skull and crossbones&rdquo, orientation. The lid of the 19th century coffin had brass tacks that spelled &ldquo, JB55&rdquo, the initials of the person lying there and age at death. JB55 had evidence of chronic pulmonary infection, perhaps tuberculosis. It is possible that JB55 was deemed a vampire due to his disease, and therefore had to be &ldquo, killed&rdquo, by mutilating his corpse. In an attempt to reveal the identity of JB55, DNA testing was performed. Ancestry informative single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) analysis using the Precision ID Ancestry Panel indicated European ancestry. A full Y-chromosomal short tandem repeat (Y-STR) profile was obtained, belonging to haplogroup R1b. When the Y-STR profile was searched in the publicly accessible FamilyTreeDNA R1b Project website, the two closest matches had the surname &ldquo, Barber&rdquo, A search of historical records led to a death notice mentioning John Barber, whose son Nathan Barber was buried in Griswold in 1826. The description of Nathan Barber closely fits the burial of &ldquo, NB13,&rdquo, found near JB55. By applying modern forensic DNA tools to a historical mystery, the identity of JB55 as John Barber, the 19th century Connecticut vampire, has been revealed.

Considering the changes in the cultural consciousness of Lithuanian rural and small town residents, intended to carry out a systematic study of the concept of mythological creatures. The article analyzes the field study collected information characterizing the twenty-first century town of Vidukle and surrounding villages in the situation. Formed a systematic questionnaire, taking into account aspects such as functionality, appearance, living space, the relationship with the man, described the ten most popular of the Baltic mythological and legendary creatures. The study collected information is compared with the sixteenth-eighteenth and nineteenth century’s written sources of information, Lithuanian folk legends and mythologists works to identify the essential differences between concept of mythological creatures in the earlier period and the twenty-first century. Keywords: mythological creatures, Samogitia, XIX century society, the concept of mythological beings, Vidukle. Summary Religion, belief, worldview are the peaks of spiritual life. However, this is not only different gods with many different functions, not only strange or sometimes very simple rituals that helps us to feel secure in this world. Religion is the system, with its laws and elements which have clear associations with different communities. With those aspects we face every day. However, it would be wrong to say, that no changes happened in religious systems and peoples worldviews since the beginning of ages. We clearly can see how every religion and culture changes by the influence of political, ideological, social and environmental changes. In this case no difference and Baltic region. Since V century A.D. to the XV century balts formed their lifestyle based on their own local religion tradition, which were big contrast to Western Europe, which lived by the Christian mentality. Even when Lithuanian–Poland ruler Jogaila started christianize Lithuanians in year 1385, many of those differences still existed. When official religion were abolished in the region, because of weak spread of Christianity and remains of old beliefs, in the period of XVI–XVIII centuries born new regional beliefs based on agricultural lifestyle and in the XIX century – many of mythical tails. Since that time, many of those beliefs, because of reformation movement and activity of Jesuitical order lost their meaning in people understanding of the world. However, many of goddess, god, and mythical tale creatures are still known to the people even if we talk about XXI century society, so understand and characterize them are very important. The main goal in this research, is to collect information from Vidukle‘s community people what they know about mythical creatures and pagan gods, how they characterizes them and compare that with historical sources information from XVI–XVIII and XIX centuries. With help of this information, we are able to identify main changes and inaccuracies in mythical beings characteristic, also determine what are the main reasons for those changes. As a result, we clearly can single out different groups of mythical beings based at the level of characteristic changes and inaccuracies. That shows us, that majority of beings are losing their real characteristic (in physical looks and functions). Two main reasons which lead to this situation is too big influence from television and popular culture and too small attention from school, teaching children traditional culture and local history. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.15823/istorija.2016.06

In 2009, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) banned characterising flavours for cigarettes with the exception of menthol and tobacco.1 New regulations, released in May 2016, deemed electronic cigarettes to be tobacco products under the FDA's regulatory authority.2 Nicotine-containing liquid (e-juice) used in e-cigarettes is marketed in thousands of flavours. While the initial set of FDA rules did not address e-juice flavours, future FDA action may do so. The agency's determination on whether or not e-cigarettes should be subject to flavour regulations similar to those already in place for traditional combustible cigarettes will depend on evidence of differential appeal of these products to youth. Unicorns are mythological creatures which permeate popular culture, especially children's literature (eg, The Princess and the Unicorn), television (eg, My Little Pony) and games (eg, Rainbow Unicorn).3 A search for ‘unicorn children's’ in the Amazon.com book section returned 5223 items (15 May 2016). The number one item is titled: ‘Sparkly the Unicorn: Cute Bedtime Story for Kids with a Lesson About Caring and Love’. The purpose of this article is to describe unicorn-themed flavoured e-juice and their associated advertising messaging. In analysing over 12 000 e-cigarette advertisements, we have encountered a remarkable assortment of unicorn-themed e-juice products4 ,5 (table 1). Most illustrations of unicorns show them as happy, playful and cuddly creatures. Unicorn e-juice products most often are named after the creature's supposed secretions and excretions: milk, breath, tears, blood, puke, vomit, poop, piss, spew and jizz \[sic\] (figures 1⇓⇓–4). In advertisements, the e-juice emanates from the appropriate bodily orifice of the unicorn in the form of an …

