The legends of vampirism, dragons and alchemy have always been linked in the collective unconscious of Eastern Europe. Two actual families are linked in legend to the threefold mythic complex. Both families are linked to the soil that they have there origins in. The first of these is the family Rakoczy, this family is listed as being invested with or being members of the Order of the Dragon. A figure of history known by the title the Count of Saint Germain gave his name as being Fenerc Rakoczy and was known to be an alchemist who had attained the secret of immortality. In the lore of Eastern Europe there is mention of a school of Alchemy known as the Scholomance; this school is also credited as being the source of vampirism in Eastern Europe. The teacher of this school was said to take the form of a dragon. This Count was seen never to eat in public and was known to dress mostly in black. The Count has been reported throughout history and the depictions of him remain consistent.

The second family is that of the Tsepesh aka Dracula, this family like the Rakoczy is listed as being invested with or being members of the Order of the Dragon. One member of the Tsepesh family, Vlad the 3 rd who was the Prince of Transylvania and due to his being a member of the Ordo Draconis often signed himself and was known as Dracula that is to say the son of the Dragon. In recorded legend many members of the Dracula family were credited with being graduates of the Scholomance making them alchemists. Both Vlad and Fenerc are said to be vampires in fiction.\

Given the similarity of both historical personages and the occult symbolism attached to both one could take the tact that both represent a specific vampiric-occult current? It is of interest to note that the vampirism linked to the Count of Saint Germain is cast in a less sinister light than that attached to Dracula. Saint Germain is thought by some to be an ascended master, while Dracula is seen as a type of the antichrist of Christianity. The contrast between the two personages goes to the fact that the tales of Dracula both in folklore and in fiction are told or written by those who view vampirism and its paradigm as being antichristian and therefore evil, while the tales told of Saint Germain are told from the perspective that vampirism its self is neither good nor evil.

The author views these two personages as being halves of the Eastern European draconic-vampiric current. While the dragon symbolism is quite overt in the case of the mythos of Dracula, it is less so in that of Saint Germain. The dragon symbolism in the mythos of Saint Germain is encoded in the device used by the Count as a personal symbol. The Count’s symbol is said to be both in fiction and history to be an image of eclipse. In many mythologies eclipses are linked to the idea that a monster, often a dragon, is said to swallow the sun. This idea of eclipse is also shown in the image of an oroborus, a version of which was the emblem of the Order of the Dragon as well as being on the banner of the Dacians whom both the Tsepesh and the Rakoczy trace their blood roots to, as does the Bathory Family who like the Tsepesh and the Rakoczy have been linked to at least one “historical” vampire. In the mythos of both, blood is taken by the vampire as part of a sexual or quasi-sexual exchange. In these two expressions of the archetype we see consumption of life force in one case in a predatory fashion and in the other the fashion is symbiotic.

Given these facts it is possible to see a single formula applied in two differing fashions. The principle at work is the same in both, the vampyre while preternatural requires renewal of its life-force through the blood or other biochemical medium to sustain its existence in the mundane world.

In the vampyric exchange the energy of both the donor, in the case of Saint Germain and the victim in the case of Dracula, and that of the vampyre are raised and brought into harmony. The vampyre in some manner creates an opening in its prey and takes the life- force into its self through its chosen medium. The subject is weakened and in this open state according to some the vampyre may infuse the energy of the prey with its own energy that will in time make the subject as its self, that is to say undead.

Is it not possible that at times the vampyre may have recourse to either approach to its feeding, just as the leopard is at times a predator and at others a scavenger? It all depends on the nature of the prey and the disposition of the vampyre in question. This contrast is reconciled in the principle of Ne-hast or resurrection that is composed of enlightenment and endarkment in equal measure as the vampyre as per this concept is able to choose to some degree its approach to feeding. Truth has two equal parts to its path, Enlightenment being the pursuit of knowledge and Endarkment being the pursuit of power. This unified duality is perfected in the western image of the dragon who is the guardian of treasure and virginity, i.e. power and immortality while also being the embodiment of Chaos and destruction, these last two could be viewed as types or symbols of evolution which is enacted in the steps of Alchemy. The dragon then, whether overt as in Dracula or covert as the eclipse in Saint Germain, represents the vampyric ideal of the primitive and the modern being one whole. The dragon is the pursuit of the alchemist free of its intellectual veneer in which the person of the vampyre is both the crucible and the stone that yields the gold of immortality and power which are the means to complete the Magnum Opus or Great Work.