Okay, so I just finished the second season of "Rise of Empires: Ottoman" which covers the story of Vlad "The Impaler" Dracula (yes, that Dracula), and to a lesser extent, his brother Radu. They were given to the Ottomans as political hostages to be killed if their father "misbehaved".
That gave me Thoughts about E&E! With Maedhros and Maglor, no matter how much they actually cared for the twins, were absolutely holding them as hostages; first to try and get the silmaril back, and then to deter pursuit by Gil-Galad. If he had tried to attack them in retribution for Sirion, all M&M would have to do is hold up a twin and a knife and Gil-Galad would have to back off.
Then, when they were given to Gil-Galad, he could have held them hostage as well, or else it could easily be misconstrued as that. Gil-Galad has a somewhat shakey claim to the throne, especially if you interpret the confusion about his father as in-universe or him being an illegitimate heir. Elrond and Elros likewise have a shakey claim to the throne. They are the great-grandsons of the last high king... through his daughter.
Gil-Galad COULD hold them hostage just to keep them under control and make sure they don't try to overthrow him in the confusion during the War of Wrath. Or, he could have genuinely been trying to make sure they were okay and they just misinterpreted it.
Back to the Ottomans, I think Elros parallels Vlad. He matured faster (in my mind) and more fully understood what was going on. Because of that, he had to deal with constant stress and anxiety, which takes a serious toll on the mind.
Perhaps, like Vlad, that shaped him into a very uncompromising person. As soon as Gil-Galad let him go/sent him away, Elros declared himself king of all Men. As king, he started making some... shady decisions regarding children (conscripting young boys, trying children as adults, refusing to show mercy to children on the other side, etc.) He received no mercy when he was a child. Why should they!?
Elrond matured much more slowly (again, in my mind) and was never really able to grasp the level of danger he was in. He was just swinging from caretaker to caretaker and trying to keep his sense of safety intact.
The mind, especially those of children, is EXCELLENT at twisting the facts until things are okay. Elrond didn’t focus on the fact that Maedhros held a knife to his throat to ward off Gil-Galad, he focused on the extra rations he got that night and the fact that HE was the one to save the camp from conflict. That rose-tinted view probably prevented him from examining what happened from an objective point of view until WELL into his adult life.
Gil-Galad may have offered Elrond the position of herald to a) quell rebellious whisperings that Elrond should be king instead of him, and b) to give Elrond a place in life where he FINALLY had some leverage. Elros, in his black and white view of the world, just saw it as another means of control. That was the biggest fight he and Elrond ever had.
How fucked up people can be when someone reads the excerpt from Chalkokondyles that explicitly states things like:
“it happened that the sultan was almost killed by the boy when he had wanted to have sex with him” (explicitly mentioned r*pe attempt),
“he [Radu] fought him off and refused to consent to intercourse with him” (explicitly mentioned lack of consent on one side),
and “the sultan kissed the unwilling boy, who drew a dagger and struck the sultan on his thigh” (explicitly mentioned physical attack of the victim in order to protect himself from being r*ped),
and then proceeds to glorify Radu’s relationship with Mehmed and portray them as happily and passionately in love?
And Radu was thirteen when this happened. Fucking. Thirteen.
Note: This is the “Hollywood” version of the story including many popular myths about Radu cel Frumos. How true some of these myths are will be further explored in later posts on this blog.
Do you want to hear a story?
It’s about Dracula.
No, not that Dracula, the real one.
No, not Vlad “the Impaler” Dracula. The other one. Radu “the Beautiful” Dracula.
There’s two Draculas! you say.
Well, actually there were three, (not including all the illegitimate Draculas) but I’m here to tell you about the youngest; Radu III cel Frumos.
A quick google search will tell you lots about this obscure Romanian noble – he was the Sultan’s “homosexual obsession”, “the man who killed Dracula”, the man who actually inspired Bram Stoker’s Dracula, a Muslim, a Christian, a weak-pushover and a strong military leader. In fact it will tell you so many things that you may ended up knowing nothing about him. In any case, let me try to give you an overview of the Hollywood highlights of the other Dracula’s life.
The 15th century Balkans
Radu was born sometime between 1437-1439, the third legitimate son of Vlad II Dracul. His father was Voivode (Prince) of Wallachia – barely. Despite being declared Voivode of Wallachia in 1431 Vlad Dracul hadn’t actually obtained the throne until 1436 because 15th century Balkan politics were a messTM.
Now, Vlad Dracul hadn’t been born with the name Dracul but had taken it after being indicted into the Order of the Dragon (Dracul=Dragon in Romanian). The Order of the Dragon was a Holy order of nobles founded to fight the enemies of Christendom - particularly the Ottoman Empire - and by taking the name Dracul Vlad proudly proclaimed himself as a member of this order. His sons, Radu and his two older brothers Vlad (later to be remembered as Vlad the Impaler) and Mircea, were consequently called Dracula meaning ‘Son of the Dragon’.
So, Radu’s early years were spent as a young Christian prince of a rather volatile country. However, Radu did not spend long in his Romanian homeland as by 1444 he, and his older brother Vlad, had been sent to the Ottoman court of Sultan Murad II as hostages.
