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Welcome to the Serial Killer Podcast, the podcast dedicated to serial killers. Who they were, what they did, and how.
I am your Norwegian host, and tonight we are back in the Holy Roman Empire, over 400 years ago. Last week, we left Ersebet as she was growing ever more desperate. Her late husband's funds were running out. His armed forces were no longer to be relied upon to protect her and her estates.
And first of all, her famous beauty was fading as age started to ravage her body. This episode is, thanks to you, dear listener, 100% sponsored ad free. It is financed solely by my very loyal patrons, who are helping to produce the show via Patreon. As I have mentioned in the last couple of episodes,
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Feel free to post reviews, comments, or questions there. Imagine, if you will, dear listener, a grey sky hanging over a small muddy village in Eastern Europe 400 years ago. If you are my age, and if you happen to have someone in your bloodline hailing from that area,
They would be your great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather or mother. It was, in other words, a very long time ago. But the voices and actions of those men and women echo into our own era. Civil war in the 17th century Europe was not uncommon.
And in 1604, the Hungarian king and Holy Roman Emperor, Rudolf II, experienced this first hand. For one thing, the common people had been violently oppressed for centuries. Their anger and desperation was growing every day. Conscripting them in rebellion against their ruler was not particularly difficult. The emperor was of the House of Habsburg.
and their troops and mercenaries were routinely sent into Hungary in order to secure the Emperor's holdings, i.e. his castles, quite often, and perhaps particularly now that Count Nadasti no longer was the Emperor's personal creditor, him being dead and all, these troops were simply not paid for their services.
The troops then took out their own frustration on the local population, burning villages and towns, raping women, raping children, and killing the men as they saw fit. Countess Bathory experienced this first-hand herself, as imperial troops commandeered one of her many manor homes, barred entry to her castle, and looted her lands.
In Transylvania, not far away, Protestant landowners, those times middle class, one might say, were often falsely accused of treason and rebellion. They were summarily tortured and executed, often in a gruesome fashion. A common method of execution in Transylvania for traitors was for centuries impalement.
Impalement was an extremely painful and often drawn-out way to die. A contemporary account of such an execution follows. They lay the malefactor upon his belly, with his hands tied behind his back. Then they slit up his fundament with a razor, and threw into it a handful of paste that they have in readiness, which immediately stops the blood.
after that they thrust up into his body a very long stake as big as a man's arm sharp at the point and tapered which they grease a little before when they have driven it in with a mallet till it come out at his breast or at his head or shoulders
They lift him up, and plant this stake very straight in the ground, upon which they leave him so exposed for a day. One day I saw a man upon the pole, who was sentenced to continue so for three hours alive, that he might not die too soon. The stake was not thrust up far enough to come out at any part of his body.
and they also put a stay or rest upon the pole, to hinder the weight of his body from making him sink down upon it, or the point of it from piercing him through, which would have presently killed him. In this manner he was left for some hours, during which time he spoke, and turning from one side to another, prayed those that passed by to kill him,
making a thousand wry mouths and faces because of the pain he suffered, when he stirred himself. But after dinner the commander sent one to dispatch him, which was easily done, by making the point of the stake come out at his breast, and then he was left till next morning, when he was taken down because he stunk horridly and quivered.
The reason the Catholic Habsburgs went after the Protestants of Transylvania was not just religious. A more mundane cause was simply that they could confiscate their lands. Protestant churches were also confiscated, with ministers and townspeople forced to convert to Catholicism. All across Central Europe, the Habsburgs were oppressing Protestants.
even though the late Count Nadasti and his wife, Countess Bathory, had been loyal subjects to the Emperor. She was a Protestant, and now under enormous threat. This increasing harassment, oppression, and persecution culminated in the 1604 uprising.
Since 1599, the Transylvanian throne had been held by a Habsburg general, a certain Giorgio Basta. His orders from the Holy Roman Emperor were clear. Drive out all Turks, abolish Protestantism, and turn Transylvania into a Catholic country by any means.
