August 4, 2025 • 53 mins
Elizabeth Bathory: The Blood Countess — Monster or Myth?
She bathed in blood to preserve her beauty... or did she?
In this chilling episode of Macabre: A Dark History Podcast, we journey deep into the shadowy halls of Castle Čachtice to uncover the truth behind Elizabeth Bathory — the woman dubbed "The Blood Countess" and "Countess Dracula."
Was she truly the most prolific female serial killer in history, torturing and murdering hundreds of young women in a sadistic quest for eternal youth? Or was she a powerful noblewoman caught in a web of political conspiracies and misogynistic rumors designed to strip her of power and wealth?
Join us as we sift through centuries-old testimonies, delve into the folklore that immortalized her, and confront the blood-soaked legends head-on. Is Elizabeth Bathory a monstrous murderer — or a misunderstood victim of history's darkest game of thrones?
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Don't ever laugh as a hearse goes by for you.
Maybe the next die. They wrap you up in a bloody
sheet then drop you 6 feet underneath.
They put you in a big black box and cover you up with dirt and
(00:22):
rocks. It all goes well for about a
week and then your coffin begins.
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That's Gothic with 2C's because they're all about thick thighs
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Shadows. That's Gothic threads.com.
Today on the Cobb, we're diving into the dungeons of the Castle
of a Blood Count test, looking past the folklore with the help
of historian Rachel Bledsall's groundbreaking research.
(01:27):
I will post a link to her thesisin the show notes.
What I'm primarily using for this episode.
Was Elizabeth Bathory A sadistickiller obsessed with youth?
Or was she simply a threat to the patriarchy, silenced by
those in power? I'll let you decide at the end
(01:47):
of the episode. For now, welcome to Macabre, a
dark history podcast. I'm Hallie.
I'm Blair. Let's first begin with the
common conspiracy theories. For hundreds of years, Elizabeth
Bathory has been viewed through the lens of a monster.
(02:07):
But in the 20th century, a new theory emerged that Elizabeth
Bathory was framed and that her story had been warped by time
and political agendas. Historian Rachel Bledsoe, whose
thesis I mentioned I used extensively for researching this
episode, coined a term for thosewho defend Bathory's innocence,
(02:29):
the enthusiasts. Let's begin by breaking down
their arguments. First, the political conspiracy
at the heart of this theory is King Matthias the Second of the
Habsburg Empire. Elizabeth Bathory was not just
rich, she was filthy rich. She came from one of the most
(02:52):
powerful families in Hungary, and her late husband, Florence
Nadasdi, was also quite wealthy.At one point, he had loaned a
massive amount of coin to the king to fund campaigns against
the Ottoman Turks, and Matthias couldn't repay his debt.
This theory claims that by convicting Bathory of the
(03:15):
horrific crimes, the king could seize her lands, wipe out his
debt, and silence a political threat in one fell swoop.
It's a brutal solution, but not unprecedented in 17th century
Europe, where property and poweroften changed hands by scandal
and execution. The second is the gender
(03:38):
conspiracy. This is more emotionally
charged. Bathory, after her husband's
death, was a single woman managing more than 20 estates.
If you can even fathom that, To give you an idea, it's crazy.
I'm like still working on that four O 1 Ki.
(03:58):
Was just going to say I was likeI can't manage 20 of anything
but. To give you an idea of her
wealth and power, it looked likethis after her marriage to
Ferentz. Their combined holdings included
at least 17 castles and fortresses, over 300 villages
(04:19):
and smaller estates. Holy shit.
Vast agricultural lands, forest and vineyards, numerous mills,
mines and livestock operations. She had a lot going on.
They had a lot going on. Yeah.
(04:41):
Not only that, but her husband was a famed military commander.
They called him the Black Knightof Hungary.
And his campaigns brought in additional money through a
plunger and royal rewards. After Frank's death, she managed
more than 20 major estates herself.
Some historians estimate her annual income would have rivaled
(05:04):
or exceeded that of many minor Princess or even small European
monarchies at the time. So she would have been pretty
powerful than a monetary sense, but in other ways too.
Oh yeah. She was also highly educated.
(05:25):
She was fluent in Latin, German and Greek.
She ran legal affairs. She issued commands.
She negotiated with nobles. She didn't just hold power, she
wielded it confidently. To a deeply patriarchal society,
this was dangerous. A woman with wealth, land and no
male guardian, That was a threatto the feudal structure.
(05:48):
Some scholars argue that Bathorywas punished because she defied
those expectations. Even her enemies admitted that
she was intelligent. Her surviving letters display
sharp wit and economic finesse. She wasn't just a grieving
widow. She was a political force.
Together, these two theories argue that Elizabeth was undone
(06:11):
by men who envied or feared her and who used rumors and feared
to orchestrate her downfall. But the truth, as you know, is
always messy. Now, through Rachel Bledsoe's
research, she poses the question, what if both sides are
wrong? What if Bathory was neither a
(06:33):
misunderstood noble woman nor a supernatural monster, but maybe
something kind of in the middle?So for us to understand
Elizabeth Bathory, we first haveto step into her world, which
was one of shifting borders, endless wars, superstition and
(06:58):
savage codes of honor. Imagine Hungary at the turn of
the 17th century. You have to picture it, a land
that was torn into three pieces,carved up like a map from Game
of Thrones. To the West and the north, you
had Royal Hungary under the Habsburgs.
To the center, Ottoman Hungary, occupied and ravaged by the
(07:20):
Turks. To the east, Transylvania,
nominally independent but constantly balancing allegiances
to survive. Not to mention maybe Vlad.
I don't think they were at the same time, but.
No, but close. I mean, yeah.
I like to imagine that. Right.
And just picturing, yeah, we, there's a lot to talk about
(07:44):
after for all kinds of theories.I'm excited.
I'm excited. Well, the countryside was
scarred by decades of war at this point.
Fields, late abandoned villages were burned to the ground.
Families were scattered. Raids were common.
It wasn't uncommon for Turkish horsemen to descend at dawn,
burning crops and taking captives.
(08:05):
Local militias would retaliate. And let's not forget about
death, disease, and a famine, who were all often bedfellows.
So we have that to contend with too.
Right. Elizabeth Bathory's world was
governed by brutal necessity. The nobility families like the
Bathory's and Nadasdi's weren't just aristocrats sipping wine
(08:27):
and candlelit halls. They were warlords, defenders of
the Borderlands, keeping the entire Micro Kingdoms in place.
A noble woman wasn't a passive figure sitting in her parlor
knitting or embroidering handkerchiefs.
She was much more involved. She would oversee the defense of
(08:49):
her estate, arrange troop movements and negotiate ransoms.
And to add to her early life, she was born into a blood soaked
tapestry. Born in 1560 to one of the most
powerful families in Hungary, her lineage was impeccable.
The bathories had produced kings, Princess and warlords.
(09:12):
They even claimed to be descended from a legendary
dragon slaying ancestor. Like more info on that please?
Yeah, from childhood, though, Elizabeth was surrounded by
violence and privilege and equalmeasure.
Rumors claim she watched her family soldiers execute Turkish
(09:33):
prisoners and torture servants accused of theft.
Some historians even suggest that an uncle introduced her to
occult practices, though evidence for this is scarce and
buried by time. What we do know is this, she was
highly educated for her time. Unlike most mobile women in
Western Europe, she was taught to read and write fluently in
(09:54):
multiple languages. As I mentioned, she studied
politics, mathematics and estatemanagement.
This education wasn't just for her entertainment or whimsy, it
was a weapon and a tool for survival.
At the young age of 15 is when she married for Rink the Dasty.
(10:18):
This marriage cemented 2 very powerful alliances.
Nadasdi, known as the Black Knight of Hungary, was
celebrated for his cruelty against Ottoman soldiers.
It was said that he once impaledprisoners along the road to
intimidate advancing armies. Very glad S.
(10:41):
I was just going to say I wonderwhere he got that from.
Yeah, I wonder where he got that.
Must have just been the thing atthe time.
I guess that was how you struck fear into your enemies, for rent
was often away at war. Elizabeth was left to run 25
villages of fortress and oversawhundreds of servants and
peasants at that time. There are letters in her own
(11:04):
hand that are coldly efficient, that include orders for grain
deliveries, instructions to overseers to collect taxes,
decrees about forest use and livestock slaughter.
She did not simply survive in a man's world.
She excelled. Her authority went unquestioned.
(11:25):
Peasants feared her. Lesser nobles look to her for
guidance. She became the perfect example
of what the Hungarian call virago, which means a strong,
autonomous woman, respected, even admired, for stepping into
masculine roles. Yet with this kind of power came
(11:46):
isolation. She was feared more than she was
loved, respected more than she was cherished.
She gave birth to at least five children, though only three
survived infancy. While she managed her estates,
she also had to navigate family betrayals, endless legal
disputes and the constant threatof Ottoman raids.
(12:08):
So we feel a lot going on. Yeah, definitely, to put it
politely. Don't know that I would envy
her. No, not at all.