The ruins of the Fortress of Eğrigöz in north-western Anatolia where Radu and Vlad spent their first few years as hostages before being relocated to the Ottoman capital at Edirne.
As hostages, the brothers were meant to ensure the loyalty of their father to the Ottoman Sultan and stop him from teaming up with Hungary in anti-Ottoman crusades under the threat that Sultan Murad would execute the boys. However, this did not stop Dracul from quickly betraying the Ottomans and assuming his sons dead (after all he still had his eldest son, Mircea, so Vlad and Radu weren’t that important).[1]
But luckily for Vlad and Radu, Murad had other reasons for keeping the boys alive. Through education and indoctrination he planned to raise the boys as good, loyal - and legitimate - future rulers of Wallachia.[2]
As a result the boys were well treated and educated by the finest tutors available, in logic, the Qu’ran, languages, horse riding, battle – all the necessary skills for great future rulers.
How Radu experienced these years in the Ottoman court is unclear. The general consensus is that whilst Vlad was just straight up not having a good time (often being whipped or beaten for being a bad student), Radu was more adaptive - but the consensus stops there. Depending on who you ask you might be told that he “was a compromiser, consumed by the pleasures of the palace” [3], a victim of Stockholm syndrome and “a weakling and a voluptuary, famous for his beauty” [4]. But others will say that he was an intelligent young man with both military and political promise.
However, a key part of his story that is often repeated, is that he was very good looking hence his nickname “cel Frumos” meaning “the beautiful” in Romanian. He attracted many admirers both male and female. Among them was Murad’s son, the future Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror. Although they had a rough start (their first kiss involved Radu stabbing Mehmed and then hiding up a tree) the two became very close and thanks to this relationship Radu gained much power at the court.[5]
Meanwhile, his relationship with his brother deteriorated and the two developed an intense hatred.[6]
At the end of 1447 the news reached the brothers that their father, Dracul, had been killed and their older brother, Mircea, had been buried alive by the Hungarians.[7] It was now time for Vlad, as the eldest, to take the Wallachian throne under the support of the Ottoman Sultan.
As Vlad left the palace of Edirne for Wallachia it would be more than a decade before he saw his younger brother again. And then it would be on the battlefield…
During this time Murad died and Mehmed took the Ottoman throne in 1451. Radu became a prominent figure in the Ottoman court, converted to Islam and played an important role in Mehmed’s conquest of Constantinople (maybe).[8]
However, his life at the Ottoman court ended in 1461 when Vlad (now Voivode of Wallachia) began actively rebelling against the Ottomans. Mehmed, who was busy trying to become the next Alexander the Great, did not have time for this. What he did have, was a perfect replacement for Vlad in the loyal Radu.
So, in Summer 1462 Radu and Mehmed crossed the Danube with 35,000 Ottoman soldiers against Vlad’s meagre 7-8,000.[9] Despite Vlad’s vicious scorched earth tactics and daring night attacks he stood no chance against the superior Ottoman forces and was forced to flee north. When Radu and Mehmed reached the Wallachian capital of Tărgovişte Vlad was long gone but had left a grisly gift that would earn him his nickname Ţepeş – the Impaler. Along the road to Tărgovişte he had planted a forest of impaled Ottoman soldiers that stretched for kilometres…[10]
A Saxon woodcut (c.1499) of Vlad enjoying a meal with some new garden ornaments. Despite the fact he definitely did impale people it’s worth remembering that a lot of the Saxon publications about him were essentially propaganda so take the image with a grain of salt.
Despite this horror, Radu took his place on the throne as Voivode Radu III. He ruled Wallachia for eleven years and by 15th century Balkans standards it was almost peaceful. Although he was supported by the Ottomans he managed to win the respect of the local Wallachian boyars (nobles) and maintain peace with Hungary (the other big regional power). However, his real trouble was with the third Romanian state – Moldavia - where Stephen the Great had come to the throne and was wanting to assert his dominance over the region. Stephen did not like Radu, mostly because of his pro-Turkish stance. In 1465 Stephen took control of the previously Wallachian port city of Chilia. There was a period of relative peace but then from 1470 onwards Radu and Stephen became engaged in a serious of border wars that ended with Stephen defeating Radu on November 18-20th 1473. Stephen marched into the Wallachia capital ready to place his own guy, Basarab Laoită, on the throne and Radu, like his brother before him (minus the forest of impaled people), was forced to flee the city leaving all his treasure, effects, clothing, wife and daughter behind.
Three weeks later Radu returned with Ottoman reinforcements and retook his throne (also his wife and daughter). Over the next year the throne continued to alternate between Basarab backed by Stepehn and Radu backed by the Ottomans until January 1475 when Radu was dethroned for the final time, presumably dying sometime soon after.[11]
The details are unknown but there are three main theories as to what caused his death and sudden absence from the historical record:
a) He was executed by Stephen the Great who was sick of having to dethrone him.[12]
b) He died of syphilis, “unloved and unmourned”[13]
c) He became a vampire[14]
My bets are on c)
-
The story of Radu is a good one. However, it’s also built on a lot of assumptions and blatant falsities that have been spread by academic and popular writers alike. Finding “The Truth” of Radu’s life necessitates a return to primary sources. But, how much of person can we really construct from a smattering of 15th century writings? And how much will we never know?
