Christopher Lee

The BBC is the latest adaptation of Dracula was one of the highlights of The Holiday season, when it appeared on the TV about the New Year .

The Image of the blood-sucking Transylvanian nobles has become a cultural icon, inspiring everything from The Nine Hammer-horror-films of The Twilight series of novels for young adults, and TV series, from Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Count Duckula .

Bram Stoker , the Gothic novel appeared in 1897, was an Irishman, and Dracula fans have long sought connections to the vampires in the author's home.

One possible connection is in the St. Patrick's Church of Ireland Church in Monaghan town.

Lucy Westenra - Dracula's beautiful teenage victims - is one of the Central figures in the novel.

Westenra is certainly an unusual name. It is also the name of The Local Superiority landowning family, also known as the Rossmores.

And in The Church there is a memorial sculpture portrays the death-bed of a young woman.

It is a dramatic scene, known as The farewell glance, in which The Woman is desperate, man restrained by a friend.

The sculpture of Mary Ann Westenra, from her grieving husband, Lord Warner William Westenra, was dedicated.

Bram Stoker was an inspector of Petty Sessions, before he thought for a writer, and it is, he would have visited Monaghan in his work.

The theory says, to conjure up that Stoker saw the sculpture and The Image of the young woman and the Westenra name, the character of Lucy.

"It may be as simple as he was, on his lunch break and went to The Church ," said local historian, Sinead O'reilly.

Dracula connection was ideal for Monaghan tourism, she added.

"I've searched and searched, but I've never been able to find a connection between Stoker and the Westenras," admitted Ms O'reilly.

Monaghan-based actor Martin Markey recalled, in a local production of Dracula in the Westenra Arms Hotel in Monaghan in the 1980s.

"At one point I was pointed to The Church with a bat on my hand and I knew it," he said.

Mr. Markey says, it is potential to be more of the Dracula connection.

"I, one day, we can use a Bram Stoker festival, creating hope here in Monaghan," he said.

Bob Curran, a retired lecturer from the University of Ulster is. He has a unique perspective on the Dracula story that combines the ancient and the modern.

"Dracula" is Irish," he said, not a trace of doubt in his voice.

He should know that books like vampires: A field guide to The Creatures That stalk The Night , The Werewolf manual and The Truth about the Leprechaun .

According to Mr Curran, Stoker had based an interest in Irish folklore and the character of Dracula on a Celtic chieftain named Abhartach, who is buried in the townland of Slaughtaverty between Garvagh and Dungiven in County Londonderry .

The story goes that Abhartach was a bully, who terrorizes The Local peasantry. Attempts to kill him failed, and he shows up again and again, demanding a bowl of blood every Time .

He was one of the "night of the walking dead," said Mr Curran explained. In the end, the tyrant was executed by a sword of yew wood and buried the head, which seemed to put an end to his life after the apparitions.

according to The Legend , was Mr. Curran, well known in Irish literary circles.

"Lady Wilde, Oscar Wilde 's mother, undoubtedly knew, and Stoker was a regular visitor to the Wilde's house in Dublin," he said.

The Academic , the other theory is that Dracula is a social commentary on the conditions in Ireland in the late 19Th Century . Dracula is a well-hated of the landlords, whose power, by The Local peasantry.

"All of The Elements of Ireland, and you are not looking at a horror novel, but a novel, current issues, and contemporary Ireland," he explained.

Dracula is on Bbc Iplayer until the end of January 2020. Catch-up

Source of news: bbc.com