Now there was a legal framework at this time that was supposed
to govern power. It was called the Tripper Titum.
(12:29):
It was a codification written in1517 of Hungarian law.
A medieval relic emphasized noble privileges above all else.
A noble woman like Bathory. Basically what it said was she
could beat or imprison A peasantwithout any consequence.
Servants were looked at as property, but there was one rule
(12:52):
that was supposed to be unbreakable and that was she was
not supposed to kill anyone without cause.
So it gave her broad rights but not absolute immunity, and this
is where she becomes vulnerable.We also have to consider the
mindset of the Europeans at thistime when it came to their views
(13:17):
on torture and punishment. Public executions, as you
listeners have heard before, we know we're a form of
entertainment. Torture was not something that
was hidden. It was a spectacle designed to
reinforce authority. Peasants gathered in town
squares to watch criminals broken on the wheel, burned
(13:40):
alive and even impaled. Children were brought there to
witness these acts as a moral lesson.
Which I can't imagine. Now you're a kid or.
Being a kid and seeing that, like, oh.
No wonder, everybody. Was so fucked up, yeah.
And I mean, we talked about thiswhen you did the Ropes Pierre
(14:03):
episode about how glamorized executions were and how people
idolize the executioners and thefashion and and all that.
But yeah, yeah. So the boundaries at that time
between cruelty and justice wereblurred didn't didn't really
(14:24):
exist. And Elizabeth grew up in this
world. We have to remember that She
watched it, she internalized it.And when she punished servants
or peasants, she was not really acting outside of the society
norms at that time, at least notat first.
But somewhere along the way, shebegan to push beyond what we
(14:46):
would consider the brutal norms at the time.
Some historians propose that herhusband, for Rent, played a
crucial role in this. While they shared little time
together when he was on his campaigns, they reportedly
exchanged letters discussing disciplinary measures.
(15:06):
Some suggested that For Rent introduced Elizabeth to creative
torture methods that he had usedon his prisoners of war.
There's a chilling anecdote that's recorded in later
confessions where For Rank supposedly taught Elizabeth to
smear honey on a servant girl and leave her tied outside to be
(15:28):
devoured by insects. Now the question is, was this
some kind of a joke, or was it ademonstration?
Or was it something that Elizabeth had asked him about?
Right. When Ferent died of an unknown
illness in 16 O four, they thinkpossibly a war wound, possibly a
(15:52):
stroke. Elizabeth was left alone and
this is really where things tooka turn for her.
Because whatever self-control she had before all that went
away, she had no one to help control those impulses.
(16:16):
And in Hungarian society, widowsare expected to defend their
families interests fiercely. They're also vulnerable because
the kind of the common belief atthe time was that they were to
remarry or rely on their male relatives to survive.
(16:37):
But Elizabeth refused to give upher autonomy, and she just
tightened her grip on the estates.
She surrounded herself with royal female servants, some of
whom would later be named as heraccomplices.
And as rumors grew, so did her isolation.
(16:58):
Families began to whisper about missing daughters.
Local clergy started to questionthe castle's activities.
Yet few dared to openly confronther for probably obvious
reasons. And even as the rumors of
missing girls circulated, Elizabeth's status as a noble
(17:19):
woman placed her beyond the immediate reach of justice.
Her power was so entranced for years that she, like I said,
operated without any fear of anylegal repercussions.
Doesn't that sound a little bit like someone else we covered in
Season 2? Maybe.
(17:43):
It's very Madame Lalarie Laveau.It very much is.
And also, it made me wonder if she knew about Elizabeth
Bathory, if she was familiar with her story and if she kind
of, like, copycatted that because there's a lot of
similarities. Yeah, there's a lot of
(18:04):
similarities in just how they treated the people that were in
their home. Yeah.
Yeah, definitely. I could definitely see that and
would not be surprised if she knew.
Yeah, when we place Elizabeth Bathory into this context, the
line between fact and legend becomes almost
(18:25):
indistinguishable. Was she a monstrous serial
killer born from a violent society that turned cruelty into
habit? Or was she simply an ambitious
woman crushed under the weight of politics and medieval
paranoia? Before we answer that question,
we have to dive into the next layer of her story.
The crimes themselves, the bodies, the confessions, the
(18:49):
evidence found within the dark, echoing halls of her castle.
All right after her husband's death, she cracked.
It was basically like something really dark that was there all
along just got unleashed. And that's when the real horror
(19:11):
began. For years, Elizabeth's violence
was an open secret. Local villagers whispered about
girls who had vanished after entering the castle gates.
Hasn't families begged each other not to send their
daughters to serve at the castle.
But in a society where noble privilege reigned supreme, the
rumors really meant nothing. Their earliest documented
(19:34):
accusations detailed beatings that escalated into torture.
Witnesses later testified to seeing young servant girls drag
through the courtyard, half naked and bleeding, with their
fingernails torn off, their faces burned, their hair shaved
off. As punishment, some girls
reportedly had their hands and feet broken so they could no
(19:55):
longer run. A peasant girl named Sophia was
said to have arrived at the castle to work in the kitchens.
Within days, she was discovered dead, her body allegedly covered
in bite marks, her flesh bruisedand discolored as if chewed by a
wild animal. Holy.
(20:15):
Shit. Another girl, Ilona, was found
frozen to death, having been doused repeatedly with cold
water and left naked in the snow, an execution that
neighbors claimed that they could hear on silent winter
nights. In one particularly disturbing
testimony, a servant described Elizabeth forcing a girl to
(20:38):
strip, then smearing her body with honey and releasing her
into the courtyard where ants and bees slowly tortured her.
Some accounts even describe Elizabeth herself standing
nearby, laughing as if entertained by a MC Cobb show.
But how did this go unchecked? Well, as we've said all along,
(21:05):
it was partly due to social hierarchy.
Serving girls were seen as expendable.
They were property tools, not considered people.
In Elizabeth's eyes, and in the eyes of much of the nobility at
the time, the death of a peasantgirl was not a crime worth
serious punishment. And because she wielded immense
(21:28):
political power, she could bribelocal officials, She could
silence priests and threaten anyfamily daring to raise an
accusation. It wasn't until she ran out of
peasants that she made a fatal error.
Desperate to replenish her supply of victims, Elizabeth
established what she called a gynesium, or a finishing school
(21:51):
for young noble girls. These girls were not nameless
peasants. They were the daughter of minor
nobles, families who expected tosee them married off to
strengthen their alliances. These girls were the future
mothers of Hungary's aristocracy.
Their disappearance could simplynot be ignored.
(22:13):
When noble daughters began to vanish or return home mutilated
beyond recognition, the alarm bells finally rang loud enough
for the king to act. Enter Palatine Yorgi Thurzo.
Thurzo, the highest ranking official in Hungary after the
(22:33):
king, was a man torn between loyalty and duty.
He was, after all, Elizabeth's cousin.
And he it's complicates things just a little.
Bit. Just a wee bit.
And he had once promised her rank to protect her and her
children. But as noble families demanded
(22:54):
answers, Thurzo knew his hand was forced to uncover the truth
behind the accusations. So in 1610, he launched an
investigation. Not a witch hunt like many at
the time. It was instead a deliberate and
meticulous inquiry. There's no dispatch, emissaries
and clerks across Elizabeth's estates.
(23:17):
They interviewed servants, laborers, local priests and
minor officials. The confessions they collected
paint a horrifying picture, and Castle Cook claimed she saw
barrels of ash containing charred human bones.
A washer woman describes scrubbing cloth so saturated
(23:39):
with blood that the water in thewash basin turned black.
One stable boy recounted hearingyoung women scream throughout
the night and seeing a pile of discarded clothing, dresses and
aprons stacked in the cellar like an old laundry pile.
A priest named Janos wrote directly to Thurzo, claiming he
(24:02):
had discovered the bodies of nine young women hidden in
crypts below the Chapel. Their corpses bore signs of deep
lacerations, puncture wounds andsevere burns.
One girl had her eyes gouged out.
Another had been sewn into a sack and left to starve.
(24:22):
Oh. Oh, Nope.
Nope. Yeah, yeah.
Continuing on, testimony suggests Elizabeth kept a Ledger
of the girl she had acquired, a chilling detail often overlooked
in more sensational retellings. According to legend, this Ledger
listed over 600 names, though nophysical copy survives today.
(24:49):
So whether this Ledger ever truly existed is debated amongst
historians. But if it did exist, the Blood
Countess would be proven as the worst serial killer in all of
history. She'd take that top spot for
sure. Yeah.
On December 29th of 1610, Thurzodecided it was time to take
(25:13):
action. He and his soldiers arrived at
the castle under the cover of darkness.
They stormed the main hall, pushing aside shock servants and
torch bearing guards. They found Elizabeth in the act.
According to Thurzo's official report, Torturing a girl, 1
victim lay dead on the floor, her skin slashed open in
(25:35):
countless places. Another still alive, moaned in a
pool of her own blood. Several more captives were
discovered in underground chambers, chained to walls, half
starved and covered in open wounds.