Basta took on this task with gusto and sent his imperial troops to carry out his orders. Up until 1604, Basta terrorized the local population with random killings, burnings, rapes, and confiscations. A Protestant nobleman, a cousin of Erzsébet, named Istvan Bokskay, rallied enough disgruntled soldiers, farmers, and Ottoman Turks to launch a rebellion.
They managed to clear Transylvania of imperial troops in less than a year and were taking aim at Vienna itself. Istvan wanted to get rid of the Habsburg reign once and for all. Protestants across the region from Transylvania all the way up to Vienna were encouraged by Istvan's success and joined in on the rebellion. In the spring of 1605,
The rebellion was directly affecting Countess Bathory. The Turks in Istvan's employ regularly took noblemen as hostages for ransom. A noblewoman under Countess Bathory, Susanna Vagi, wrote a petition to Lady Bathory on behalf of her husband, Ferenc Vatai. She was willing to purchase a Turkish prisoner in exchange for her husband.
but a deal required a sponsor of substance. Countess Bathory took pity on the woman, and wrote to Ferenc Bacchiani for his assistance in the matter. Her letter reads as follows. I write at your grace's service, wishing all good things for my son, my lord. I wish also, your grace, that God grant you a happy and healthy life. Poor Ferenc Bacchiani was taken prisoner,
with the hope of assistance that he be freed from captivity. His poor wife, having no other means, has beseeched us for the prisoner's release, which your grace would show a favor, and that doing good works unto God, your grace would release a prisoner by whom would yet liberate Ferenc Fatai.
I ask your grace to be of all good assistance to us and take into account the issue of a prisoner exchange. God grant your grace long life and good health. Dated from our Sarvar, 9th day of March, 1605. Wishing your grace goodwill and forever at your service, Ershibet Bathory. End quote.
Meanwhile, Istvan's rebel troops were becoming more and more unpredictable. The locals were becoming equally afraid of Istvan's troops, as they were of the Habsburgs.
Countess Bathory and other area nobles were forced into the difficult position of deciding whether to support the unruly and unpredictable Bucksky rebels, and thus risk a charge of treason for doing so, or remain faithful to the honor of Habsburgs.
In June of 1605, Countess Bathory herself wrote to Bathiani for his advice on whether she should send a representative to Gergel Nemeti, one of Istvan's rebel leaders. Her tone was urgent, which is unsurprising considering a wrong choice could prove fatal. The letter reads as follows.
"'Your Grace, regarding Gergal Nemeti, it must be resolved whether to send a letter and arrange a meeting. Your Grace, I ask you to show your great love and indicate what I should do in this matter, and hereby authorize what you conclude for me and what I should do, Your Grace.'
Write yet in haste, I know that your grace wishes good for myself and all my children, and would not wish any evil upon us. Your grace, send your good answer in haste. May the Lord God protect and keep you, and grant you good health this year. Dated at Levka, the 1st of June, 1605.
P.S. Your Grace, I ask that you please write whether to do this or not, because I have had to do everything by myself. May this letter you send arrive to me. I look forward, sir, to your Grace's hasty reply. —Ershebet Bathory. But Yanni advised the Countess to remain openly loyal to the Holy Roman Emperor at all costs, and the Countess obliged.
This did not result in her lands being completely overrun by Istvan's rebels, but his unruly Hajduk troops did loot and burn Countess Bathory's town of Tsetje, but they spared her castle. It was clear that the threat against Countess Bathory was growing, following her decision to remain loyal to the crown.
She wrote another letter to Ferenc Batjani, where she urgently asks for help in protecting her castle in Sarvar. I'll not read the whole letter, but the PS at the bottom lays out the situation fairly clearly. I quote...
Sarvar and all the surrounding areas are indeed threatened. I do not know what will follow, that if this week they shall want my protection, because we ourselves, the protectorate, are few."
