• 1047  First appearance in written form of the word upir (an early form of the word later to become "vampire") in a document referring to a Russian prince.

• 1190  Walter Map's De Nagis Curialium includes accounts of vampire-like beings in England.

• 1196  William of Newburgh's Chronicles records several stories of vampire-like revenants in England.

• 1431  Vlad Tepes, the son of Vlad Dracul, is born in Romania.

• 1436  Vlad Tepes becomes Prince of Wallachia and moves to Tirgoviste.

• 1442  Vlad Tepes is imprisoned with his father by the Turks.

• 1447  Vlad Dracul was beheaded.

• 1448  Vlad breifly attains the Wallachian throne. Dethroned, he goes to Moldavia and he freinds Prince Stefan.

• 1451  Vlad and Stefan flee to Transylvania.

• 1453  Constantinople falls.

• 1456  John Hunyadi assists Vlad Tepes to attain Wallachian throne. Vladislav Dan is executed.

• 1458  Matthias Corvinus succeeds Hunyadi as King of Hungary.

• 1459  Easter massacre of boyers and rebuilding of Dracula's castle. Bucharest is established as the second governmental center.

• 1460  Attack upon Brasnov, Romania.

• 1461  Successful campaign against Turkish settlements along the Danube. Summer retreat to Tirgoviste.

• 1462  Following the battle at Dracula's castle, Vlad flees to Transylvania. Vlad begins 13 years of imprisonment.

• 1475  Summer wars in Serbia against Turks take place. November: Vlad resumes throne of Wallachia. 

• 1476  Vlad is assassinated. 

• 1560  Elizabeth Bathory is born. 

• 1610  Bathory is arrested for killing several hundred people and bathing in their blood. Tried and convicted, she is sentenced to life imprisonment. 

• 1641  Elizabeth Bathory dies. 

• 1645  Leo Allatius finishes writing the first modern treatment of vampires, De Graecorum hodie quirundam opinationabus. 

• 1657  Fr. Francoise Richard's Relation de ce qui s'est passé á Sant-Erini Isle de l'Archipel links vamparism and witchcraft. 

• 1672  Wave of vampire hysteria sweeps through Istra. 

• 1679  A German vampire text, De Masticatione Mortuorum, by Phillip Rohr is written. 

• 1710  Vampire hysteria sweeps through East Prussia. 

• 1725  Vampire hysteria returns to East Prussia. 

• 1725-32  Vampire hysteria linger in Hungary. The wave of vampire hysteria in Austrian Serbia produces the famous cases of Peter Plogojowitz and Arnold Paul (Paole). 

• 1734  The word vampyre enter the English language in translations of German accounts of the European waves of vampire hysteria. 

• 1744  Cardinal Guiseppe Davanzati publishes his treatise, Dissertazione sopra i Vampiri. 

• 1746  Dom Augustin Calmet publishes his treatise on vampires, Dissertations sur les Apparitions des Anges des Démons et des Espits, et sur les revenant, et Vampires de Hundrie, de Boheme, de Moravie, et de Silésie.

• 1748  The first modern vampire poem, Der Vampir, is published by Heinrich August Ossenfelder.

• 1750  Another wave of vampire hysteria occurs in East Prussia. 

• 1756  Vampire hysteria peaks in Wallachia.

• 1772  Vampire hysteria occurs in Russia.

• 1797  Goethe's Bride of Corinth (a poem concerning a vampire) is published.

• 1798  Samuel Taylor Coleridge writes Cristabel, now conceded to be the first vampire poem in English.

• 1800  I Vampiri, an opera by Silvestro de Palma, opens in Milan, Italy.

• 1801  Thalba by Robert Southey is the first poem to mention a vampire in English.

• 1810  Reports of a sheep being killed by having the jugglar veins cut and their blood drained circulate through northern England. The Vampire by John Stagg is published.

• 1813  Lord Byron's poem The Giaour includes the hero's encounter with a vampire.

• 1819  John Polidori's The Vampire, the first vampire story in English, is published in the April issue of "New Monthly Magazine". John Keats composes The Lamia, a poem built on ancient Greek legends.

• 1820  Lord Ruthwen ou Les Vampires by Cyprien Berard is published anonymously in Paris. June 13: Le Vampire, the play by Charles Nodier, opens at the Theatre de la Porte Saint-Martin in Paris. August: The Vampire or, The Bride of the Isles, a translation of Nodiers Play by James R. Planché, opens in London.

• 1829  March: Heinrich Marschner's opera, Der Vampyr, based on Nodier's story, opens in Leipzig.

• 1841  Alexey Tolstoy publishes his short story, Upyr, while living in Paris. It is the first modern vampire story by a Russian.

• 1847  Bram Stoker is born. Varney the Vampire by Thomas P. Prest begins lengthy serialization.