The site was so horrific that even hardened soldiers vomited
and fell to their knees. Several accounts describe
(25:55):
seizing guards openly weeping now.
When she was caught, Elizabeth did not resist.
Instead, she reportedly looked up from her victim and calmly
remarked, What are you doing here, cousin?
As though they had interrupted her during an afternoon tea
(26:16):
rather than a human sacrifice. What the heck?
Yeah, just another day in the. Bathory Castle.
Yeah, typical Tuesday night. Yeah, the aftermath was as
calculated as the investigation itself.
Thurzo faced an impossible dilemma.
Publicly trying Elizabeth would mean shaming 2 of Hungary's most
(26:39):
powerful families, the bathoriesand the Nadasties.
A scandal on that scale could destabilize the fragile balance
of noble alliances. So Thurzo convened a meeting
with Elizabeth's relatives, including her son Paul and her
sons in law. They reached a grim compromise.
Elizabeth would be confined to her castle for the rest of her
(27:02):
life, and her accomplices would bear the brunt of public
punishment. Fucking figures, right?
Right. Her own family did not defend
her. They did not claim and claim
injustice or conspiracy. They accepted Thurso's evidence.
They chose to protect the family's reputation rather than
(27:24):
protect Elizabeth. On January 2nd, 1611, a trial
was held for Elizabeth's 4 closest servants, Ilona, Joe,
Doritaya, Caitlin, and Janos. The trial was brutal.
Torture was not only permitted but expected.
(27:45):
Ilona and Doritaya confessed to helping Elizabeth procure
torture and dispose of victims. They described the Countess's
obsession with cleanliness, how she would make them wipe away
every drop of blood before she would enter her Chamber of
suffering. They claim she delighted in
biting flesh from girls, particularly their faces, and
(28:09):
mocking them as she chewed. She supposedly sometimes sewed
their lips shut to silence theircries.
They also describe various custom built torture devices
including iron cages suspended from the ceiling, designed to
lower and raise victims into freezing or boiling water,
(28:30):
spiked rollers used to lay skin from the back, sharp iron
pinchers heated in the fire before being applied to the
thighs and the arms. Catalin, who played a lesser
role, was sentenced to life imprisonment.
Janos, due to his youth, was granted A Merciful beheading.
(28:52):
Merciful. Yeah.
Yeah. Alona and Doritaya were executed
in a gruesome spectacle, their fingers torn off with hot
pinchers before being burned alive at the stake.
The confessions collected voluntarily after torture would
be dismissed today, but in the 17th century they were accepted
(29:16):
as legal proof. Judicial torture followed a
logic that it is almost impossible for us to comprehend.
It was believed that the human body, under extreme pain, would
betray the soul's secrets. After the accomplice's deaths,
the Kingdom turned its focus back to Elizabeth.
Rather than face execution, Elizabeth was walled inside her
(29:38):
own chamber at the castle. The windows were bricked up,
leaving only a small slit through which food and water
were passed. She was not allowed visitors or
any correspondence. She basically became a living
ghost. According to the guards journal.
She spent her days pacing, muttering to herself, and
(29:59):
writing long letters, Letters that no one would read.
Once a powerful figure who controlled vast lands and
hundreds of lives, she was reduced to a prisoner in her own
fortress. Four years later, on August
21st, 1614, Elizabeth Bathory was found dead in her cell.
She was 54 years old. Her final words are unknown,
(30:22):
though. 1 legend claims she saidto herself I'm cold just before
lying down to sleep and never waking again.
Sounds like she had it pretty easy if you ask me.
Compared to, yeah. Compared to what she'd done, and
compared to like her alleged accomplices and servants had to
(30:44):
endure, the blood Countess Legend was born not from the
crimes themselves, but from the cock gossip, superstition, and
political necessity that surrounded her downfall.
Were there really bloodbaths? We have no contemporary evidence
of her bathing in blood. There are no credible accounts
(31:06):
or physical proof of that. The bloodbathing motif only
appeared decades after her death, likely a creation of some
sensational storytellers who found it easy to sell a vampire
narrative than to confront the more mundane yet equally
horrifying truth that a powerfulwoman using her absolute
(31:27):
authority to inflict unimaginable suffering simply
because she could. Elizabeth Bathory did not need
to be a literal vampire to be monstrous.
Her cruelty was human, and that's the scariest part.
And that's why I think her storycontinues to haunt us.
(31:47):
Not because she was a creature of the night, but because she
was a noble woman, bred in violence, corrupted by power,
and left unchecked until it was far too late.
When we think of a confession, we think of an emotional
outpouring, A suspect breaking down under the weight of guilt,
finally telling the truth. And our modern understanding a
(32:10):
confession is meant to be voluntary, untainted by coercion
or pain. But in early 17th century
Hungary, that and indeed across Europe, the concept was
profoundly different. Here, torture wasn't hidden, it
was formal and regulated as a part of their justice system.
(32:30):
So let's take a moment just to pause and understand the
philosophy behind this, because there's some debate right about
like, did the servants? Were they really involved or
whatever? Was it just torture that made
them say whatever they wanted tohear?
But medieval and early modern legal scholars believe that
(32:53):
humans were inherently sinful and deceitful.
The body, they argued, was a vessel of lies, and only under
extreme pain would the soul's truth emerge.
This wasn't just a barbaric when, it was part of their law.
The legal foundation of torture in Hungary and much of Europe
stem from Roman law, especially the constitutional criminalist
(33:15):
Carolina, the Criminal Code issued by Emperor Charles the
5th in 1532. This document set strict
guidelines for when and how to torture people.
Basically like here's the rules on torture.
It wasn't meant to be random or sadistic.
It was concerned a precise tool for validating evidence.
(33:37):
According to this document, torture could be applied if
there was something called half proof, substantial evidence that
did not yet amount to a conviction.
So they at least went in saying we have to have some sort of
evidence, you know, witness statements, circumstantial
evidence and suspicious behaviorof the accused all potentially
(34:02):
qualify under that. We're going to talk about
torture and execution real soon in a separate episode.
I got some land on that, but listeners may not know this and
we're going to talk about it more in depth on later episode.
But torture methods were classified by severity.
(34:23):
First came territorial intimidation, the display of
torture instruments, then non lethal pain was inflicted, such
as thumb screws. Speaking of.
Yeah. We've got an episode coming up
on that. I do a lot of this, sounds very
(34:43):
familiar. Yeah, Strepato, where prisoner
was suspended by bound hands behind their back or leg
crushing. Finally came methods likely to
cause permanent damage or death,like the rack or heated iron
implements. Crucially, confessions under
torture were not immediately valid.
The accused had to confirm them later, free from the immediate
(35:05):
pain. If they recanted, the process
began again though, so this loopcould go on and on until they
either confess or were just absolutely destroyed physically.
In Elizabeth Bathory's case, herfour main accomplices were not
(35:26):
nobles. They had no protection under the
Tripper Titan. They were expendable.
The judicial process was designed to break them, and it
succeeded. Ilona, Joe, Dorataya, and the
others confessed to unimaginableacts.
They describe burying bodies under floorboards, feeding
corpses to the dogs, and burningremains in the great hearth
(35:48):
fires to eliminate evidence. They detailed how Elizabeth
delighted in forcing girls to stand naked in icy water and
dance while being stabbed with needles if they faltered.
These confessions painted a picture of a household operating
as a sadistic machine, each accomplice playing a role, each
victim stripped of humanity. Some historians, as I sort of
(36:14):
am, like, I don't know how I feel about confessions under
torture, but some historians think that it should just be
entirely dismissed because how could you believe what anyone
says when they're being subjected to that level of pay?
But here's the dilemma. While we know torture leads to
false confessions, we also must grapple with the sheer volume of
(36:38):
corroborating evidence. In this case.
This includes what is testimonies, missing girls,
recovered remains, and letters from priests, all aligned to
support the admissions. And furthermore, even before any
torture began, rumors and reports had circulated for over
a decade. So priests were noted like they
(37:02):
had records. They kept records.
For years, peasant families had refused to send their daughters.
There was a lot of smoke coming from the castle lot.
A lot of smoke. For that time, not good.
Yeah, we also have to remember that this trial was not an
(37:23):
isolated incident in European history.
The use of fortress legal evidence was widespread.
So Bathory's accomplices were not considered witches.
They were servants. But the same psychological
mechanisms were at play here. Pain, isolation and fear rewired
their understanding of the truth.
(37:46):
Definitely. Elizabeth was never tortured and
she was not tried in open court.As a noble woman, she was
entitled to a different treatment.
Her family's deal with Thurzo ensured no public humiliation.
Instead, she was bricked into her own castle, a form of living
and two men. Historians often point to this
(38:07):
final arrangement as damning proof of her guilt.
Why would a powerful family allow such a fate for one of its
matriarchs if they believe that she was innocent?