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$45 upfront payment equivalent to $15 per month. New customers on first three-month plan only. Taxes and fees extra. Speeds lower above 40 gigabytes per detail. Hey, I'm Ryan Reynolds. Recently, I asked Mint Mobile's legal team if big wireless companies are allowed to raise prices due to inflation. They said yes. And then when I asked if raising prices technically violates those onerous two-year contracts, they said, what the f*** are you talking about, you insane Hollywood a**hole?
So to recap, we're cutting the price of Mint Unlimited from $30 a month to just $15 a month. Give it a try at mintmobile.com slash switch. $45 upfront payment equivalent to $15 per month. New customers on first three month plan only. Taxes and fees extra. Speeds lower above 40 gigabytes in details. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. As a family man with three kids, I know firsthand how extremely difficult it is to make time for self-care.
But it's good to have some things that are non-negotiable. For some, that could be a night out with the boys, chugging beers and having a laugh. For others, it might be an eating night. For me, one non-negotiable activity is researching psychopathic serial killers and making this podcast. Even when we know what makes us happy, it's often near impossible to make time for it.
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Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash serialkiller today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash serialkiller. In the late July of 1605, Ershabett's own brother, Istvan Bathory, died. She hurried back to the family seat in Exed for the funeral.
Amidst the chaos of war, the strain of another funeral only a year after her dearly departed husband, evidently all this proved too much for Elisabeth. She mentally snapped, and according to witnesses, she viciously attacked the handmaids who rode with her in her carriage. The attack was so vicious that girls later died as a result of their wounds.
On her way back from her brother's funeral at Exed, she tortured a nobleman's young daughter at length. The girl died and was buried midway on the return journey. Erzsébet Bathory was by now turning into the figure most people know of her from legend and history. Pushed to the edge of sanity by the stress of war and unburdened by her husband's command regarding murder, no longer in effect,
She went on more and more killing sprees. Within a year of Count Nadastey's death, the death toll had risen to nearly two hundred murdered young girls. War ravaged the lands, both Count Bathory's and most of the eastern part of Emperor Rudolf's empire. It was also becoming clear that the Emperor was losing his mind.
As his provinces burned around him, he preferred to lock himself away, dabbling with his hobbies. His hobbies included tending to his horses, repairing and collecting clocks, and science. Science back then was not modern science. It consisted of a hodgepodge of actual science and occult rituals, alchemy and astrology.
With the war effort going badly, Emperor Rudolf's brother, Archduke Matthias, and Georgi Thurzo finally stepped in to fix things. They began peace talks with the rebel Istvan Boktskaj, a truce was called in February of 1606, which was followed by the 23rd of June historical treaty called Peace of Vienna.
The treaty guaranteed constitutional as well as religious rights for Hungarians in both Hungary and Transylvania. It acknowledged Bokskay as voivode of Transylvania and recognized Transylvania as an official country, guaranteeing the Transylvanians the right to elect their own independent rulers.
Nobles who had sided with Bokskai were granted full pardons, and in Hungary the office of Palatine was restored. Both the Lutheran and Calvinist faiths were officially recognized, and for his part in the negotiations, Thurzo would be appointed Palatine in 1609. The Habsburgs also promised to pay reparations of 200,000 thalers,
approximately $7.2 million in today's value, to the Ottoman Turks. Emperor Rudolf was not happy with this treaty, but he had little choice but to agree to it as long as Istvan Bokskay was alive. However, in late December of 1606, Istvan was poisoned by his own chancellor.
Rudolph immediately began to nullify all of the laws resulting from the peace of Vienna. Archduke Matthias, the emperor's brother, worked behind the scene to overthrow the emperor. Nobles were contacting him, begging for him to act, but he advised them to conduct business as usual until his plans for a coup would come to fruition.
The unstable Rudolf was planning an all-out war with the Ottoman Empire, which would have been devastating. Armed with 15,000 men, Matias moved on Rudolf and overtook him. The stunned emperor ceded the Hungarian, Moravian, and Bohemian crowns to Matias, and he was summarily named Matias, King of Hungary, in 1608.
