Hey, we're both right!
Among the Romanian peasantry, Vlad Ţepeş was remembered as a just prince who defended his people from foreign aggression, whether those foreigners were Turkish invaders or German merchants. He is also remembered as a champion of the common man against the oppression of the boyars.
However, despite the more positive interpretation, the Romanian oral tradition also remembers Vlad as an exceptionally cruel and often capricious ruler....Outside of Romanian folklore the reputation of Vlad Ţepeş is considerably darker...Impalement was Vlad's favourite method of torture but was by no means his only one. The list of tortures he is alleged to have employed is extensive: [whitefonting]nails in heads, cutting off of limbs, blinding, strangulation, burning, cutting off of noses and ears, mutilation of sexual organs (especially in the case of women), scalping, skinning, exposure to the elements or to animals, and boiling alive.
An old Romanian story says that one could even leave a bag of gold in the middle of the street, then return and pick it up the next day, as people were so afraid to commit crimes during his reign due to these horrific means of torture and capital punishment.
No one was immune to Vlad the Impaler's attentions. His victims included women and children, peasants and great lords, ambassadors from foreign powers and merchants. Nevertheless, the vast majority of his European victims came from the merchants and boyars of Transylvania and his own country, Wallachia.
This would make a neat tattoo, if you ignored the history: [link]
![[link]](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/cc/Dragon_order_insignia.jpg/180px-Dragon_order_insignia.jpg){kind=link}
[The Order of the Dragon (German: Drachenorden; Hungarian: Sárkány Lovagrend; Latin: Societas Draconistrarum) was an order of selected nobles modeled on the Order of Saint George of Hungary. The order was founded in 1408 by Sigismund, King of Hungary, and his second wife Barbara Cilli. The defeated dragon is a symbol of the destruction of heresy. The Order flourished in Germany and Italy. Members of the Order were known as draconists. So I guess it's not just about Vlad.]