June 30, 1937
București, Kingdom of România
After I wasted several days in the archives, the only additional mentions of any kind of ring associated with Vlad the Impaler I uncovered were merely in passing and related to a militant organization called the Order of the Dragon. It was founded in the Kingdom of Hungary by the Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund twenty years before Vlad was born and was, in fact, the reason his father was given the sobriquet of “Dracul” (“the Dragon”) and why the Impaler was called Vlad Dracula (“son of the Dragon”).
This dragon society was open to only a select few aristocrats, church officials, and politicians. It was modeled after the Order of Saint George, whose legendary defeat of a dragon was used as the order’s symbol. The order to which Dracul, the father, and Dracula, the son, both belonged had a purpose: to drive out the Turks from Eastern Europe and to protect the Catholic church from pagans.
Funny, that last part. Documents mention a special dragon ring being given in ceremony to Vlad’s father upon joining this aristocratic society—a ring that was rumored to have occult powers. After Vlad’s father died, the Impaler inherited the order membership.
Did he also inherit his father’s occult dragon ring?