Vlad the Impaler

Vlad III, commonly known as Vlad the Impaler or Vlad Dracula, was Voivode of Wallachia three times between 1448 and his death in 1476/77. He is often considered one of the most important rulers in Wallachian history and a national hero of Romania. From burning the old and sick alive to impaling tens of thousands of enemy soldiers, earning his fearsome nickname, Vlad the Impaler's bloodlust and cruelty was said to have inspired the most famous vampire of literature. In 1476 Vlad was ambushed by an Ottoman patrol and killed. He was reportedly decapitated, and his head was sent to the sultan in Constantinople as a trophy. Vlad was accidentally killed in battle by one of his own men in Dec of 1476 or Jan of 1477. When he was 11 years old, Vlad was sent to the court of the Ottoman sultan Murad II as a hostage. His father and elder brother were assassinated when he was 16, and Vlad spent the rest of his life fighting to claim his father's title.