The simplest answer is they saw the evidence with their own
eyes. They made a cold and strategic
choice to sacrifice her to preserve the family's wealth and
legacy. After the trial, the official
(38:30):
narrative shifted almost immediately.
Elizabeth's story began to transform even before her death.
The blood count test became a folk monster, her real crimes
embroidered into the fantastical.
By the mid 18th century, rumors of bloodbath appeared, as I
mentioned, echoing the vampire folklore which was already so
(38:50):
popular in Eastern Europe. These vampire tales served as
cultural metaphors, representations of aristocrats
feeding off of the lifeblood of the peasants.
Elizabeth's legend fit perfectlyinto the stark tapestry.
The question remains, do we accept these confessions as
fact, or do we see them as relics of a barbaric legal
(39:14):
system? The truth, as is often the case
in dark history, may lie somewhere in the middle.
We know violence occurred. We know what young woman died, a
lot of them. We know Elizabeth ruled with an
iron fist. And we also know the legal
machinery of the time was deeplyflawed and cruel.
(39:34):
In the end, perhaps it doesn't matter whether every confession
detail was true. The weight of evidence, corpses,
testimonies, and family betrayalsuggests that Elizabeth was no
innocent victim of a patriarchalconspiracy.
She was a woman who took the accepted cruelties of her class
to monstrous extremes and finally paid the price for
(39:57):
stepping too far beyond even those boundaries.
Thoughts. I, I have a lot of, I agree with
a lot of that. I don't even know where to
begin. I guess from the beginning we
(40:19):
have to realize where she comes from, that part of Europe.
I mean, like we mentioned in thebeginning, just an example of
how cruel and how just completely gruesome it was to
even live a normal life. Look at the life of Vlad the
Impaler. They're not that far separated
(40:41):
from that time frame either. And it was very bloodthirsty.
You had to show how powerful youwere to maintain what you did
have. The Ottomans were quite the
nightmare. And it's not surprising that,
you know, Transylvania or like Romania, hungry in that whole
(41:04):
section of Europe, had to reallyput up a big front and show that
they were strong, having to prove that they could do things
like we were talking about impaling people and leaving them
on the road as an example. And I do still think, though,
that a lot of it was dramatized later.
(41:26):
I agree that I think that a lot of that was stretched for
torture purposes. I agree that confessions under
duress are not the greatest. And then rumors and gossip after
the facts spread like wildfire and things always grow to
another dramatic level. So I believe that the reality of
(41:47):
Elizabeth Bathory is in the middle.
I do think that she was very cruel and I think that she
needed to be and it sets a. Course for.
Her, and you can tell that afterher husband passed away is when
things really got bad and it's kind of like a fear thing.
She wanted to maintain power. And I think having that example
(42:11):
of Game of Thrones is so perfect.
She's like the Cersei of Yura. She's like the Cersei's like
combined with Ramsey, it's like you could put those two
together. If they had a love child, it
would be Elizabeth Beth. Yeah, it's a scary thought.
(42:34):
Agreed. And I think her servants, I do
think that, yes, they knew things that happened.
They probably did help with somethings because they were made
to. Oh yeah, right.
Probably fucking terrified. Like if you don't, you know,
there's that mentality of who's really responsible here.
(42:56):
And yes, every person needs to take some accountability for
their own actions, but if you'rewitnessing these things and
you're in that position, I don'tknow what I would do.
I mean being afraid for your life and your only option for
(43:17):
survival is to make choices thata normal person would never want
to make or have to make. Right.
Something happens in your brain sometimes for some people when
you're faced with death. It doesn't excuse the behavior.
But yeah, I think they were. They were involved because they
(43:41):
didn't have a choice. They didn't have a choice like
you're going to die or be tortured.
Those are your choices. Yep, exactly.
You're going to help. Cover it up or you're going to
be in the pile with the rest of them.
Exactly, and to see how brutal things were, it's not surprising
at all, especially when she's taking on younger staff.
(44:07):
There was definitely a purpose for that.
She wanted to make sure that they were impressed upon, that
this was a reality and it's easier to manipulate a younger
individual. Yeah, this happened over the
course of decades and I don't know.
(44:30):
And the victim count, I'm sure the 600 is very, it's a lot.
It's a lot. I mean, I guess over the course
of time, is that feasible? I don't know.
Maybe, you know, she did open upthat the school at one point.
(44:52):
600 just seems like a lot. Even if you divided up over 20
years, that's couple victims every month.
Right. I don't know.
I don't know. It was a lot.
No matter what the number was, it was, it was a lot.
It was enough for those rumors to circulate and.
(45:16):
Definitely, yeah. And of course, you know, it's
like, OK, she didn't really get any sort of punishment at the
end, But since they were a pretty powerful family, of
course the family is going to choose to protect their name
over an individual, especially if it was a matriarch running a
(45:40):
facility like that. So I think that part of that was
also the case. And yeah, it's so hard to to
know, of course, the level. But like you said too, this is
very similar to the witch trialsas well.
I think there was a lot at play with this, and it wasn't
necessarily all her being the evil individual that they let
(46:05):
her to be. It was also to profit.
But yeah, yeah, I think it's a sweet middle.
This one, a lot going on on on this one for sure.
And we'll never really know the truth, but it is a different
perspective. I think, you know, because
there, there was one group of people that were just like, she
(46:28):
was absolutely just targeted, But I don't think that was the
case here. I I think she had that power and
influence for a long time. And it wasn't totally uncommon
for a Hungarian woman to step into that role.
So I don't see that as being like a smear campaign
(46:52):
necessarily. And I mean, everybody would have
had it been on it and been in onit, those stories that were
circulating about people missingand things that like everybody
would have had it been in on it,right.
So, yeah, yeah. Terrifying to think about, even
if part of that is true. If part of the torture and part
(47:16):
of the meth like Oh no. Yeah, terrible.
Yeah, super gruesome. I did not know about the
burnings. I knew about some of the other
stuff but oh definitely did not know about the honey thing
either that. Yeah, the one that got me was
the freezing the girls out in the on a winter night, like
(47:38):
repeatedly dousing them with. Water.
Yeah, that's very reminiscent oflast season when we talked about
Unit 731. Yeah, it's like, it's almost
like. She enjoyed testing people's
limits. Yeah.
And, you know, there were two incidents where they it was
(48:01):
mentioned that she was. She laughed and enjoyed and
like, the biting gets me, too. I can't.
Yeah, something. Definitely.
Snapped in her. That's.
For sure and if it. Was just a desperation attempt
because her husband passed away and it was one of those things
where she's like, I know that I'm done for now because I have
(48:25):
to go up. Against all of.
These other very, you know, wealthy aristocrats from around
my boundaries, let alone the Turks.
Like if I don't make my name look like a certain way, I'm
screwed. Kind of the same with with Vlad.
And notoriously that section of Europe was so much more brutal
(48:50):
in how they went about that kindof stuff versus places like
England. And of course, that was
something that they like fanaticized about of like, Oh my
gosh, the the terror, the horrorof, you know, this type of
torture, It's unfathomable. And so I don't think that that
(49:10):
helped either, having a different perspective coming
into it being like, whoa. And then everybody in Hungary
and Romania are like, you know, typical.
It's a typical Tuesday night, you know.
But. Yeah, either way, crazy.
So glad. That we live in the.
Time that we do, even though things are crazy sometimes,
(49:33):
right? And there are still crazy people
out there who do horrible thingsso that's just never going to
change unfortunately, right? Yeah, but yeah.
So what do we take away? One, don't do anything like
that. Just.
(49:54):
Don't access your. Power in that way.
OK there. There's way better ways to be
like you know what? I'm a woman and I.
Am in charge and I am powerful. Yeah, maybe not.
Take it. Take it to that level.
Don't, just still don't be a. Blood Countess.
Yeah, don't be cutting. And chopping.
(50:15):
And biting. And honey.
Dripping and freezing. And the throwing the pins and
the the back scratches from hell.
And yeah, you thought this. Was bad.
Just wait for the E episode. Oh yeah, just wait.
Well. Just wait for the.
C. Episode you want to know crazy
(50:36):
just wait I mean you might as. Well, give listeners a hint at
what's coming, all right? So.
C Strap your boots on because you're talking about Caligula if
you don't. Know who's strap to hear?
What? Strap your boots on your.
Little boots, because we're going to be talking about
(50:58):
Caligula, which literally means little.
Boots. Oh, does it I?
Didn't know well. Yeah, just just you wait.
That'll. Be.
That'll be a very. Comedic, that's.
Good 'cause it'll be. After it'll be after your
macabre feature, that'll be the next episode after that, which
(51:19):
will be a nice palate cleanser for everything that's happened
so far. Oh, definitely remember.
How We said we were going to bring the comedy.
Yeah, we're starting it. With C, Yep.
Oh well, listeners that is. All I have for you tonight,
today, this afternoon, whatever time it is, where you're at,
it's MC Cobb time and. It's.