In the same year, Erzsibet Bathory's nineteen-year-old cousin, Gabor, took over the Transylvanian throne by his own military seizure of power. With the rebellion finally over, Countess Bathory returned to the ordinary administration of her estates, and took to repairing the damage that had been done.
This took its toll on her finances, and although she was in constant litigation with the imperial crown to get back what it had loaned from her late husband, no money was ever given. Her funding was drying up quickly. She was desperate, and started to sell off items and property in an attempt to raise cash. In 1610, she sold Beckhove Castle,
but she could only get a meager two thousand gulden for it. As we covered earlier, two thousand gulden was about two million US dollars, quite a bargain for a fully equipped castle with surrounding lands. As a result of the conflict, her poor finances, and her slipping diplomatic skills, her relationship with the Palatine Thurso grew increasingly cooler. He had several daughters he was marrying off,
But a countess had to be asked several times before she grudgingly relented and attended one of the Thurzo weddings. The stress of this social engagement proved too much for her. After the wedding, the return trip, through the freezing and desolate countryside, became unbearable for her female staff. One of the young maids tried to escape, which could, of course, not be tolerated.
Contemporary witnesses recount how the young servant girl was taken to the nearby village of Predmere, where she was stripped naked in the bitter cold, and then she was forced to stand up to her neck in the river water, and repeatedly doused in more water until she froze to death. The countess tended to mete out punishments that reflected on the supposed crime,
A typical example is when a servant girl was accused of stealing a coin, Erzsébet had it heated red-hot and then pressed into the young girl's hand. In November of 1608, Countess Erzsébet Bathory attended the coronation of Matyas as the King of Hungary and Croatia. The return trip from the coronation at Bratislava was not uneventful.
Some of Erzsabet's young servant-girls were yet again the subject of her wrath, resulting from the mounting stress. They were burned with molten iron, and some of them died as a result. It appears that the more uncomfortable the visit or social engagement, the worse the fate inflicted upon her victims would be.
It is famously said that the Blood Countess was obsessed about her age and appearance, especially after her husband's death. She would sit in front of a mirror for hours on end, and, if in a rage, she would go on to smash every single mirror in the house. As a young woman, she was famous for her beauty—
One of the few portraits of Erzsébet that have survived to this day show a young woman with a high forehead. Her dark hair is pulled back, and she is wearing a lighter weight summer dress, perhaps in occasion of her birthday in August. She has brown eyes and a slightly pouty mouth with distinct eyebrows. As she was now a middle-aged woman, her looks started to fail when she found out something remarkable—
After striking a young girl so hard that her blood splattered all over her face, she noticed after drying it off that her skin was revitalized and youthful. She did not waste any time and soon started to drain servant girls' bodies completely of all their blood so that she could bathe in it. Initially, according to legend, the blood baths worked well,
But peasant blood soon lost its anti-aging properties, and Erzsébet started to look for other, more potent sources. As we covered earlier, back then it was seen as a fact that noble blood was physically different than peasant blood. Erzsébet thus began to seek out highborn girls in order to prepare a stronger anti-aging remedy.
I don't know.
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And with that, we leave 17th century Austria-Hungary for now and return to our postmodern 21st century. But fair not, dear listener. Next week, I will bring to you a fresh new installment in the Blood Countess saga. As you perhaps have guessed, we will then explore Erzsébet's legendary bloody skin treatments even further.
So, as they say in the land of radio, stay tuned. I have been your host, Thomas Weibog Thun, and this podcast would not be possible if it had not been for my dear patrons who pledge their hard-earned money every month. There are especially a few of those patrons I would like to thank in person. These patrons are Sandy, Maud, Amber,
You guys really helped produce this show. And you have my deepest gratitude. Thank you. As always, I thank you, dear listener, for listening.
Please feel free to leave a review on your favorite podcast app, my Facebook page at facebook.com slash the SK podcast or Reddit. And please do subscribe to the show if you enjoy it. Thank you. Good night and good luck.
