vamper

[Eng. vamp (1), v.; -er.] 1. One who vamps; one who patches or pieces old things with something new. 2. One who vamps musical accompaniments. văm-pěr, v. i. [A nasalized form of vapor (q. v.).] Το vapor or swagger. ( Scotch .) văm'-pire, s. & a. [Fr., from Ger. vampyr, from Serv. wamper, wampira; Pol. upior; Ru . upir =a vampire.] A. As substantive: I. Literally: 1. A kind of nocturnal demon, supposed to eat out the hearts and souls or suck the blood of its victims. This superstition had its rise in the desire of savage animism to account for the fact that certain patients are seen becoming, day by day, without any apparent cause, thin, weak, and bloodle , and is found among the Karens, in Polynesia, and in the Malay Peninsula. But it is in Slavonia and Hungary that these demon bloodsuckers have their special home, and it is from these countries that their name of "vampire" is derived. According to Tylor, there are two theories of vampirism. The first is, that the soul of a living man, usually a sorcerer, leaves its own body and goes forth, in the visible shape of a straw or a piece of fluff, and attacks its sleeping victim. Should the sleeper awake and clutch the embodied soul, he may through it have his revenge by maltreating or destroying its bodily owner. The second theory is that the soul of a dead man goes out from its buried corpse to suck the blood of living men. The corpse, thus supplied by its returning soul with blood, is believed to remain unnaturally fresh, supple and