Kringa — Jure Grando, the štrigon of Istria

OVERVIEW

Jure Grando Alilović (1578–1656) was a stonemason of Kringa, a small village near Tinjan in Istria, with a wife, Ivana, and two children. He was called a štrigon, a Venetian word for a sorcerer (compare Italian stregone) used here for something like a vampire and a warlock. The Carniolan scientist Johann Weikhard von Valvasor wrote about his life and afterlife in The Glory of the Duchy of Carniola after visiting Kringa — the article calls it the first written document on vampires.

HISTORY

By the legend, for sixteen years after his death Jure rose at night and knocked on doors around the village; from whichever house he knocked at, someone died within days. He appeared to his widow in her bedroom. The village priest, Father Giorgio, faced him with a cross; villagers led by the prefect Miho Radetić failed to pierce his heart with a hawthorn stake. Nine people then dug up the coffin and found the corpse perfectly preserved, smiling; the stake would not go in, and after prayers of exorcism Stipan Milašić sawed off the head. The corpse screamed and bled, and peace returned. His children fled to Volterra in Italy.

REPORTED ACTIVITY

LEGEND. Later retellings by Erasmus Francisci and Görres (1855) added sensational detail. The claim year is the decapitation in 1672, approximate. Kringa now embraces the legend.

VISITING

A village near Tinjan in central Istria.