Vlad Tepes 002 - Public domain portrait painting

Who was Vlad the Impaler? Vlad the Impaler is also known as: Vlad III Dracula, or Vlad III Draculea and Vlad Tepes in Romanian. Vlad was a Romanian voivode, a military governor or ruler, of Wallachia in the 15th century. His cruel methods of punishing his enemies made his name infamous in history. He was responsible for killing over 80,000 people in his lifetime, 20,000 of those at least through a method of torture and death called impalement. Impalement is a gruesome and cruel death. Vlad the Impaler is known for impaling over 20,000 people. It is thought that Vlad the Impaler was the inspiration for the character Dracula in Bram Stoker's fictional horror novel, Dracula, published in 1897.