Speculative fiction examines the leading edge of science and can be used to introduce ideas into the classroom. For example, most students are already familiar with the fictional infectious diseases responsible for vampire and zombie outbreaks. The disease dynamics of these imaginary ailments follow the same rules we see for real diseases and can be used to remind students that they already understand the basic rules of disease ecology and immunology. By engaging writers of this sort of fiction in an effort to solve problems in immunology we may be able to perform a directed evolution experiment where we follow the evolution of plots rather than genetic traits.

Fantastic beasts are not only found in the imaginary worlds of authors like J.K. Rowling. The oceans are full of them. Michael Gross rounds up some unusual suspects.

One of the most evocative uses of the metaphor of a ghost in psychoanalytic writing was crafted by Hans Loewald in "On the Therapeutic Action of Psycho-Analysis" (1960). In this seminal work, Loewald likened the process of psychoanalytic change to that of transforming psychic ghosts into ancestors. In the present paper, the author supplements the metaphor of ghosts that haunt with the metaphor of vampires that menace, and links these two alien experiences to two psychological processes: repression and dissociation. Descriptions of ghosts and vampires in folklore, and the ways they are experienced in analytic treatment, are followed by an explication of the enacted dimension of analytic process-the arena of treatment in which all demons are inevitably revivified, "recognized," and ultimately laid to rest. The paper includes a clinical illustration of a dissociated vampire: a Holocaust trauma transmitted across three generations of survivors.

Monday February 12, 1883, Vendramin-Calergi Palace, Venice:In an apartment rented by Duke della Grazia, the fourth of that line,1 1 Maria Adinolfo Leopoldo Antonio Ettore (1840–1911), fourth Duke d...

In two experiments (N = 64), we told 6- to 7-year-olds about improbable or impossible outcomes (Experiment 1) and about impossible outcomes concerning ordinary or magical agents (Experiment 2). In both experiments, children claimed that the outcomes were impossible and could not happen, but nonetheless generated realistic and natural explanations for the outcomes. These findings show that 6- to 7-year-olds are strongly inclined to provide natural explanations. The findings are also informative about children's judgments about whether outcomes are possible, and further suggest that asymmetries between children's predictions and explanations may stem from differences in how these 2 forms of reasoning are constrained by possibility. (PsycINFO Database Record

Deviant burials can reveal important information about both social and individual identity, particularly when the mortuary record is supplemented by an examination of skeletal remains. At the postmedieval (17th to 18th c. AD) cemetery of Drawsko (Site 1), Poland, six individuals (of n = 285) received deviant, anti-vampiristic mortuary treatment. A previous study using radiogenic strontium isotope ratios ( x¯= 0.7112 ± 0.0006, 1σ, n = 60) found that these "vampires" were in fact locals, not migrants to the region targeted for deviant burial due to their status as immigrant outsiders. However, considerable geologic overlap in strontium isotope ratios across the North European Plain may have masked the identification of at least some nonlocal individuals. This study further contextualizes strontium isotope ratios using additional biogeochemical data to test the hypothesis that additional nonlocals were present in the Drawsko cemetery.Stable oxygen and carbon isotopes from the dental enamel of 58 individuals interred in both normative and atypical burials at Drawsko were analyzed.Both δThose interred as vampires appear local to the region and thus likely underwent deviant funerary treatment due to some other social stigma not apparent from the skeleton.

