Sign in

Coffin Boffin

@coffinboffin.bsky.social
1.1K followers 116 following 503 posts

Dr Sam George, Open Graves Open Minds Project. Gothic Enchantment. Books on Vampires, Wolves, Fairies, Unruly Plants, Shadows. herts.academia.edu/SamGeorge

PostsRepliesMedia
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 15h
IGNIS FATUUS or Will o’ the Wisp. A corpse candle that haunts pathways with a flickering light. This phenomenon is used in Bram Stoker's #Dracula; a flickering blue flame is seen by Harker on his carriage journey through the wolf-infested forest to Castle Dracula #31daysofHalloween #Spooktober
12511
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 12/10/2026
LILITH 1895 #Vampire novella by George MacDonald who inspired Tolkien & the Inklings. Mr Vane ventures through a mirror into another world where he encounters the immoral desires of #vampire Lilith and the satanic shadow that manipulates her #Spooktober
Lilith by George MacDonald
0276
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 12/10/2026
IRISH MYTH of FALLEN FAIRIES 'FAIRIES are the FALLEN angels who were cast down by the Lord God out of heaven for their sinful pride. Some fell into the sea & some on dry land & the devil gives these knowledge & power ' Lady Wilde, 187I #MythologyMonday #31daysofHalloween
Fairy/Angel, Highgate Cemetery, UK.
0344
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
Dirk Puehl @wunderkammertales.eurosky.social · 11/10/2026
"The Bat-Woman" 🎨 Alfredo Edel (1890) #Spooktober
111021
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
DRACULA NOTEBOOKS Stoker’s handwritten #Dracula notebooks were sold to Sotheby's in 1913 ( now held in the Rosenbach Museum). The novel is the result of 7 years research. The page where he works out the attributes of his #vampire is endlessly fascinating for writers & scholars #31daysofHalloween
page from Stoker's research notes for Dracula
03410
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
TREATISE on VAMPIRES & REVENANTS By Calmet, a Benedictine Monk who lived through the European #vampire epidemic in the eighteenth century. It was translated across Europe as The Phantom World in 1850. Image is my 1993 reprint with cover illustration by Frank Papé #SpookySunday #31daysofHalloween
0554
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
The Ghost Monk @theghostmonk.bsky.social · 11/10/2026
A dramatic scene from the six-volume 'Casquet Of Literature' compiled by James Gibbon and Marie Elizabeth Christie in 1895. Anyone like to guess the story? I suppose some website could find it but I prefer human interaction (as apposed to AI or ghostly!) #SpookySunday #Ghost
A ghost in a long gown, a skull showing through its veil begins to leave a bed chamber, looking down at the prostrate woman on the floor. A man in bed is covering his face in horror.
1335
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
Mika Paananen @painmike1.bsky.social · 02/08/2026
Adelaide Claxton, “The Party on the Stairs”(1875). #SpookySunday
Adelaide Claxton, “The Party on the Stairs”(1875).
127867
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
Dirk Puehl @wunderkammertales.eurosky.social · 11/10/2026
"The Evening" 🎨 Charles Dana Gibson (1899) #SpookySunday #Spooktober
211523
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
Matthew Meyer @yokai.com · 11/10/2026
A-Yokai-A-Day for October 11 Plenty of scary stories feature premonitions of one's own death. However, not too many of them feature children predicting their own posthumous funerary name. 📜✍️ #ayokaiaday www.patreon.com/theyokaiguy/...
patreon.com
A-Yokai-A-Day: A Matter Difficult to Determine as Not Being Supernatural | Matthew Meyer (The Yokai Guy)
Tonight's story came to Negishi Yasumori from Andō Sōtai, who told him the story a few days back about the mysterious grave with a posthumou
0226
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 11/10/2026
VAMPIRES & SUNLIGHT #31DaysofHalloween There is no precedence in folklore for the idea that #vampires burn up in sunlight. This trait comes to us via film, arriving as an iconic moment in F. W. Murnau's 'Nosferatu' 1922. 🎨 Vampire Burning at Dawn, Hernan Conde de Boeck; Orlok #SpookySunday
vampire burning at dawnOrlok's death scene, 1922 Nosferatu.
0567
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 11/10/2026
BEWARE of FAIRY FOOD on #HALLOWEEN It is transformed by their use of GLAMOUR & is likely made up of weeds or rotten fruit. Fairies themselves prefer stalks of heather & the milk of red deer. 🎨Fairy Banquet: Rackham #FolkloreSunday
Arthur Rackham, Fairy Banquet
1337
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
HISTORY OF VAMPIRES The Histoire des vampires et des spectres malfaisans (1820) was written by French demonologist Jacques-Albin-Simon Collin de Plancy & based on prior 18th-century treatises, local European folklore, and historical #vampire panics #31daysofHalloween Image: second edition, 1820.
1820 history of vampires (French)
0287
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
This looks epic. Would love to present something on Polidori for this!