(51:42):
Night time for me, so I'm going to say thank you for joining me
in the shadows tonight. This has been MC Cobb, a dark
history podcast. Until next time, sleep well and
remember, sometimes the most terrifying monsters wear human
faces. Goodnight.
(52:07):
Tuck your toes then. People, Yeah, tuck in your.
Feet keep those monsters away. Uh huh.
You don't want anything tickle in those toesies.
(52:52):
None.
Don't ever laugh as a hearse goes by for you.
Maybe the next die. They wrap you up in a bloody
sheet then drop you 6 feet underneath.
They put you in a big black box and cover you up with dirt and
(00:22):
rocks. It all goes well for about a
week and then your coffin begins.
This episode of Macabre is brought to you by our friends at
Gothic Threads, the official merch partner of the show.
That's Gothic with 2C's because they're all about thick thighs
and culti vibes. Our friends at Gothic Threads
(00:45):
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merch now at gothicthreads.com before it disappears into the.
Shadows. That's Gothic threads.com.
Today on the Cobb, we're diving into the dungeons of the Castle
of a Blood Count test, looking past the folklore with the help
of historian Rachel Bledsall's groundbreaking research.
(01:27):
I will post a link to her thesisin the show notes.
What I'm primarily using for this episode.
Was Elizabeth Bathory A sadistickiller obsessed with youth?
Or was she simply a threat to the patriarchy, silenced by
those in power? I'll let you decide at the end
(01:47):
of the episode. For now, welcome to Macabre, a
dark history podcast. I'm Hallie.
I'm Blair. Let's first begin with the
common conspiracy theories. For hundreds of years, Elizabeth
Bathory has been viewed through the lens of a monster.
(02:07):
But in the 20th century, a new theory emerged that Elizabeth
Bathory was framed and that her story had been warped by time
and political agendas. Historian Rachel Bledsoe, whose
thesis I mentioned I used extensively for researching this
episode, coined a term for thosewho defend Bathory's innocence,
(02:29):
the enthusiasts. Let's begin by breaking down
their arguments. First, the political conspiracy
at the heart of this theory is King Matthias the Second of the
Habsburg Empire. Elizabeth Bathory was not just
rich, she was filthy rich. She came from one of the most
(02:52):
powerful families in Hungary, and her late husband, Florence
Nadasdi, was also quite wealthy.At one point, he had loaned a
massive amount of coin to the king to fund campaigns against
the Ottoman Turks, and Matthias couldn't repay his debt.
This theory claims that by convicting Bathory of the
(03:15):
horrific crimes, the king could seize her lands, wipe out his
debt, and silence a political threat in one fell swoop.
It's a brutal solution, but not unprecedented in 17th century
Europe, where property and poweroften changed hands by scandal
and execution. The second is the gender
(03:38):
conspiracy. This is more emotionally
charged. Bathory, after her husband's
death, was a single woman managing more than 20 estates.
If you can even fathom that, To give you an idea, it's crazy.
I'm like still working on that four O 1 Ki.
(03:58):
Was just going to say I was likeI can't manage 20 of anything
but. To give you an idea of her
wealth and power, it looked likethis after her marriage to
Ferentz. Their combined holdings included
at least 17 castles and fortresses, over 300 villages
(04:19):
and smaller estates. Holy shit.
Vast agricultural lands, forest and vineyards, numerous mills,
mines and livestock operations. She had a lot going on.
They had a lot going on. Yeah.
(04:41):
Not only that, but her husband was a famed military commander.
They called him the Black Knightof Hungary.
And his campaigns brought in additional money through a
plunger and royal rewards. After Frank's death, she managed
more than 20 major estates herself.
Some historians estimate her annual income would have rivaled
(05:04):
or exceeded that of many minor Princess or even small European
monarchies at the time. So she would have been pretty
powerful than a monetary sense, but in other ways too.
Oh yeah. She was also highly educated.
(05:25):
She was fluent in Latin, German and Greek.
She ran legal affairs. She issued commands.
She negotiated with nobles. She didn't just hold power, she
wielded it confidently. To a deeply patriarchal society,
this was dangerous. A woman with wealth, land and no
male guardian, That was a threatto the feudal structure.
(05:48):
Some scholars argue that Bathorywas punished because she defied
those expectations. Even her enemies admitted that
she was intelligent. Her surviving letters display
sharp wit and economic finesse. She wasn't just a grieving
widow. She was a political force.
Together, these two theories argue that Elizabeth was undone
(06:11):
by men who envied or feared her and who used rumors and feared
to orchestrate her downfall. But the truth, as you know, is
always messy. Now, through Rachel Bledsoe's
research, she poses the question, what if both sides are
wrong? What if Bathory was neither a
(06:33):
misunderstood noble woman nor a supernatural monster, but maybe
something kind of in the middle?So for us to understand
Elizabeth Bathory, we first haveto step into her world, which
was one of shifting borders, endless wars, superstition and
(06:58):
savage codes of honor. Imagine Hungary at the turn of
the 17th century. You have to picture it, a land
that was torn into three pieces,carved up like a map from Game
of Thrones. To the West and the north, you
had Royal Hungary under the Habsburgs.
To the center, Ottoman Hungary, occupied and ravaged by the
(07:20):
Turks. To the east, Transylvania,
nominally independent but constantly balancing allegiances
to survive. Not to mention maybe Vlad.
I don't think they were at the same time, but.
No, but close. I mean, yeah.
I like to imagine that. Right.
And just picturing, yeah, we, there's a lot to talk about
(07:44):
after for all kinds of theories.I'm excited.
I'm excited. Well, the countryside was
scarred by decades of war at this point.
Fields, late abandoned villages were burned to the ground.
Families were scattered. Raids were common.
It wasn't uncommon for Turkish horsemen to descend at dawn,
burning crops and taking captives.
(08:05):
Local militias would retaliate. And let's not forget about
death, disease, and a famine, who were all often bedfellows.
So we have that to contend with too.
Right. Elizabeth Bathory's world was
governed by brutal necessity. The nobility families like the
Bathory's and Nadasdi's weren't just aristocrats sipping wine
(08:27):
and candlelit halls. They were warlords, defenders of
the Borderlands, keeping the entire Micro Kingdoms in place.
A noble woman wasn't a passive figure sitting in her parlor
knitting or embroidering handkerchiefs.
She was much more involved. She would oversee the defense of
(08:49):
her estate, arrange troop movements and negotiate ransoms.
And to add to her early life, she was born into a blood soaked
tapestry. Born in 1560 to one of the most
powerful families in Hungary, her lineage was impeccable.
The bathories had produced kings, Princess and warlords.
(09:12):
They even claimed to be descended from a legendary
dragon slaying ancestor. Like more info on that please?
Yeah, from childhood, though, Elizabeth was surrounded by
violence and privilege and equalmeasure.
Rumors claim she watched her family soldiers execute Turkish
(09:33):
prisoners and torture servants accused of theft.
Some historians even suggest that an uncle introduced her to
occult practices, though evidence for this is scarce and
buried by time. What we do know is this, she was
highly educated for her time. Unlike most mobile women in
Western Europe, she was taught to read and write fluently in
(09:54):
multiple languages. As I mentioned, she studied
politics, mathematics and estatemanagement.
This education wasn't just for her entertainment or whimsy, it
was a weapon and a tool for survival.
At the young age of 15 is when she married for Rink the Dasty.
(10:18):
This marriage cemented 2 very powerful alliances.
Nadasdi, known as the Black Knight of Hungary, was
celebrated for his cruelty against Ottoman soldiers.
It was said that he once impaledprisoners along the road to
intimidate advancing armies. Very glad S.
(10:41):
I was just going to say I wonderwhere he got that from.
Yeah, I wonder where he got that.
Must have just been the thing atthe time.
I guess that was how you struck fear into your enemies, for rent
was often away at war. Elizabeth was left to run 25
villages of fortress and oversawhundreds of servants and
peasants at that time. There are letters in her own
(11:04):
hand that are coldly efficient, that include orders for grain
deliveries, instructions to overseers to collect taxes,
decrees about forest use and livestock slaughter.
She did not simply survive in a man's world.
She excelled. Her authority went unquestioned.
(11:25):
Peasants feared her. Lesser nobles look to her for
guidance. She became the perfect example
of what the Hungarian call virago, which means a strong,
autonomous woman, respected, even admired, for stepping into
masculine roles. Yet with this kind of power came
(11:46):
isolation. She was feared more than she was
loved, respected more than she was cherished.
She gave birth to at least five children, though only three
survived infancy. While she managed her estates,
she also had to navigate family betrayals, endless legal
disputes and the constant threatof Ottoman raids.
(12:08):
So we feel a lot going on. Yeah, definitely, to put it
politely. Don't know that I would envy
her. No, not at all.
Now there was a legal framework at this time that was supposed
to govern power. It was called the Tripper Titum.
(12:29):
It was a codification written in1517 of Hungarian law.
A medieval relic emphasized noble privileges above all else.
A noble woman like Bathory. Basically what it said was she
could beat or imprison A peasantwithout any consequence.