For answers to these questions and more keep an eye on this page...
References
[1] Davin Nicolle, Cross & Crescent in the Balkans: The Ottoman Conquest of Southeastern Europe. (Great Britain: Pen & Sword Military, 2010), 153.
[2] M. J. Trow, Vlad the Impaler: In Search of the Real Dracula. (United Kingdom: Sutton Publishing Ltd, 2003), 140.
[3] Romano, Will. ‘Vlad Dracula’s War on the Turks’. Military History; Herndon, October 2003.
[4] Franz Babinger, Mehmed the Conqueror and His Time (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1978), 207.
[5] Ibid.; Will Romano, “Vlad Dracula’s War on the Turks,” Military History, October 2003.; James Waterson, Dracula’s Wars: Vlad the Impaler and His Rivals. (Gloucestershire: The History Press, 2016) 111.; Radu R. Florescu and Raymond T. McNally. Dracula: Prince of Many Faces. (Boston, United States: Little, Brown and Company, 1989), 56.; Masson, Gemma Masson, “Dracula and the Ottomans,” Womenareboring, 15 March 2018. https://womenareboring.wordpress.com/2018/03/15/4286/.; Shibli Zaman, “How the Muslims killed Dracula.” Worldbulletin, 31 July 2013, https://www.worldbulletin.net/historical-events/how-the-muslims-killed-dracula-h114250.html.
[6] Dion Overtoun, “Radu Cel Frumos: The Queer Brother Nobody Cares Dracula Had,” Frightful/Filthy: The Writing of Dion Overtoun, 28 June 2017, https://dionovertoun.com/2017/06/28/radu-the-queer-brother-nobody-cares-dracula-had/.; Zaman, “How the Muslims killed Dracula.”; Florescu and McNally, Dracula: Prince of Many Faces, 59.
[7] Waterson, Dracula’s Wars, 111.; Florescu and McNally, Dracula: Prince of Many Faces, 56. ; Zaman, “How the Muslims killed Dracula.”; “Radu Cel Frumos,” Project Gutenberg, Acessed 30 September 2019, http://www.self.gutenberg.org/articles/Radu_cel_Frumos.
[9] Kent, Jasper. The Last Rite: (The Danilov Quintet 5). Random House, 2014.; Zaman, “How the Muslims killed Dracula.”; Masson, “Dracula and the Ottomans.”; Trow, Vlad the Impaler, 139.; “Radu Cel Frumos,” Wikipedia, Accessed 8 October 2019, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Radu_cel_Frumos&oldid=920222947. ; Philippe Lemaire, “Recherches sur le vampire,” Site de Philippe Lemaire, auteur de fantastique, Accessed 30 September 2019, https://sites.google.com/site/philip63lemaire/recherches-sur-le-vampire.; “Radu Cel Frumos.” ; Elest Ali, “Is “Dracula Untold” An Islamophobic Movie?” The New Republic, 25 October 2014, https://newrepublic.com/article/119991/dracula-untold-islamophobic.; Beyaz Arif Akbas, “Kim Bu Güzel Radu?” Milliyet Blog, Accessed 9 October 2019, http://blog.milliyet.com.tr/kim-bu-guzel-radu-/Blog/?BlogNo=402166.
[10] For a detailed explanation of the numbers involved in this campaign see - Adrian Gheorghe, “Understanding the Ottoman Campaign in Wallachia in the Summer of 1462. Numbers, Limits, Manoeuvres and Meanings,” in Vlad Der Pfähler – Dracula Tyrann Oder Volkstribun?, ed. Thomas Bohn (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2017), 11.
[11] Ibid, 30.;
[12] Franz Babinger, Mehmed the Conqueror and His Time (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1978), 339.; Tasin Gemil, Romanians and Ottomans in the XIVth to the XVIth Centuries, (Bucharest: Editura Enciclopedicã, 2009), 203.; Jonathan Eagles, “The Reign, Culture and Legacy of Ştefan Cel Mare, Voivode of Moldova: A Case Study of Ethnosymbolism in the Romanian Societies,” (University College London, 2011), 13.; Liviu Pilat and Ovidiu Cristea, The Ottoman Threat and Crusading on the Eastern Border of Christendom During the 15th Century. (Boston, United States: Brill, 2017), 143 – 145.
[13] Kurt W. Treptow, Vlad III Dracula The Life and Times of the Historical Dracula, (Oxford: The Center for Romanian Studies, 2000), 159.
[14] Trow, Vlad the Impaler, 208.; Waterson Dracula’s Wars, 184.
We have a wiki, but it needs a lot of work! When I found it, there were only four or five pages. I've written pages for Radu, Cyprian, and a stub template, so now we're up to eight, but it's still not a lot.
If you're interested in the series, or knowledgable about it, this is your time to shine! Check out the wiki, improve it, talk to me and give feedback! Anything is appreciated!