Vampirism has been a component of Central European and Balkan folklore since the Middle Ages and was often believed to be responsible for the transmission of serious infectious diseases such as plague and tuberculosis/consumption. Vampirism was believed to be spread within the same family or village and if the rite of the so-called second burial after death was not performed. The practice of "second burial" entailed exhumation of the body and the removal of the shroud from the mouth of the corpse, and a search for evidence if the corpse had chewed the cloth. If the shroud was chewed, a handful of earth or a brick was put into the body's mouth so that the vampire could no longer harm others. In some cases, the corpse was decapitated and an awl, made of ash, was thrust into its chest. Furthermore, the limbs were nailed down to prevent its movements. Remarkably, these beliefs were not restricted to the popular classes, but were also debated by theologians, political scientists at the height of the eighteenth century (Enlightenment). In the Habsburg Empire, this question attained such important political, social as well as health connotations as to force the Empress Maria Theresa to entrust an ad hoc study to her personal physician Gerard van Swieten with a view to determining what was true about the apparitions of vampires that occurred throughout central Europe and in the Balkans. The result of this investigation led to a ban on the "second burial" rites. Despite this prohibition, the practice of necrophilia on the bodies of suspected people continued, and both a cultured and popular literature on vampirism continued to flourish well into the nineteenth century.

This article concerns the mythical dimension of vampires. Vampires have made an impressive comeback through literature (Anne Rice), cinema (Dracula, Interview With the Vampire, Blade, Vampires, Queen of the Damned, Underworld, Twilight…), role-playing games (Vampire: The Masquerade), music and fashion (the gothic style). The authors's works on the evolution of family models help understanding this contemporary fascination towards vampires. It is surprising to see how much the features lent to these legendary creatures echo the contemporary psychopathological characteristics that the authors have already described and related to the evolution of society as well as of family values: individualism and “auto-reference”, hedonism and symmetrical relations, narcissistic fragility, difficult relations with others, phantasms of all-power and “auto-begetting”, etc. According to the authors, the vampire has become a myth constituting a reservoir of symbolic representations and allowing teenagers to better elaborate their maturing stages. Contemporary society is not capable of proposing effective rites of passages on the symbolic plane anymore and teenagers have to find their own rites and references. The vampire then takes all its importance as it has several characteristics of adolescence: a body which changes and which it is necessary to learn how to master, a new rapport with the others, the dangers of relations, the impression of immortality, etc.). Narcissistic perversion, the clinical entity defined by Racamier, is also the object of a parallel with the vampire, showing the symbolic relevance of this myth both on the social and cultural planes, but also on the psychological and psychiatric ones.

The biological status of the so-called 'Upland seal' has remained contentious ever since historical records described a distinct seal from the uplands of New Zealand's (NZ) remote sub-Antarctic islands. Subsequent genetic surveys of the NZ fur seal (Arctocephalus forsteri) detected two highly-divergent mtDNA clades, hypothesized to represent a post-sealing hybrid swarm between 'mainland' (Australia-NZ; A. forsteri) and sub-Antarctic (putative 'Upland'; A. snaresensis) lineages. We present ancient-DNA analyses of prehistoric mainland NZ and sub-Antarctic fur seals, revealing that both of these genetic lineages were already widely distributed across the region at the time of human arrival. These findings indicate that anthropogenic factors did not contribute to the admixture of these lineages, and cast doubt on the validity of the Upland seal. Human-mediated impacts on Arctocephalus genetic diversity are instead highlighted by a dramatic temporal haplotype frequency-shift due to genetic drift in heavily bottlenecked populations following the cessation of industrial-scale harvesting. These extinction-recolonisation dynamics add to a growing picture of human-mediated change in NZ's coastal and marine ecosystems.

A new genus and associated species of false vampire, family Megadermatidae, are described based on three specimens from Bala Forest, Narathiwat Province, peninsular Thailand. The new taxon is characterised by a unique combination of distinctive dental, cranial, and external characters, some of which are shared with exclusively African genera and some with Asian genera. These characters are comparable to, or exceed in number, those differentiating currently recognised genera in the family Megadermatidae. They include the absence of a first upper premolar; greatly enlarged upper canine without an anterolingual cingular cusp but with a robust posterolingual cusp; unmodified upper first molar with the preparacrista subequal in length to the postmetacrista, the metastyle not reduced and situated labially; robust lower canine without an anterolingual cusp; the first lower premolar enlarged, equal to or larger than the second lower premolar. In the skull, there is a pronounced rostral depression but no well developed frontal shield with preorbital and/or postorbital processes; the coronoid process is greatly enlarged in each half mandible. Externally, the body size is relatively large and the posterior noseleaf is rounded. The baculum has a robust shaft and two short prongs-the bacula of all five other species of megadermatid are illustrated for the first time; extraordinarily, those of Macroderma gigas and Megaderma lyra comprise two separate bones. DNA barcoding indicate a genetic divergence of about 20 percent (sequence divergence in the mitochondrial gene CO1) between the new genus and species of Megaderma and Cardioderma. Currently, despite numerous bat surveys in peninsular Thailand, the new genus is only known from Bala Forest. The small area of this forest and the very low capture rate suggest that the new species may be extremely rare. Its natural history is little known, although its robust dental and cranial features when coupled with chance observations of its feeding behaviour, suggest it may specialise in eating large beetles. Its conservation status is considered to be at risk owing to the rapid loss of forest habitat in much of the Thai-Malay peninsula.

