The name of the Irish novelist's fictional blood-sucking character has become synonymous with that of Vlad Tepes, the Impaler, a.k.a. Dracula, a cunning warrior who impaled anyone who crossed him on a wooden stake. No doubt about it, Vlad was a nasty piece of work. But he was not a vampire.

Elizabeth Miller, a professor of English at Memorial University in Newfoundland, drew this conclusion after examining the notes made by Mr. Stoker during the seven years it took to write the 1897 Gothic horror novel.

The link between Vlad the Impaler and the vampire was made in a popular 1972 book In Search of Dracula. Since then, the connection has been reinforced so many times, including in the 1992 movie, Bram Stoker's Dracula, that Vlad the Impaler has become the prototype for a vampire in the popular imagination.

"Never has so much been written by so many about so little," she says. "The time has come to put this myth to rest once and for all."

Mr. Stoker probably drew on the proceedings of an 18th century inquiry into vampire sightings around Europe as well as the literature of his contemporaries, she says. "There were a lot of vampire stories in the 19th century. It was part of the Gothic tradition. Stoker was just jumping on the bandwagon," says Miller, who despite being an internally renowned Dracula expert, does not dabble in the occult, rarely wears black and didn't even watch Dracula movies as a teenager.

Many Eastern European countries including, Hungary, Poland, Ukraine and parts of Austria, have vampire stories in their folklore. But those beliefs are actually weaker in Romania. Even the word "vampire" comes from a Slavic, not a Romanian, word. "He had never even been to Transylvania," Ms. Miller says of Mr. Stoker. "He just thought it would be a good place to put his vampire. Transylvania is vampire central now."

In fact it's likely that part of his inspiration came from New York newspaper clippings covering the claims that a Rhode Island woman was a vampire. Mercy Brown died in 1992 after her mother and sister died. Family and friends believed that the Browns were under a curse and the bodies of all three were exhumed. The remains of the mother and one daughter were little more then bones, but the body of Mercy Brown was still fresh. When her heart was cut, it dripped blood.

Mr. Stoker, who named 30 sources in his notes, decided to rename his character, originally called "Count Wampyr" after he read the name Dracula in an obscure history book. The book erroneously stated that "Dracula" was Wallachian for "the devil". The name sounded exotic, foreign and evil, but Mr. Stoker really had little information about Vlad Tepes. "It was like his own private joke," says Ms. Miller.

The real Vlad Tepes, the prince Dracula, was named after his father, Dracul, who took his name from a Christian order whose name means "dragon." Mr. Stoker's notes indicate he was already well into writing the novel before he decided to name the title character.

Miller released her findings in a book Dracula: Sense and Nonsense at the Second World Dracula Congress in the Transylvania resort of Poiana Brasov last month, where scholars mingled with vampire aficionados and souvenir vendors hawking palm-sized wooden coffins containing earth from under Castle Dracula.

Among the guests at the event was philosophy professor Constantin Balaceanu-Stolnici, Vlad Tepes' last remaining descendent.

Vlad Tepes is revered in Romania for keeping Turkish invaders at bay. The prince, whom a contemporary described as stocky, with bushy eyebrows, long curly hair and a black moustache, has numerous streets, statues and postage stamps dedicated to him.

Ms. Miller says Romanian scholars are happy she wants to break the link between Dracula the vampire and Vlad Tepes, even though the link has provided the Transylvania region with a growing tourism industry. "A lot of academics have felt a little annoyed that this Irish writer took a historical figure and turned him into the inspiration for a vampire," says Ms. Miller, who frequently has to field e-mails from teenagers who want to know how they can become vampires.

Mr. Stoker's notes, housed in the Rosenbach Museum and Library's literary collection in Philadelphia, have not been scrutinized much by a academics. "If you did that with Shakespeare, people would be jumping down your throat," she says. "To state speculation as fact does a disservice to the field."

"A scholar has a responsibility to set the record straight."