{"id":120206,"date":"2024-10-30T21:57:52","date_gmt":"2024-10-30T14:57:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hotvideos24.online\/?p=120206"},"modified":"2024-10-30T21:57:52","modified_gmt":"2024-10-30T14:57:52","slug":"the-blood-countess-was-called-the-most-prolific-female-serial-killer-of-all-time-but-researchers-have-a-new-theory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hotvideos24.online\/?p=120206","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;The Blood Countess&#8221; was called the most prolific female serial killer of all time, but researchers have a new theory"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <script async src=\"https:\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js?client=ca-pub-3711241968723425\"\r\n     crossorigin=\"anonymous\"><\/script>\r\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\"\r\n     style=\"display:block\"\r\n     data-ad-format=\"fluid\"\r\n     data-ad-layout-key=\"-fb+5w+4e-db+86\"\r\n     data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-3711241968723425\"\r\n     data-ad-slot=\"7910942971\"><\/ins>\r\n<script>\r\n     (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\r\n<\/script><br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"\">\n<p>More than 400 years after her death, the truth about &#8220;the Blood Countess,&#8221; a Hungarian noblewoman alleged to have been the most prolific female serial killer of all time, remains elusive.<\/p>\n<p>From her castle atop a rugged peak in what is today \u010cachtice in western Slovakia, Elizabeth B\u00e1thory was alleged to have tortured and killed up to 650 young women and girls, sparking gruesome legends that she delighted in bathing in the blood of her victims in the belief it would help her retain her youth.<\/p>\n<p>Rumors of B\u00e1thory&#8217;s cruelty spread throughout the Kingdom of Hungary in the early 17th century, and after a royal inquiry, four of her servants were convicted of murder and brutally executed. The Blood Countess was arrested and confined to the walls of her castle until her death in 1614. \u00a0<\/p>\n<figure class=\"embed embed--type-image is-image embed--float-none embed--size-medium\"><span class=\"img embed__content\"><img alt=\"Slovakia Bathory Legend \" height=\"414\" width=\"620\" class=\" lazyload\" srcset=\"https:\/\/assets1.cbsnewsstatic.com\/hub\/i\/r\/2024\/10\/30\/cddd5895-a2cf-48cd-b63c-34362b1f847a\/thumbnail\/620x414\/7c2d9d60c34b558a48f2859b384092a8\/ap24299536748888.jpg?v=17b612a59ff4c1e4774d3d0d3ec005e8 1x, https:\/\/assets1.cbsnewsstatic.com\/hub\/i\/r\/2024\/10\/30\/cddd5895-a2cf-48cd-b63c-34362b1f847a\/thumbnail\/1240x828\/78d30f094ab844575e886037bd63046b\/ap24299536748888.jpg?v=17b612a59ff4c1e4774d3d0d3ec005e8 2x\"\/><\/span><figcaption class=\"embed__caption-container\"><span class=\"embed__caption\">A painting of Elizabeth Bathory is seen in the Draskovic museum in Cachtice, Slovakia, Sunday, Oct. 20, 2024.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>                  <span class=\"embed__credit\"><\/p>\n<p>                Bela Szandelszky \/ AP<\/p>\n<p>                          <\/span><br \/>\n              <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>B\u00e1thory&#8217;s macabre story has captivated imaginations, and invited speculation, for centuries, spawning books, films, television series and local legends. But some researchers have cast doubt on whether she was truly responsible for the alleged savagery and suggest that as a wealthy and powerful woman in late Renaissance Europe, she herself may have been the victim.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"newsletter_signup \">\n<figure class=\"embed embed--type-newsletter-widget embed--float-none embed--size-large embed--type-iframe\" data-ads=\"{\" wordcount=\"\">\n<\/figure>\n<\/aside>\n<p>&#8220;Was B\u00e1thory a serial killer who was tormenting and torturing 650 young women for nothing more than her pleasure?&#8221; asked <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/news\/uk-england-cambridgeshire-69057709\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Annouchka Bayley<\/a>, a British author and academic who recently published a novel about the wealthy countess. &#8220;I&#8217;m very convinced that it is, as we put it in England, a stitch-up job.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Bayley, author of &#8220;The Blood Countess&#8221; and associate professor of arts and creativities at Cambridge University, says the popular narrative of B\u00e1thory as a serial killer relies on a &#8220;woman as monster&#8221; trope that is not supported by the available evidence.<\/p>\n<p>Instead of a murderer, she argues, Bathory may have been a subversive figure who was a threat to the kingdom&#8217;s power structure, especially given evidence that she taught many young women to read and may have owned a printing press &#8211; radical acts during the period in which she lived.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"embed embed--type-image is-image embed--float-left embed--size-small\"><span class=\"img embed__content\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/assets3.cbsnewsstatic.com\/hub\/i\/r\/2024\/10\/30\/8c4677ac-b7d5-4578-ae8e-5c43bff4b83f\/thumbnail\/620x1061\/1eea3f8d3f9816c235bc707d6a846810\/gettyimages-1454211594.jpg?v=17b612a59ff4c1e4774d3d0d3ec005e8#\" alt=\"Elizabeth Bathory \" height=\"1061\" width=\"620\" srcset=\"https:\/\/assets3.cbsnewsstatic.com\/hub\/i\/r\/2024\/10\/30\/8c4677ac-b7d5-4578-ae8e-5c43bff4b83f\/thumbnail\/620x1061\/1eea3f8d3f9816c235bc707d6a846810\/gettyimages-1454211594.jpg?v=17b612a59ff4c1e4774d3d0d3ec005e8 1x, https:\/\/assets3.cbsnewsstatic.com\/hub\/i\/r\/2024\/10\/30\/8c4677ac-b7d5-4578-ae8e-5c43bff4b83f\/thumbnail\/1240x2122\/87f75d1316b72a02b595cd5380df2bf9\/gettyimages-1454211594.jpg?v=17b612a59ff4c1e4774d3d0d3ec005e8 2x\"\/><\/span><figcaption class=\"embed__caption-container\"><span class=\"embed__caption\">Countess Elizabeth Bathory de Ecsed (7 August 1560 &#8212; 21 August 1614) was a countess from the renowned Bathory family of nobility in the Kingdom of Hungary. She has been labeled the most prolific female serial killer in history, although the number of murders is debated, and is remembered as the &#8220;Blood Countess.