52. Special Episode: Elizabeth Bathory Commits Serial Murder, Castle of Csejte, Hungary 1590-1610

There was only one contemporary portrait of Elizabeth Bathory, and it was stolen in the 1990’s. This is a copy, which was made about 100 years later. In this painting of her in her youth, it’s obvious that she was quite good looking. Nevertheless. She did not bathe in blood so as to keep her good looks. That got made up some time after her death. Sorry.

(Special Episode — Post-Medieval!) Between 1590 and 1610 (probably), Elizabeth Bathory tortured and killed girls and women (probably).  When all of that got stopped, she was arrested — but never accused — and four of her servants were arrested, tortured, and put on trial.  Three of them were executed, and the last imprisoned for life. Elizabeth was put under house arrest. She was never accused, she never went to trial, and she died of natural causes. What. The. Hell. We discuss the scanty evidence, we discuss the mushrooming of the Stories About Her Horrible Badness, and Michelle’s rabbit hole concerns current tourism in Slovakia, which is making a killing (ha ha) from tours of the ruins of her castle, and selling really dark red wine. Since one of the stories is that she bathed in blood to keep her good looks. She didn’t.  But she was indeed very badly behaved.

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