Reviews for The blood countess : Murder, betrayal, and the making of a monster
Library Journal
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In this deeply researched, revelatory biography, Puhak (The Dark Queens) shatters the horrific centuries-old legend surrounding the Hungarian noblewoman Elizabeth Bathory. Instead of "the Blood Countess" who tortured and murdered hundreds of servant girls, bathing in their blood to preserve her youth, Puhak discovers a shrewd, strong-willed widow whose vast landholdings and religious convictions made her a target for ambitious men. Puhak identifies the conflict between Lutherans and Calvinists in Reformation Europe as central to the smear campaign waged against Bathory and to the subsequent misinterpretations of the evidence used against her. This flimsy evidence, consisting of hearsay and the confessions of servants obtained through violent interrogations, conflated folk remedies and Calvinist burial practices with torture and its cover-up, establishing a portrait of the countess that played upon common superstitions and justified the seizure of her lands. VERDICT Puhak's level-headed analysis of the evidence, grounded in historical context, exposes the tragic ease with which a powerful woman may be attacked through innuendo and misinformation. Given the fame of the Blood Countess Bathory, this should be a popular acquisition.—Sara Shreve
Publishers Weekly
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This striking account from poet and historian Puhak (The Dark Queens) separates the true story of Hungarian noblewoman Elizabeth Bathory from her blood-soaked mythology. For centuries, Bathory (1560–1614) has featured in popular folklore as a vampiric figure, a result of the gruesome crime she was imprisoned for in 1610—the torture and murder of 650 women—as well as embellishments added in later written accounts of her supposed exploits, such as that she bathed in virgins’ blood. Scouring the archives, Puhak instead finds Bathory, an outspoken widow from an influential family, to have been betrayed via “a remarkably successful disinformation campaign” by male religious leaders and fellow nobles, including her own in-laws, who sought to usurp her power. The author meticulously refutes the charges against Bathory, including the list of 650 victims (likely cribbed from “a popular true-crime story”) and the term “carnifex” applied to her in letters between two Lutheran pastors, which probably meant “someone who was not fasting properly” rather than “butcher” as her detractors asserted. The author also intriguingly hypothesizes that the accusations willfully misconstrued women’s medical care as evil. Bathory, she suggests, employed female herbalists who used “plant-based medicine” to treat local women’s ailments; thus, alleged torture victims being “rolled in nettles” were actually patients being treated for “inflammatory conditions.” It’s a stunning feminist reconsideration of one of history’s most reviled villainesses. (Feb.)
Kirkus
Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
A feminist debunking of the myth of a monstrous Renaissance noblewoman. Countess Báthory Erzsébet—or Elizabeth Bathory, as she’s referred to in English and throughout this book—was, until recently, theGuinness Book of World Records champion of serial killers, with 650 possible victims, all virginal young women and girls allegedly dispatched to provide the blood that Bathory bathed in to sustain her youth. Her legend inspired horror films, and a Swedish death metal band borrowed her surname as a sign of its extreme badass-ness. But since the 1980s, scholars have taken a closer look at the historical evidence to uncover a story unlikely to satisfy the bloodlust of a true crime or horror fan. Through close reading of Bathory’s many letters and various contemporary accounts, poet and writer Puhak uncovers a thoroughly pre-modern Renaissance woman, well bred and well read, from a distinguished ancient family. Unusually, for a woman of that time, when her war-hero husband apparently died of the plague, Bathory assumed her husband’s political roles in the counties where their vast estate lay and in the national parliament in Bratislava, all while maintaining her traditional tasks as lady of the manor and ward of a finishing school for noblewomen and courtiers-to-be. She was known for her keen interest in what the Hungarians calligazság. “This refers to truth and justice in the broadest sense,” Puhak writes. Elizabeth was considered “someone with a strong ethical sense…who would fight for what was morally right and not just politically expedient.” How did she wind up with such a ghastly reputation? It’s a complicated story involving Machiavellian intrigue between Catholics and Protestants, Calvinists and Lutherans, Hungarians and Germans, Europe and the Ottoman Empire, and, of course, powerful men stymied by a strong woman. Admirably clear-eyed history related in crystalline prose. Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