Servants were looked at as property, but there was one rule
(12:52):
that was supposed to be unbreakable and that was she was
not supposed to kill anyone without cause.
So it gave her broad rights but not absolute immunity, and this
is where she becomes vulnerable.We also have to consider the
mindset of the Europeans at thistime when it came to their views
(13:17):
on torture and punishment. Public executions, as you
listeners have heard before, we know we're a form of
entertainment. Torture was not something that
was hidden. It was a spectacle designed to
reinforce authority. Peasants gathered in town
squares to watch criminals broken on the wheel, burned
(13:40):
alive and even impaled. Children were brought there to
witness these acts as a moral lesson.
Which I can't imagine. Now you're a kid or.
Being a kid and seeing that, like, oh.
No wonder, everybody. Was so fucked up, yeah.
And I mean, we talked about thiswhen you did the Ropes Pierre
(14:03):
episode about how glamorized executions were and how people
idolize the executioners and thefashion and and all that.
But yeah, yeah. So the boundaries at that time
between cruelty and justice wereblurred didn't didn't really
(14:24):
exist. And Elizabeth grew up in this
world. We have to remember that She
watched it, she internalized it.And when she punished servants
or peasants, she was not really acting outside of the society
norms at that time, at least notat first.
But somewhere along the way, shebegan to push beyond what we
(14:46):
would consider the brutal norms at the time.
Some historians propose that herhusband, for Rent, played a
crucial role in this. While they shared little time
together when he was on his campaigns, they reportedly
exchanged letters discussing disciplinary measures.
(15:06):
Some suggested that For Rent introduced Elizabeth to creative
torture methods that he had usedon his prisoners of war.
There's a chilling anecdote that's recorded in later
confessions where For Rank supposedly taught Elizabeth to
smear honey on a servant girl and leave her tied outside to be
(15:28):
devoured by insects. Now the question is, was this
some kind of a joke, or was it ademonstration?
Or was it something that Elizabeth had asked him about?
Right. When Ferent died of an unknown
illness in 16 O four, they thinkpossibly a war wound, possibly a
(15:52):
stroke. Elizabeth was left alone and
this is really where things tooka turn for her.
Because whatever self-control she had before all that went
away, she had no one to help control those impulses.
(16:16):
And in Hungarian society, widowsare expected to defend their
families interests fiercely. They're also vulnerable because
the kind of the common belief atthe time was that they were to
remarry or rely on their male relatives to survive.
(16:37):
But Elizabeth refused to give upher autonomy, and she just
tightened her grip on the estates.
She surrounded herself with royal female servants, some of
whom would later be named as heraccomplices.
And as rumors grew, so did her isolation.
(16:58):
Families began to whisper about missing daughters.
Local clergy started to questionthe castle's activities.
Yet few dared to openly confronther for probably obvious
reasons. And even as the rumors of
missing girls circulated, Elizabeth's status as a noble
(17:19):
woman placed her beyond the immediate reach of justice.
Her power was so entranced for years that she, like I said,
operated without any fear of anylegal repercussions.
Doesn't that sound a little bit like someone else we covered in
Season 2? Maybe.
(17:43):
It's very Madame Lalarie Laveau.It very much is.
And also, it made me wonder if she knew about Elizabeth
Bathory, if she was familiar with her story and if she kind
of, like, copycatted that because there's a lot of
similarities. Yeah, there's a lot of
(18:04):
similarities in just how they treated the people that were in
their home. Yeah.
Yeah, definitely. I could definitely see that and
would not be surprised if she knew.
Yeah, when we place Elizabeth Bathory into this context, the
line between fact and legend becomes almost
(18:25):
indistinguishable. Was she a monstrous serial
killer born from a violent society that turned cruelty into
habit? Or was she simply an ambitious
woman crushed under the weight of politics and medieval
paranoia? Before we answer that question,
we have to dive into the next layer of her story.
The crimes themselves, the bodies, the confessions, the
(18:49):
evidence found within the dark, echoing halls of her castle.
All right after her husband's death, she cracked.
It was basically like something really dark that was there all
along just got unleashed. And that's when the real horror
(19:11):
began. For years, Elizabeth's violence
was an open secret. Local villagers whispered about
girls who had vanished after entering the castle gates.
Hasn't families begged each other not to send their
daughters to serve at the castle.
But in a society where noble privilege reigned supreme, the
rumors really meant nothing. Their earliest documented
(19:34):
accusations detailed beatings that escalated into torture.
Witnesses later testified to seeing young servant girls drag
through the courtyard, half naked and bleeding, with their
fingernails torn off, their faces burned, their hair shaved
off. As punishment, some girls
reportedly had their hands and feet broken so they could no
(19:55):
longer run. A peasant girl named Sophia was
said to have arrived at the castle to work in the kitchens.
Within days, she was discovered dead, her body allegedly covered
in bite marks, her flesh bruisedand discolored as if chewed by a
wild animal. Holy.
(20:15):
Shit. Another girl, Ilona, was found
frozen to death, having been doused repeatedly with cold
water and left naked in the snow, an execution that
neighbors claimed that they could hear on silent winter
nights. In one particularly disturbing
testimony, a servant described Elizabeth forcing a girl to
(20:38):
strip, then smearing her body with honey and releasing her
into the courtyard where ants and bees slowly tortured her.
Some accounts even describe Elizabeth herself standing
nearby, laughing as if entertained by a MC Cobb show.
But how did this go unchecked? Well, as we've said all along,
(21:05):
it was partly due to social hierarchy.
Serving girls were seen as expendable.
They were property tools, not considered people.
In Elizabeth's eyes, and in the eyes of much of the nobility at
the time, the death of a peasantgirl was not a crime worth
serious punishment. And because she wielded immense
(21:28):
political power, she could bribelocal officials, She could
silence priests and threaten anyfamily daring to raise an
accusation. It wasn't until she ran out of
peasants that she made a fatal error.
Desperate to replenish her supply of victims, Elizabeth
established what she called a gynesium, or a finishing school
(21:51):
for young noble girls. These girls were not nameless
peasants. They were the daughter of minor
nobles, families who expected tosee them married off to
strengthen their alliances. These girls were the future
mothers of Hungary's aristocracy.
Their disappearance could simplynot be ignored.
(22:13):
When noble daughters began to vanish or return home mutilated
beyond recognition, the alarm bells finally rang loud enough
for the king to act. Enter Palatine Yorgi Thurzo.
Thurzo, the highest ranking official in Hungary after the
(22:33):
king, was a man torn between loyalty and duty.
He was, after all, Elizabeth's cousin.
And he it's complicates things just a little.
Bit. Just a wee bit.
And he had once promised her rank to protect her and her
children. But as noble families demanded
(22:54):
answers, Thurzo knew his hand was forced to uncover the truth
behind the accusations. So in 1610, he launched an
investigation. Not a witch hunt like many at
the time. It was instead a deliberate and
meticulous inquiry. There's no dispatch, emissaries
and clerks across Elizabeth's estates.
(23:17):
They interviewed servants, laborers, local priests and
minor officials. The confessions they collected
paint a horrifying picture, and Castle Cook claimed she saw
barrels of ash containing charred human bones.
A washer woman describes scrubbing cloth so saturated
(23:39):
with blood that the water in thewash basin turned black.
One stable boy recounted hearingyoung women scream throughout
the night and seeing a pile of discarded clothing, dresses and
aprons stacked in the cellar like an old laundry pile.
A priest named Janos wrote directly to Thurzo, claiming he
(24:02):
had discovered the bodies of nine young women hidden in
crypts below the Chapel. Their corpses bore signs of deep
lacerations, puncture wounds andsevere burns.
One girl had her eyes gouged out.
Another had been sewn into a sack and left to starve.
(24:22):
Oh. Oh, Nope.
Nope. Yeah, yeah.
Continuing on, testimony suggests Elizabeth kept a Ledger
of the girl she had acquired, a chilling detail often overlooked
in more sensational retellings. According to legend, this Ledger
listed over 600 names, though nophysical copy survives today.
(24:49):
So whether this Ledger ever truly existed is debated amongst
historians. But if it did exist, the Blood
Countess would be proven as the worst serial killer in all of
history. She'd take that top spot for
sure. Yeah.
On December 29th of 1610, Thurzodecided it was time to take
(25:13):
action. He and his soldiers arrived at
the castle under the cover of darkness.
They stormed the main hall, pushing aside shock servants and
torch bearing guards. They found Elizabeth in the act.
According to Thurzo's official report, Torturing a girl, 1
victim lay dead on the floor, her skin slashed open in
(25:35):
countless places. Another still alive, moaned in a
pool of her own blood. Several more captives were
discovered in underground chambers, chained to walls, half
starved and covered in open wounds.
The site was so horrific that even hardened soldiers vomited
and fell to their knees. Several accounts describe
(25:55):
seizing guards openly weeping now.
When she was caught, Elizabeth did not resist.
Instead, she reportedly looked up from her victim and calmly
remarked, What are you doing here, cousin?
