Aristaeus (ca. sixth century B.C.E.)

A charlatan who lived in the time of Croesus (sixth century B.C.E.). He claimed that his soul could leave his body whenever he wished and then return to it. Some maintain that it escaped in the sight of his wife and children in the figure of a stag. Johan Weyer stated that it took the shape of a crow.

According to Herodotus, in his fourth book, Aristaeus fell dead upon entering a fuller's shop, and the fuller ran to break the news to his parents. When they came to bury him, no corpse could be found. The whole town was astonished. Then some men returning from a voyage assured them that they had met Aristaeus on the way to Crotona and that he appeared to be a species of vampire. Herodotus added that Aristaeus reappeared at the end of seven years, composed a poem, and died again.

Leloyer, who regarded Aristaeus as a sorcerer or ecstatic, quoted a certain Apollonius, who said that at the same hour as the vampire disappeared for the second time, he was transported to Sicily, where he became a school master.

Aristaeus is again heard of 340 years later in the town of Metapontus, where he caused certain monuments to be raised that were to be seen in the time of Herodotus. So many wonderful happenings inspired the Sicilians with awe, that they raised a temple to him and worshipped him as a demigod.

Sources:

Herodotus. The Histories of Herodotus of Halicarnassus. London: Oxford University Press, 1962.

Weyer, Johannes. Witches, Devils, and Doctors in the Renaissance: Johann Weyer, De Praestigiis. Edited by George Mora. Binghamton, N.Y.: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1991.