0103
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
DRACULA NOTEBOOKS Stoker’s handwritten #Dracula notebooks were sold to Sotheby's in 1913 ( now held in the Rosenbach Museum). The novel is the result of 7 years research. The page where he works out the attributes of his #vampire is endlessly fascinating for writers & scholars #31daysofHalloween
page from Stoker's research notes for Dracula
03410
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
There is some truth in that but Stoker was steeped in Irish folklore & Fraser's Golden Bough. He never visited Romania but his reading included Gerard, Bonner and others on Transylvania. He found the name 'Dracula' in an account of Wallachia & Moravia & sourced a pamphlet on Vlad the Impaler.
120
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Well, yes, the otherness of the vampire is greatly increased for British & Irish audiences if you show its links to Eastern Europe. It allows Stoker to explore a reverse colonisation through Dracula, an invasion by the 'Other' into the very heart of the British Empire.
010
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
IS THIS THE FIRST VAMPIRE FILM The Devil's Manor, or The Haunted Castle, a 3-minute silent film released in 1896 in France (Le Manoir du Diable) by the Lumière brothers, inventors of the motion picture projector & Georges Méliès. It shows the vampire as bat!
2317
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
1732 THE YEAR OF THE VAMPIRE 12 books and four dissertations were written on the vampire in this year. Flückinger's Visum er Repertum (Seen or Discovered) documented a vampire outbreak in Serbia; a full scale vampire panic erupted & the term 'vampire' entered the English language #WyrdWednesday
tombs in a cryptwooden stakes for slaying vampires
08025
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
Dirk Puehl @wunderkammertales.eurosky.social · 07/10/2026
“…but then without those doors there did stand the lofty and enshrouded figure of the lady Madeline of Usher.” (Edgar Allan Poe “The Fall of the House of Usher”, 1839) 🎨 Harry Clarke #WyrdWednesday
0324
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
Annie Brassey @anniebrassey.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
"A Corpse Awakening : Ligeia Risen From Her Bed Of Death." The Illustrated London News 18.12.1909. #WyrdWednesday
0287
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
Rivka @theasraidance.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
The Wounded Vampire by Wilhelm Kotarbinski #WyrdWednesday
Artwork depicting an injured female vampire with bat-like wings in a landscape.
04311
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
The Ghost Monk @theghostmonk.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
'The Boundary Of Life And Death By Edgar Allan Poe' as presented by Alberto Martini. #WyrdWednesday #EdgarAllanPoe #Poe #31DaysOfHalloween
210024
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
VAMPIRE FAIRY TALE Marusia is courted by a young man who she later sees feeding on a corpse laid out in the church. Falling victim to the #vampire she's buried at a crossroad & blooms again as a flower. Afanasev, Tales 1855-67 #31DaysOfHalloween #FairyTaleTuesday
0254
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
OLDER THAN DRACULA: in search of the English vampire. An article of mine from the archive!! #31daysofHalloween theconversation.com/older-than-d...
theconversation.com
Older than Dracula: in search of the English vampire
New research is uncovering medieval legends about the undead in Britain.
1278
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
Matthew Meyer @yokai.com · 06/10/2026
What would you do if you woke up in a hotel and there was a shadowy figure looming over your bed? 🛌🦊 Tonight's story is great nightmare fodder! A-Yokai-A-Day: A Matter in Which It Is Hard to Say There Was No Yōkai #ayokaiaday www.patreon.com/theyokaiguy/...
patreon.com
A-Yokai-A-Day: A Matter in Which It Is Hard to Say There Was No Yōkai | Matthew Meyer (The Yokai Guy)
Greetings yokai lovers! Even though this is called "A-Yokai-A-Day," so far this month we've only looked at strange phenomena, ghosts, and on
02110
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
VAMPIRE FAIRY TALE Marusia is courted by a young man who she later sees feeding on a corpse laid out in the church. Falling victim to the #vampire she's buried at a crossroad & blooms again as a flower. Afanasev, Tales 1855-67 #31DaysOfHalloween #FairyTaleTuesday
0254
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
JULES VERNE'S TOMB (1907) The monument, created by sculptor Albert Roze, shows the writer as a #revenant or returner from beyond the grave, reaching towards the sky. Its face was modelled on his death mask. Image: Amiens, France. #WyrdWednesday
Jules Verne's tomb in France
112547
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
1732 THE YEAR OF THE VAMPIRE 12 books and four dissertations were written on the vampire in this year. Flückinger's Visum er Repertum (Seen or Discovered) documented a vampire outbreak in Serbia; a full scale vampire panic erupted & the term 'vampire' entered the English language #WyrdWednesday
tombs in a cryptwooden stakes for slaying vampires
08025
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
I love this theme, though strictly speaking vampires are undead; zombies are the living dead!
1191
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 05/10/2026
helleborezine.com/products/dar...
helleborezine.com
Beautiful folklore occult folk horror magazine darkness
As Samhain heralds the darker half of the year, we descend into the domain of darkness to explore its associations with folklore, myth, and legend. In this issue we delve into the night as the domain of shadows—the time when demonic creatures prey on the living and people could easily become the Devil’s own.
