Part one of term paper
Throughout history the legend of the vampire has been used to "explain" other natural phenomena that primitive people who lacked scientific knowledge could not otherwise explain. Such medical conditions such as Anemia, Catalepsy, and especially Poryphyria were much easier to explain away with superstition than with rational thought. It is p ...

Part two of term paper
... In times before there was widespread scientific knowledge, the sufferer could be buried alive, thought to be dead. When the victim "awoke" they would frantically try to escape their early grave, in the process getting their own blood on their hands from trying to claw their way out. This might also explain the accounts of corpses unearthed after several days to be found as if newly dead, because they were. Corpses unearthed during the Black Death(Bubonic Plague), rooted firmly the ideas of bloo ...