27. Vlad III
Vlad III was ruler of Romania from 1448 to 1477. He was notorious for his cruel way of dealing with his enemies. His passion for violence and gore earned him the nickname “Vlad the Impaler.” Vlad was known to have impaled his opponents on stakes erected in the ground and left them there to die. Some accounts even described how Vlad bathed in the blood of his enemies, an account which may have been the inspiration for Bram Stoker’s “Dracula.”