• 1849 In France, the petty officer first class François Bertrand comes tried in order to have taken from many tombe the corpses in order to suck the blood.

• 1851  Alexandre Duma's last dramatic work, Les Vampire, opens in Paris.

• 1854  The case of vampirism in the Ray family of Jewett, Connecticut, is published in local newspapers.

• 1872  Carmilla is written by Sheridan Le Fanu. In Italy, Vincenzo Verzeni is convicted of murdering two people and drinking their blood.

• 1874  Reports from Ceven, Ireland, tell of sheep having their throats cut and their blood drained.

• 1888  Emily Gerard's Land Beyond the Forest is published. It will become the major source of information about Transylvania for Bram Stoker's Dracula.

• 1894  H.G. Wells' short story, The Flowering of the Strange Orchid, is a precursor to science fiction vampire stories.

• 1896  The first film comes turned in France on the vampiri: Le Manoir du Diable, directed by George Méliès.

• 1897  Dracula by Bram Stoker is published in England. The Vampire by Rudyard Kipling becomes the inspiration for the creation of the vamp as a stereotypical character on stage and screen.

• 1912  The Secrets of House No. 5 is produced in Great Britain.

• 1913  Dracula's Guest by Bram Stoker is published.

• 1920  Dracula, the first film based on the Stoker's novel, is made in Russia. No copy has survived.

• 1921  Hungarian filmmakers produce a version of Drakula directed by Karoly Lajthay.

• 1922  Nosferatu: Eine Simphonie des Grauens, a German-made silent film produced by Prana Films and directed by Friedrich W. Murnau, is the third attempt to film Dracula.

• 1924  Hamilton Dean's stage version of Dracula opens in Derby. Fritz Harmann of Hanover, Germany, is arrested, tried and convicted of killing more than 20 people in a vampiric crime spree. Sherlock Holmes has his only encounter with a vampire in The Case of the Sussex Vampire.

• 1927  February 14: Stage version of Dracula debuts at the Little Theatre in London. October: American version of Dracula starring Bela Lugosi, opens at Fulton Theatre in New York City. Tod Browning directs Lon Chaney in London After Midnight, the first full-length feature film.

• 1928  The first edition of Montague Summers's influential work The Vampire: His Kith and Kin appears in England.

• 1929  Montague Summers's second vampire book, The Vampire in Europe, is published.

• 1931  January: Spanish film version of Dracula is previewed. February: American film version of Dracula with Bela Lugosi premiers at the Roxy Theatre in New York City. Peter Kurten of Dusseldorf, Germany, is executed after being found guilty of murdering a number of people in a vampiric killing spree.

• 1932  The highly acclaimed movie Vampyr, directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer, is released.

• 1936  Dracula's Daughter is released by Universal Pictures.

• 1942  A. E. Van Vought's Asylum is the first story about an alien vampire.

• 1943  Son of Dracula (Universal Pictures) stars Lon Chaney, Jr., as Dracula.

• 1945  John Carradine plays Dracula for the first time in The House of Dracula

• 1953  Drakula Istanbula, a Turkish film adaptation of Dracula, is released. Eerie No. 8 includes the first comic book adaptation of Dracula.

• 1954  The Comics Code banishes vampires from comic books. I am Legend by Richard Matheson presents vampirism as a disease that alters the body.

• 1956  Don Siegel play Invasion of the Body Snatchers, from Jack Finney's novel The Body Snatchers, script of Sam Peckinpah. John Carradine plays Dracula in the first television adaptation of the play for Matinee Theatre.

• 1957  Kotetsu no kyojin, the first Japanese vampire film, is released. The first Italian vampire movie, I Vampiri, is released. American producer Roger Corman makes the first science fiction vampire movie, Not of This Earth. El Vampiro with German Robles is the first of a new wave of Mexican vampire films.

• 1958  Hammer Films in Great Britian initiates a new wave of interest in vampires with the first of it's Dracula films, released in the U.S. as The Horror of Dracula. First issue of Famous Monsters of Filmland signals a new interest in horror films in the United States.

• 1959  Plan 9 From Outer Space by Ed Wood is Bela Lugosi's last film.

• 1961  Ahkea Khots is the first Korean adaptation of Dracula.

• 1962  "The Count Dracula Society" is founded in Los Angeles by Donald Reed.

• 1963  El parque de juegos (Park of Games) is the first Spanish-made vampire movie.

• 1964  The Munsters and The Addams Family, two horror comedies with vampire characters, open in the fall television season.

• 1965  Jeanne Youngson founds the "Count Dracula Fan Club". The Munsters, based on the television show of the same name, is the first comic book series featuring a vampire character.

• 1966  Dark Shadows debuts on ABC afternoon television.

• 1967  April: in episode 210 of Dark Shadows, vampire Barnabas Collins makes his first appearance.

