Dead Hungarian Scholar Logs onto Facebook!

Well, well, well.

Look who went and got a new admin!

Yes, that's right, the VRS Facebook group (as covered here and here) - under the direction of Sean Manchester - have decided to recruit the services of one "Arminius Vámbéry". That is, the same bloke I revealed to be a blatant plagiarist.

Evidentially, he's now helping fuel the VRS Propaganda Machine with regurgitated posts.

Vampire scholars may be familiar with the real Arminius Vámbéry (1832-1913) from his link to author of Dracula (1897), Bram Stoker. Here's what Vámbéry's Wikipedia entry says about it:

Vámbéry knew Bram Stoker and is believed by some biographers to have acted as his consultant on Transylvanian culture. The character of Professor Van Helsing in Stoker's novel, Dracula, is sometimes said to be based on Vámbéry, though there is no real evidence of this supposition. In the novel (chapter 23) the professor refers to his "friend Arminius, of Buda-Pesth University".

But, as renowned Dracula scholar, Elizabeth Miller, notes in Dracula: Sense & Nonsense (Westcliff-on-Sea, Essex: Desert Island Books Limited, 2000, p. 31):

There is no reason to believe that Arminius Vambery was the source for any of Stoker's knowledge about vampire lore. While it is unlikely, Stoker and the Hungarian professor might have talked about vampires; Vambrey might have sparked Stoker's interest sufficiently to send him scurrying off to the library to find some books. To say that he did is irresponsible.

Seriously, how much more desperate can the VRS get to further their "cause"? I mean, recruiting dead Hungarian scholars into their ranks? Come on!

Oh, and as of this writing, their Facebook page has a total of "179 members".