Thanks to literary and cinematic classics like Bram Stoker’s Dracula and F W Murnau’s Nosferatu, the legend of the vampire has pervaded all across the world today.

However, it’s easy to forget that these tales were rooted in ancient superstition and popular folklore (the creation of Dracula was said to have been inspired by the real-life warlord Vlad the Impaler, for example) and at one time, they were treated far more seriously than mere popcorn-fodder.

The 2023 discovery of a mass burial site of 450 individuals in a sleepy Polish town is testament to that fact – especially since many of the cadavers were dismembered as part of anti-vampiric rituals and practices popular at the time.

The mass grave was stumbled upon by roadworkers in the hamlet of Luzino in northeast Poland, who were excavating the land to expand the thoroughfare. During the course of their labours, they unearthed the remains of hundreds of individuals near a church.