080
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 05/10/2026
I wrote IN SEARCH OF THE ENGLISH #VAMPIRE for the special Darkness Issue of #HELLEBORE in 2023. A bespoke small press publication devoted to British folk horror, founded in 2019 by Maria J. Pérez Cuervo. Link to this back issue below! #Gothtober #31daysofHalloween
page from Hellebore's Darkness Issue, 2023.
25111
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
TREATISE on VAMPIRES & REVENANTS By Calmet, a Benedictine Monk who lived through the European #vampire epidemic in the eighteenth century. It was translated across Europe as The Phantom World in 1850. Image is my 1993 reprint with cover illustration by Frank Papé #SpookySunday #31daysofHalloween
0554
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
EVERY AGE GETS THE DRACULA IT NEEDS 3 of the best covers #31daysofHalloween Penguin, 1979, shows Dracula the #vampire escaping his coffin; Modern Library edition, 1932, shows the Count as a member of high society; Constable, 1916, #Dracula as a bat-like creature scaling the walls of his castle
Penguin 1979Dracula 1932 coverDracula 1916 cover
0323
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
WIDDERSHINS means moving counter clockwise; this inversion of the natural order was associated with the devil and witchcraft. In this image #WITCHES delight in flying widdershins around North Berwick church with their broomsticks #FolkloreSunday #31daysofHalloween
Witches & North Berwick Church
27923
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
DRACULA COOKBOOK 1978 This gothic delight imagines what #Dracula served his guests; he does not eat (or drink wine) himself of course! #31DaysOfHalloween
Dracula Cookbook 1978
1459
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
THE BLOOD OF THE VAMPIRE by Florence Marryat, published the same year as Dracula, 1897. Harriet, daughter of a mad scientist & a voodoo priestess, has the blood of the #vampire flowing through her veins; she's draining the life out of those she loves. First edition with bat #31daysofHalloween.
1897 edition of Blood of the Vampire
0165
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
BRITISH VAMPIROLOGIST Alphonsus Augustus Montague Summers (1880-1948). The inscription on his tombstone in Richmond reads, "Tell me strange things". Buffy Summers of vampire slaying fame is named after this occult investigator #Gothtober #31daysofHalloween
Grave of British Vampirologist Montague Summers 1880-1948
03710
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
VAMPIRE MIST As the nights draw in and we get the first mists in #Gothtober remember that the dead travel fast & #Dracula as #vampire can arrive in mist or be carried in moonlight rays as elemental dust (allowing him to creep through keyholes). Image: Bela Lugosi, Dracula, 1931 #31daysofHalloween
Belia Lugosi as Dracula, 1931Hungarian graveyard, Victorian.
0272
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
VAMPIRES Join me to celebrate our best loved monster, the #vampire over the spooky season for #31daysofHalloween and throughout #Gothtober. I am writing a short cultural history of the #vampire for the British Library published next year! There'll be vampire-related posts everyday this month!
1394
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
FEMALE VAMPIRE STORY the Tomb of Sarah by F. G. Loring was published the same year as Dracula in 1897. 'I have prepared everything: the sharp knives, the pointed stake, fresh garlic, and wild dog roses; let the vampire be pierced through the heart' #31daysofHalloween
medieval style wooden coffin Victorian photograph of a woman wearing a garland
0464
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Giving a #BotanicalGothic tag to this. Watch out for our CFP coming soon!
150
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
Nina Antonia @ninaantonia13.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
As it's St. Michael the Archangel's day to whom I'm grateful for chasing away a few devils, here's the glorious Rawson memorial window, designed by Powell Brothers, 1899, which can be found in Holy Trinity church, Stockton.
115418
Reposted by Coffin Boffin
The Ghost Monk @theghostmonk.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
'Goblin Market' by Frank Craig. #FairyTaleTuesday #fairy #fairies #faerie #poetry
124458
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
FEAST OF ST MICHAEL & ALL ANGELS St. Michael the Archangel defeats the Devil, holding him by a chain, in this unsettling painting by Giovanni Gasppero. Gasparro is a contemporary artist who graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome in 2007. Check out the devil's ears and horns! #Michaelmas
St Michael slaying the devil By Gasppero
1173
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
The smell of burning turnip sums up the 70s for me!!!
010
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
hell, yes!
010
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
JACK-O-LANTERNS Before the grinning pumpkins of Halloween the folkloric versions or Jack-o-Lanterns, named for the Irish myth, were terrifying; carved from turnips or swedes they had the appearance of shrunken heads #31DaysofHalloween #FairyTaleTuesday
Irish Jack'O'Lanterncontemporary turnip lantern
03512
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
JACK PUMPKINHEAD is a fictional character from the Land of Oz in books by American author L. Frank Baum. Jack first appeared in the 2nd Oz book 'The Marvelous Land of Oz', 1904. Images of my cherished copy! #FairyTaleTuesday
Jack Pumpkinhead book 1904
24911
Coffin Boffin @coffinboffin.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
FAIRY TRANSPORT Fairies & elves are said to cast an enchantment over woodland animals. They are shown delighting in their mode of transport in the fantastical world of French author and illustrator Jean-Baptiste Monge #FolkloreSunday
0399