As though they had interrupted her during an afternoon tea
(26:16):
rather than a human sacrifice. What the heck?
Yeah, just another day in the. Bathory Castle.
Yeah, typical Tuesday night. Yeah, the aftermath was as
calculated as the investigation itself.
Thurzo faced an impossible dilemma.
Publicly trying Elizabeth would mean shaming 2 of Hungary's most
(26:39):
powerful families, the bathoriesand the Nadasties.
A scandal on that scale could destabilize the fragile balance
of noble alliances. So Thurzo convened a meeting
with Elizabeth's relatives, including her son Paul and her
sons in law. They reached a grim compromise.
Elizabeth would be confined to her castle for the rest of her
(27:02):
life, and her accomplices would bear the brunt of public
punishment. Fucking figures, right?
Right. Her own family did not defend
her. They did not claim and claim
injustice or conspiracy. They accepted Thurso's evidence.
They chose to protect the family's reputation rather than
(27:24):
protect Elizabeth. On January 2nd, 1611, a trial
was held for Elizabeth's 4 closest servants, Ilona, Joe,
Doritaya, Caitlin, and Janos. The trial was brutal.
Torture was not only permitted but expected.
(27:45):
Ilona and Doritaya confessed to helping Elizabeth procure
torture and dispose of victims. They described the Countess's
obsession with cleanliness, how she would make them wipe away
every drop of blood before she would enter her Chamber of
suffering. They claim she delighted in
biting flesh from girls, particularly their faces, and
(28:09):
mocking them as she chewed. She supposedly sometimes sewed
their lips shut to silence theircries.
They also describe various custom built torture devices
including iron cages suspended from the ceiling, designed to
lower and raise victims into freezing or boiling water,
(28:30):
spiked rollers used to lay skin from the back, sharp iron
pinchers heated in the fire before being applied to the
thighs and the arms. Catalin, who played a lesser
role, was sentenced to life imprisonment.
Janos, due to his youth, was granted A Merciful beheading.
(28:52):
Merciful. Yeah.
Yeah. Alona and Doritaya were executed
in a gruesome spectacle, their fingers torn off with hot
pinchers before being burned alive at the stake.
The confessions collected voluntarily after torture would
be dismissed today, but in the 17th century they were accepted
(29:16):
as legal proof. Judicial torture followed a
logic that it is almost impossible for us to comprehend.
It was believed that the human body, under extreme pain, would
betray the soul's secrets. After the accomplice's deaths,
the Kingdom turned its focus back to Elizabeth.
Rather than face execution, Elizabeth was walled inside her
(29:38):
own chamber at the castle. The windows were bricked up,
leaving only a small slit through which food and water
were passed. She was not allowed visitors or
any correspondence. She basically became a living
ghost. According to the guards journal.
She spent her days pacing, muttering to herself, and
(29:59):
writing long letters, Letters that no one would read.
Once a powerful figure who controlled vast lands and
hundreds of lives, she was reduced to a prisoner in her own
fortress. Four years later, on August
21st, 1614, Elizabeth Bathory was found dead in her cell.
She was 54 years old. Her final words are unknown,
(30:22):
though. 1 legend claims she saidto herself I'm cold just before
lying down to sleep and never waking again.
Sounds like she had it pretty easy if you ask me.
Compared to, yeah. Compared to what she'd done, and
compared to like her alleged accomplices and servants had to
(30:44):
endure, the blood Countess Legend was born not from the
crimes themselves, but from the cock gossip, superstition, and
political necessity that surrounded her downfall.
Were there really bloodbaths? We have no contemporary evidence
of her bathing in blood. There are no credible accounts
(31:06):
or physical proof of that. The bloodbathing motif only
appeared decades after her death, likely a creation of some
sensational storytellers who found it easy to sell a vampire
narrative than to confront the more mundane yet equally
horrifying truth that a powerfulwoman using her absolute
(31:27):
authority to inflict unimaginable suffering simply
because she could. Elizabeth Bathory did not need
to be a literal vampire to be monstrous.
Her cruelty was human, and that's the scariest part.
And that's why I think her storycontinues to haunt us.
(31:47):
Not because she was a creature of the night, but because she
was a noble woman, bred in violence, corrupted by power,
and left unchecked until it was far too late.
When we think of a confession, we think of an emotional
outpouring, A suspect breaking down under the weight of guilt,
finally telling the truth. And our modern understanding a
(32:10):
confession is meant to be voluntary, untainted by coercion
or pain. But in early 17th century
Hungary, that and indeed across Europe, the concept was
profoundly different. Here, torture wasn't hidden, it
was formal and regulated as a part of their justice system.
(32:30):
So let's take a moment just to pause and understand the
philosophy behind this, because there's some debate right about
like, did the servants? Were they really involved or
whatever? Was it just torture that made
them say whatever they wanted tohear?
But medieval and early modern legal scholars believe that
(32:53):
humans were inherently sinful and deceitful.
The body, they argued, was a vessel of lies, and only under
extreme pain would the soul's truth emerge.
This wasn't just a barbaric when, it was part of their law.
The legal foundation of torture in Hungary and much of Europe
stem from Roman law, especially the constitutional criminalist
(33:15):
Carolina, the Criminal Code issued by Emperor Charles the
5th in 1532. This document set strict
guidelines for when and how to torture people.
Basically like here's the rules on torture.
It wasn't meant to be random or sadistic.
It was concerned a precise tool for validating evidence.
(33:37):
According to this document, torture could be applied if
there was something called half proof, substantial evidence that
did not yet amount to a conviction.
So they at least went in saying we have to have some sort of
evidence, you know, witness statements, circumstantial
evidence and suspicious behaviorof the accused all potentially
(34:02):
qualify under that. We're going to talk about
torture and execution real soon in a separate episode.
I got some land on that, but listeners may not know this and
we're going to talk about it more in depth on later episode.
But torture methods were classified by severity.
(34:23):
First came territorial intimidation, the display of
torture instruments, then non lethal pain was inflicted, such
as thumb screws. Speaking of.
Yeah. We've got an episode coming up
on that. I do a lot of this, sounds very
(34:43):
familiar. Yeah, Strepato, where prisoner
was suspended by bound hands behind their back or leg
crushing. Finally came methods likely to
cause permanent damage or death,like the rack or heated iron
implements. Crucially, confessions under
torture were not immediately valid.
The accused had to confirm them later, free from the immediate
(35:05):
pain. If they recanted, the process
began again though, so this loopcould go on and on until they
either confess or were just absolutely destroyed physically.
In Elizabeth Bathory's case, herfour main accomplices were not
(35:26):
nobles. They had no protection under the
Tripper Titan. They were expendable.
The judicial process was designed to break them, and it
succeeded. Ilona, Joe, Dorataya, and the
others confessed to unimaginableacts.
They describe burying bodies under floorboards, feeding
corpses to the dogs, and burningremains in the great hearth
(35:48):
fires to eliminate evidence. They detailed how Elizabeth
delighted in forcing girls to stand naked in icy water and
dance while being stabbed with needles if they faltered.
These confessions painted a picture of a household operating
as a sadistic machine, each accomplice playing a role, each
victim stripped of humanity. Some historians, as I sort of
(36:14):
am, like, I don't know how I feel about confessions under
torture, but some historians think that it should just be
entirely dismissed because how could you believe what anyone
says when they're being subjected to that level of pay?
But here's the dilemma. While we know torture leads to
false confessions, we also must grapple with the sheer volume of
(36:38):
corroborating evidence. In this case.
This includes what is testimonies, missing girls,
recovered remains, and letters from priests, all aligned to
support the admissions. And furthermore, even before any
torture began, rumors and reports had circulated for over
a decade. So priests were noted like they
(37:02):
had records. They kept records.
For years, peasant families had refused to send their daughters.
There was a lot of smoke coming from the castle lot.
A lot of smoke. For that time, not good.
Yeah, we also have to remember that this trial was not an
(37:23):
isolated incident in European history.
The use of fortress legal evidence was widespread.
So Bathory's accomplices were not considered witches.
They were servants. But the same psychological
mechanisms were at play here. Pain, isolation and fear rewired
their understanding of the truth.
(37:46):
Definitely. Elizabeth was never tortured and
she was not tried in open court.As a noble woman, she was
entitled to a different treatment.
Her family's deal with Thurzo ensured no public humiliation.
Instead, she was bricked into her own castle, a form of living
and two men. Historians often point to this
(38:07):
final arrangement as damning proof of her guilt.
Why would a powerful family allow such a fate for one of its
matriarchs if they believe that she was innocent?
The simplest answer is they saw the evidence with their own
eyes. They made a cold and strategic
choice to sacrifice her to preserve the family's wealth and
legacy. After the trial, the official
(38:30):
narrative shifted almost immediately.
Elizabeth's story began to transform even before her death.
The blood count test became a folk monster, her real crimes
embroidered into the fantastical.