• 1969  First issue of Vampirella, the longest running vampire comic book to date, is released. John Landon e Des Roberts plays in a Laurence Merrick production of Dracula. Does Dracula Really Suck? (a.k.a. Dracula and the Boys) is released as the first gay vampire movie.

• 1970  Christopher Lee stars in El Conde Dracula, the Spanish film adaptation of Dracula. Sean Manchester founds "the Vampire Research Society".

• 1971  Marvel Comics releases the first copy of a post-Comics Code vampire comic book, The Tomb of Dracula. Morbius, the Living Vampire, is the first new vampire character introduced after the revision of the Code.

• 1972  The Night Stalker with Darrin McGavin becomes the most watched television movie to that point in time. Vampire Kung-Fu is released in Hong Kong as the first of a string of vampire martial arts films. In Search of Dracula by Raymond T. McNally and Radu Florescu introduces Vlad the Impaler-Dracula, to the world of contemporary vampire fans. True Vampires of History by Donald Glut is the first attempt to assemble the stories of all historical vampire figures. Stephen Kaplan founds the "Vampire Research Center".

• 1973  Dan Curtis Productions' versions of Dracula (1973) stars Jack Palance in a made-for-television movie. Nancy Garden's Vampires launches a wave of juvinle literature for children and youth.

• 1975  Fred Saberhagen proposes viewing Dracula as a hero rather than a villain in The Dracula Tape. The World of Dark Shadows is founded as the first Dark Shadows fanzine.

• 1976  Interview With a Vampire by Anne Rice, is published. Stephen King is nominated for the World Fantasy Award for his vampire novel, Salem's Lot. "Shadowcon", the first Dark Shadows convention, is organized by Dark Shadow fans.

• 1977  A new dramatic version of Dracula opens on Broadway starring Frank Langella. Louis Jourdan stars in the title role in Count Dracula, a three hour version of Bram Stoker's book on BBC television. Martin V. Riccardo founds the "Vampire Studies Society".

• 1978  Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's Hotel Transylvania joins the volumes of Fred Saberhagen and Anne Rice as a third major effort to begin a reappraisal of the vampire myth during the decade. Eric Held and Dorothy Nixon found the "Vampire Information Exchange".

• 1979  Based on the sucess of the new Broadway production, Universal Pictures remakes Dracula (1979), starring Frank Langella. The band Bauhaus's recording of Bela Lugosi's Dead becomes the first hit of the new gothic rock music movement. "Shadowgram" is founded as a Dark Shadows fanzine.

• 1980  "The Bram Stoker Society" is founded in Dublin, Ireland. Richard Chase, the so called Dracula killer of Sacramento, California, commits suicide in prison. "The World Federation of Dark Shadows Clubs" (now the "Dark Shadows Official fan club") is founded.

• 1983  In the December issue of Dr. Strange, Marvel Comics. "Dark Shadows Festival" is founded.

• 1985  Released Fright Night, mix of horror and humour. The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice is published and reaches best seller lists.

• 1986  Vamp, featuring Grace Jones, is released.

• 1987  Joel Schumacher play The Lost Boys.

• 1989  Overthrow of Romanian Dictator Nikolai Ceaucescu opens Transylvania to Dracula enthusiasts. Nancy Collins wins a Bram Stoker Award for her vampire novel, Sunglasses After Dark.

• 1991  Vampire: The Masquerade, the most successful of the vampire role-playing games, is released by White Wolf.

• 1992  Bram Stoker's Dracula directed by Francis Ford Coppola opens. First movie Buffy the Vampire Slayer, starring Kristy Swanson. Forever Knight, based on the Nick Knight telefilm, debut. Innocent Blood, by John Landis, is released. Andrei Chikatilo of Rostov, Russia, is sentenced to death after killing and vampirizing some 55 people.

• 1994  The film version of Anne Rice's Interview With a Vampire opens with Tom Cruise as Vampire Lestat and Brad Pitt as Louis.

• 1995  Four vampire movies are released: The Vampire in Brooklyn, Dracula: Dead and Loving It, Nadja, and The Addiction. Pam Keesey edits Dark Angels, an anthology of lesbian vampire fiction.

• 1996  Opens Jim Wynorski's Vampirella, a sexy movie, and the first of three movies From Dusk Till Dawn by Robert Rodriguez, script of Quentin Tarantino.

• 1997  TV version of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, starring Sarah Michelle Geller, debuts.

• 1998  John Carpenter play Vampires, from John Steakley's novel.

• 2000  John Malkovich and Willem Dafoe stars in Shadow of the Vampires, Elias Merhige's movie.

• 2002  From Bram Stoker's classic story, debuts on RAI television the mini-series Dracula's Curse, with Giancarlo Giannini direct Roger Young.

•      

accounts as recollected in The Vampire Book: The Encyclopedia of the Undead (from Styx, with added and modifications).