Countess Bathory. We all know that this ''noble'' was Dani's inspiration for the lyrical content of the third full-length album, ''Cruelty and the Beast''. That's why I included a bio section for the Blood Countess, Elizabeth Bathory.

For those that don't know anything about Bathory: Well, you may think of names such as the Marquis de Sade and Vlad Tepes as truly demented and malevolent. Well, Marquis de Sade was just writing books about sadism (thus a new term was invented, sadism derived from his name) while Vlad Tepes was ''just'' a ruthless warlord. He killed and slaughtered thousands (Vlad the Impaler was his ''nickname''), but all he did, he did it because medieval warfare required such attitude. It was a ''scene'' where you either treated your enemies with no mercy or either being killed yourself. But Countess Bathory… I have read about many demented human beings of history, but she surpasses them all. Among others, she invented the notorious Iron Maiden (hey, not the Heavy Metal band, the torture device). Of course if she hadn't invented this ''machine'' the band we all love or loved as teenagers wouldn't have this name… But that's another matter… Click the links below and you can read two different biographies of this demented female… Well, in my opinion she was a cruelly sadistic lesbian, since she inflicted hideous tortures only upon females…

Something other… Cradle of Filth made superb songs about Countess Bathory, Marduk made a brilliant opus about Vlad Tepes, I think one of the following Cradle of Filth albums should be about the Marquis de Sade. In my opinion, he is a romantic and totally darkly erotic figure, that fits with the Cradle of Filth musical and lyrical approach. Without being myself a mucisian, I already have in my mind some instrumental melodies that Cradle of Filth could make about him… And his books and poems provide an endless source of lyrical inspiration for Dani… He wasn't nowhere near as demented as many consider him to be, but his name alone is a legend of sadism. OK, to be honest. He whipped many girls. But his ''tortures'' were purely sexual. After he tortured them he had sex with them. He never inflicted wounds that were permanent, never mutilated a girl and never, NEVER killed anyone. The book ''120 Days of Sodom'' is entirely fiction, and an exploration of human cruelty.