STRIGE

Lore

The term strige goes back to the ancient Greek word strix, meaning a screeching night owl; the onomatopoeic root echoed the piercing cry of birds of prey. After its Roman Latinization, the word became strige, and by the 1st century CE it was already applied to female sorceresses able to change shape and drink blood.

From that Latin stratum the image spread across Europe and evolved into several regional forms: Romanian strigoi and strigoaica describe both living witches and undead vampires; Albanian shtriga keeps a parallel meaning; Italian strega narrowed to witch; Polish-Silesian strzyga became a two-souled demon. In Macedonia and Romania, the same name often refers to an ornithomorphic vampire rising after a witch's death.

Classical sources portray the creature as a hybrid dominated by avian features. The skull is disproportionately large, the eyes bulging and pupil-less, glowing yellow-red. The beak is long and needle-like; in Balkan accounts it can gleam like metal and slice skin with surgical precision. Wing color ranges from gray-white to inky-black membranes that partly resemble bat leather, enabling silent flight.

Legends of origin develop the idea of double-souled people: those born with two hearts or a double row of teeth who, after an early death, rise again because one soul departs while the second reanimates the body, creating a strige. Its hunting behavior is pack-based, cruel, and methodical, with victims often found exsanguinated and marked by clustered puncture wounds.