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p>                  <span class=\"embed__credit\"><\/p>\n<p>                Apic\/Bridgeman via Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>                          <\/span><br \/>\n              <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>&#8220;You have to remember, these are the years of the Reformation and the Counter-Reformation where people were being burned at the stake for their heretical beliefs. The printing presses, which had started flourishing across Europe, were giving people much wider access to information, and this was seen as very dangerous,&#8221; Bayley said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;There&#8217;s enough for me to go, whoa, hold on a minute. Let&#8217;s just pause here and investigate.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>B\u00e1thory, born into an aristocratic family in 1560, married a wealthy Hungarian nobleman, Ferenc N\u00e1dasdy, in 1575, and the couple controlled major wealth and lands across the kingdom. N\u00e1dasdy was a prominent soldier and key figure in wresting back control of numerous Hungarian lands that had been occupied by the Ottoman Empire.<\/p>\n<p>But after N\u00e1dasdy&#8217;s sudden death in 1604, B\u00e1thory inherited his lands and wealth and commanded a &#8220;Jeff Bezos-style huge fortune,&#8221; according to Bayley.<\/p>\n<p>It was that fortune and position of power that Bayley and other scholars have pointed to as a potential motive for other powerful figures of the time to seek to destroy B\u00e1thory and seize her wealth.<\/p>\n<p>B\u00e1thory&#8217;s refusal to remarry following her husband&#8217;s death, and her activities in educating young women &#8220;would send alarm bells ringing of anyone in power,&#8221; Bayley said.<\/p>\n<p>Skepticism over B\u00e1thory&#8217;s guilt is not limited to academia &#8211; the question can still be polarizing in the Slovakian village of \u010cachtice where the atrocities were said to have taken place. Uncertainty over where B\u00e1thory is buried has also bred speculation. She is thought to be interred in a crypt beneath the local church, but there have been rumors that her body was later moved, and the church has not allowed an excavation.<\/p>\n<p>A local museum dedicated to the countess in \u010cachtice, and groups of tourists and villagers who ascend the rocky hills to the castle above the town are testaments to the power her legend still holds over the region.<\/p>\n<p>But Ivan Pisca, a local farmer, said the power of B\u00e1thory&#8217;s story may be waning as generations come and go.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;There are legends about Elizabeth B\u00e1thory, relatively bloodthirsty ones about the young girls she tortured and then killed,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Older people believe these tales, but the younger people may know a little less about them.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Bayley believes that popular culture throughout the centuries has held an undue fascination with the most gruesome and violent narratives, and that history has often stigmatized powerful women.<\/p>\n<p>With a &#8220;counter-narrative&#8221; of B\u00e1thory&#8217;s story, she said, she hopes to provide a measure of justice for her and all others that history may have unfairly condemned.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;She deserves better, we all deserve better,&#8221; Bayley said. &#8220;Is justice for B\u00e1thory 500 years later, &#8216;She didn&#8217;t do it&#8217;? Or is justice for B\u00e1thory actually the undoing of the monster trope for all women and for all men?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>    <!-- data-recirc-source=\"queryly\" --><\/p>\n<aside class=\"component list recirculation component--type-recirculation \">\n<p><h3 class=\"component__title\">More from CBS News<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n<\/aside>\n<p><!-- tags --><\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js?client=ca-pub-3711241968723425\"\r\n     crossorigin=\"anonymous\"><\/script>\r\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\"\r\n     style=\"display:block\"\r\n     data-ad-format=\"fluid\"\r\n     data-ad-layout-key=\"-fb+5w+4e-db+86\"\r\n     data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-3711241968723425\"\r\n     data-ad-slot=\"7910942971\"><\/ins>\r\n<script>\r\n     (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\r\n<\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><div data-type=\"_mgwidget\" data-widget-id=\"1660802\">\r\n<\/div>\r\n<script>(function(w,q){w[q]=w[q]||[];w[q].push([\"_mgc.load\"])})(window,\"_mgq\");\r\n<\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/news\/blood-countess-elizabeth-bathory-slovakia-serial-killer-new-theory\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>More than 400 years after her death, the truth about &#8220;the Blood Countess,&#8221; a Hungarian noblewoman alleged to have been the most prolific female serial killer of all time, remains &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/hotvideos24.online\/?p=120206\" class=\"more-link\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-120206","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-world","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hotvideos24.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120206","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hotvideos24.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hotvideos24.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hotvideos24.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hotvideos24.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=120206"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hotvideos24.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120206\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hotvideos24.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=120206"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hotvideos24.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=120206"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hotvideos24.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=120206"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}