By the mid 18th century, rumors of bloodbath appeared, as I
mentioned, echoing the vampire folklore which was already so
(38:50):
popular in Eastern Europe. These vampire tales served as
cultural metaphors, representations of aristocrats
feeding off of the lifeblood of the peasants.
Elizabeth's legend fit perfectlyinto the stark tapestry.
The question remains, do we accept these confessions as
fact, or do we see them as relics of a barbaric legal
(39:14):
system? The truth, as is often the case
in dark history, may lie somewhere in the middle.
We know violence occurred. We know what young woman died, a
lot of them. We know Elizabeth ruled with an
iron fist. And we also know the legal
machinery of the time was deeplyflawed and cruel.
(39:34):
In the end, perhaps it doesn't matter whether every confession
detail was true. The weight of evidence, corpses,
testimonies, and family betrayalsuggests that Elizabeth was no
innocent victim of a patriarchalconspiracy.
She was a woman who took the accepted cruelties of her class
to monstrous extremes and finally paid the price for
(39:57):
stepping too far beyond even those boundaries.
Thoughts. I, I have a lot of, I agree with
a lot of that. I don't even know where to
begin. I guess from the beginning we
(40:19):
have to realize where she comes from, that part of Europe.
I mean, like we mentioned in thebeginning, just an example of
how cruel and how just completely gruesome it was to
even live a normal life. Look at the life of Vlad the
Impaler. They're not that far separated
(40:41):
from that time frame either. And it was very bloodthirsty.
You had to show how powerful youwere to maintain what you did
have. The Ottomans were quite the
nightmare. And it's not surprising that,
you know, Transylvania or like Romania, hungry in that whole
(41:04):
section of Europe, had to reallyput up a big front and show that
they were strong, having to prove that they could do things
like we were talking about impaling people and leaving them
on the road as an example. And I do still think, though,
that a lot of it was dramatized later.
(41:26):
I agree that I think that a lot of that was stretched for
torture purposes. I agree that confessions under
duress are not the greatest. And then rumors and gossip after
the facts spread like wildfire and things always grow to
another dramatic level. So I believe that the reality of
(41:47):
Elizabeth Bathory is in the middle.
I do think that she was very cruel and I think that she
needed to be and it sets a. Course for.
Her, and you can tell that afterher husband passed away is when
things really got bad and it's kind of like a fear thing.
She wanted to maintain power. And I think having that example
(42:11):
of Game of Thrones is so perfect.
She's like the Cersei of Yura. She's like the Cersei's like
combined with Ramsey, it's like you could put those two
together. If they had a love child, it
would be Elizabeth Beth. Yeah, it's a scary thought.
(42:34):
Agreed. And I think her servants, I do
think that, yes, they knew things that happened.
They probably did help with somethings because they were made
to. Oh yeah, right.
Probably fucking terrified. Like if you don't, you know,
there's that mentality of who's really responsible here.
(42:56):
And yes, every person needs to take some accountability for
their own actions, but if you'rewitnessing these things and
you're in that position, I don'tknow what I would do.
I mean being afraid for your life and your only option for
(43:17):
survival is to make choices thata normal person would never want
to make or have to make. Right.
Something happens in your brain sometimes for some people when
you're faced with death. It doesn't excuse the behavior.
But yeah, I think they were. They were involved because they
(43:41):
didn't have a choice. They didn't have a choice like
you're going to die or be tortured.
Those are your choices. Yep, exactly.
You're going to help. Cover it up or you're going to
be in the pile with the rest of them.
Exactly, and to see how brutal things were, it's not surprising
at all, especially when she's taking on younger staff.
(44:07):
There was definitely a purpose for that.
She wanted to make sure that they were impressed upon, that
this was a reality and it's easier to manipulate a younger
individual. Yeah, this happened over the
course of decades and I don't know.
(44:30):
And the victim count, I'm sure the 600 is very, it's a lot.
It's a lot. I mean, I guess over the course
of time, is that feasible? I don't know.
Maybe, you know, she did open upthat the school at one point.
(44:52):
600 just seems like a lot. Even if you divided up over 20
years, that's couple victims every month.
Right. I don't know.
I don't know. It was a lot.
No matter what the number was, it was, it was a lot.
It was enough for those rumors to circulate and.
(45:16):
Definitely, yeah. And of course, you know, it's
like, OK, she didn't really get any sort of punishment at the
end, But since they were a pretty powerful family, of
course the family is going to choose to protect their name
over an individual, especially if it was a matriarch running a
(45:40):
facility like that. So I think that part of that was
also the case. And yeah, it's so hard to to
know, of course, the level. But like you said too, this is
very similar to the witch trialsas well.
I think there was a lot at play with this, and it wasn't
necessarily all her being the evil individual that they let
(46:05):
her to be. It was also to profit.
But yeah, yeah, I think it's a sweet middle.
This one, a lot going on on on this one for sure.
And we'll never really know the truth, but it is a different
perspective. I think, you know, because
there, there was one group of people that were just like, she
(46:28):
was absolutely just targeted, But I don't think that was the
case here. I I think she had that power and
influence for a long time. And it wasn't totally uncommon
for a Hungarian woman to step into that role.
So I don't see that as being like a smear campaign
(46:52):
necessarily. And I mean, everybody would have
had it been on it and been in onit, those stories that were
circulating about people missingand things that like everybody
would have had it been in on it,right.
So, yeah, yeah. Terrifying to think about, even
if part of that is true. If part of the torture and part
(47:16):
of the meth like Oh no. Yeah, terrible.
Yeah, super gruesome. I did not know about the
burnings. I knew about some of the other
stuff but oh definitely did not know about the honey thing
either that. Yeah, the one that got me was
the freezing the girls out in the on a winter night, like
(47:38):
repeatedly dousing them with. Water.
Yeah, that's very reminiscent oflast season when we talked about
Unit 731. Yeah, it's like, it's almost
like. She enjoyed testing people's
limits. Yeah.
And, you know, there were two incidents where they it was
(48:01):
mentioned that she was. She laughed and enjoyed and
like, the biting gets me, too. I can't.
Yeah, something. Definitely.
Snapped in her. That's.
For sure and if it. Was just a desperation attempt
because her husband passed away and it was one of those things
where she's like, I know that I'm done for now because I have
(48:25):
to go up. Against all of.
These other very, you know, wealthy aristocrats from around
my boundaries, let alone the Turks.
Like if I don't make my name look like a certain way, I'm
screwed. Kind of the same with with Vlad.
And notoriously that section of Europe was so much more brutal
(48:50):
in how they went about that kindof stuff versus places like
England. And of course, that was
something that they like fanaticized about of like, Oh my
gosh, the the terror, the horrorof, you know, this type of
torture, It's unfathomable. And so I don't think that that
(49:10):
helped either, having a different perspective coming
into it being like, whoa. And then everybody in Hungary
and Romania are like, you know, typical.
It's a typical Tuesday night, you know.
But. Yeah, either way, crazy.
So glad. That we live in the.
Time that we do, even though things are crazy sometimes,
(49:33):
right? And there are still crazy people
out there who do horrible thingsso that's just never going to
change unfortunately, right? Yeah, but yeah.
So what do we take away? One, don't do anything like
that. Just.
(49:54):
Don't access your. Power in that way.
OK there. There's way better ways to be
like you know what? I'm a woman and I.
Am in charge and I am powerful. Yeah, maybe not.
Take it. Take it to that level.
Don't, just still don't be a. Blood Countess.
Yeah, don't be cutting. And chopping.
(50:15):
And biting. And honey.
Dripping and freezing. And the throwing the pins and
the the back scratches from hell.
And yeah, you thought this. Was bad.
Just wait for the E episode. Oh yeah, just wait.
Well. Just wait for the.
C. Episode you want to know crazy
(50:36):
just wait I mean you might as. Well, give listeners a hint at
what's coming, all right? So.
C Strap your boots on because you're talking about Caligula if
you don't. Know who's strap to hear?
What? Strap your boots on your.
Little boots, because we're going to be talking about
(50:58):
Caligula, which literally means little.
Boots. Oh, does it I?
Didn't know well. Yeah, just just you wait.
That'll. Be.
That'll be a very. Comedic, that's.
Good 'cause it'll be. After it'll be after your
macabre feature, that'll be the next episode after that, which
(51:19):
will be a nice palate cleanser for everything that's happened
so far. Oh, definitely remember.
How We said we were going to bring the comedy.
Yeah, we're starting it. With C, Yep.
Oh well, listeners that is. All I have for you tonight,
today, this afternoon, whatever time it is, where you're at,
it's MC Cobb time and. It's.
(51:42):
Night time for me, so I'm going to say thank you for joining me
in the shadows tonight. This has been MC Cobb, a dark
history podcast. Until next time, sleep well and
remember, sometimes the most terrifying monsters wear human
faces. Goodnight.
(52:07):
Tuck your toes then. People, Yeah, tuck in your.
Feet keep those monsters away. Uh huh.
You don't want anything tickle in those toesies.
(52:52):
None.
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