Most images of yetis in Western popular culture and scholarly literature portray them as secular, predatory monsters. These representations overlook important religious dimensions of yetis that are hidden in the current literature so I take a new look at yetis in Tibetan religions in order to clarify our understanding of these legendary creatures. Following a phenomenological approach that sets aside the issue of the ontological existence of yetis, I examine texts, art, ritual, and folklore in order to propose four yeti personal ideal types: the Buddhist practitioner, the human religious ally, the friendly yeti, and the mountain deity yeti. These ideal types enhance earlier scholarship by demonstrating that yetis may appear in friendly as well as dangerous guises, may play religious roles even when they are not venerated, and may embody numinosity even when they are most fearsome.

In 1885, the Western world was introduced to Romanian folklore with EmilyGerard’s bookTransylvanianSuperstitions. Shedescribes agroup of peoplewho, for hundreds of years, blended Christian traditionswith folk tales, which led them to believe in a demonic creature who would drinkhumanblood.Accordingtotheir superstitions, theonlywaytocombat thismonster was by driving a stake through its corpse or by removing its head and stuffing itsmouthwith garlic. Although countless artistic endeavors haveportrayed vampires in the years sinceGerard’swork published, the most iconic of them is Count Dracula, who first appeared inBramStoker’sdefiningnovel in 1897. InDracula,apersonwho appears pale and cold, is avoidant of bright lights, and has prominent teethwouldcarry thepathognomonic features toqualify for avampire. Althoughthisevil creature ismerelyacharactercreatedbyhumanminds, one cannot help but recognize the striking resemblance certain physical features bear to people with porphyria cutanea tarda (PCT). For example, a vampire “sleeps when others wake, that he may be awakewhilst theysleep!”Similarly,patientswithPCTmayprefer tocome out at night, because their skin blisters in the sun. Although there are numerous typesofporphyrias, PCT is themost commonof theporphyrias with cutaneous manifestations. Moreover, the skin around the patient’smouthmight retract, as if tightening from sun damage. This skin retraction may consequently reveal the teeth and cause them to appear more prominent. Furthermore, because these patients avoid the sun, they may develop a pale skin complexion, also causing them to fit the physical description of a vampire. It is ironic,however,thatvampireswerethoughttopreyonhumansand survive by drinking their blood, because repeated phlebotomy is amodernantidote forPCT.Nevertheless, onecannothelpbutwonder if these legendswerebornfromattemptsofpeople inthepasttocopewiththedisfigurement they encounteredonmeetingmedieval patientswith PCT.

Nell'Occidente medievale i mostri sono ovunque: nei bestiari, nella letteratura di viaggio, nelle enciclopedie, nei romanzi, ma anche nei sermoni recitati in Chiesa. I mostri sono diffusissimi nell'arte, in particolare nel periodo romanico e gotico nella scultura religiosa e nella miniatura. I mostri nel Medioevo comprendono le razze umane mostruose, come cinocefali e acefali, gli animali fantastici come grifone, basilisco, unicorno e gli ibridi, ma c'erano anche ibridi vegetali, come l'anatra vegetale o l'agnello vegetale. Il grande successo dei mostri durante il Medioevo non è dovuto a semplice ignoranza o a ingenuità, perché le radici dei mostri sono molto profonde e varie: i mostri medievali sono il frutto dell'eredità greco-romana e degli apporti del Medio e dell'Estremo Oriente, delle tradizioni orali, del Cristianesimo, ma anche di errori di copiatura e di errori di percezione. In the Middle Ages, monsters are everywhere: in bestiaries, in travel literature, in encyclopedias, in novels, but also in sermons performed in the Church. Monsters are widespread in art, particularly in the Romanesque and Gothic periods in religious sculpture and miniature. Monsters in the Middle Ages include monstrous human breeds, such as chinocephalous and acephalous, fantastic animals such as griffon, basilisk, unicorn and hybrids, but there were also plant hybrids such as vegetable duck or vegetable lamb. The great success of monsters during the Middle Ages is not due to ignorance or ingenuity, because the roots of monsters are very deep and varied: medieval monsters are the result of the Greek-Roman heritage and the contributions of the Middle and Far East, of oral traditions, of Christianity, but also of mistakes in copying and errors of perception.