Creature DA·C·0003
Revenant
The returning dead: a broad category for the dead who physically return among the living, attested in medieval chronicles long before the vampire.
- Name origin
- From French revenir, “to return” DOC: Documented
- Earliest accounts
- Twelfth-century English chronicles DOC: Documented
- Characteristics
- A physical body, not a spectre; often a sinner or someone who died a bad death DOC: Documented
- Remedies
- Exhumation, mutilation or cremation of the body PRIM: Primary source
A body, not a ghost
The revenant category lets us see the vampire as one case of a wider phenomenon. In twelfth-century English chronicles, such as William of Newburgh’s, the returning dead are concrete bodies● DocumentedCorroborated by multiple reliable and independent sources. that wander, attack and spread disease, and are stopped by acting on the corpse.
Connections to cinema
Dread Atlas uses this entry as a bridge: the medium in «La goccia d’acqua» in I tre volti della paura is closer to a revenant returning to redress a wrong than to the Victorian ghost¶ Editorial interpretationAn editorial reading, identified explicitly as interpretation..
- 1198 History
William of Newburgh collects stories of the returning dead
DOC: Documented
Connections
7 direct connections · 34 further links. Dashed lines indicate weak or unproven links.
- Film
- Creature · ritual
- Motif
- Source
- Person
- Weak link
Collections (1)
Vampires of Eastern Europe
Creatures (3)
Motifs (2)
Theft from the dead
Theft from the dead
Beliefs & rituals (1)
Protections against the dead
Sources (1)
Historia rerum Anglicarum (William of Newburgh)
Films (1)
Black Sabbath
I tre volti della paura · Les Trois Visages de la peur
- Strigoi creature · via Vampires of Eastern Europe
- Visum et Repertum source · via Vampire
- Kisiljevo place · via Vampire
- Medveđa place · via Vampire
- The threshold and invitation belief or ritual · via Vampire
- The Vampyre (Polidori, 1819) source · via Vampire
- Dracula (Stoker, 1897) source · via Vampire
- The family vampire motif · via Vampire
- La Guzla source · via Vampire
- The sound that announces the supernatural motif · via Theft from the dead
- The Vurdalak, from folklore to cinema bloodline · via Vurdalak
- La famiglia del Vurdalak source · via Vurdalak
- The vampire child motif · via Vurdalak
- Eastern Europe place · via Vurdalak
- Night of the Devils film · via Vurdalak
- Sem’ja vurdalakov film · via Vurdalak
- Boris Karloff person · via Vurdalak
- A. K. Tolstoy person · via Vurdalak
- Mario Bava person · via Black Sabbath
- American International Pictures person · via Black Sabbath
- Anton Chekhov person · via Black Sabbath
- Guy de Maupassant person · via Black Sabbath
- The threatening telephone motif · via Black Sabbath
- Italian Gothic collection · via Black Sabbath
- Dubbing glossary · via Black Sabbath
- Censorship glossary · via Black Sabbath
- Alternate cut glossary · via Black Sabbath
- Literary adaptation glossary · via Black Sabbath
- I tre volti della paura vs Black Sabbath version · via Black Sabbath
- Rome place · via Black Sabbath
- Black Sunday film · via Black Sabbath
- Black Sabbath (band) person · via Black Sabbath
- The Chekhov credit: a source that cannot be found journal · via Black Sabbath
- Why Dread Atlas begins with I tre volti della paura journal · via Black Sabbath
Revision history
- First draft.— Editorial team
How to cite this page
Redazione Dread Atlas, «Revenant», Dread Atlas, Entry DA·C·0003, updated 15 September 2026. https://macabralia.com/en/creature/revenant/