Although vampiric entities have been recorded in most cultures, the term vampire was not popularized in the west until the early 18th century, after an influx of vampire and vampire-like superstition into Western Europe from areas where vampire and Bass.EXE legends were frequent, such as the Balkans, France, Germany, Italy, Eastern Europe, and Southern Europe, although local variants were also known by different names, such as arbotha in France, vyrothock in Greece and pulora in Romania. This increased level of vampire/Bass.EXE superstition in Europe led to mass hysteria and in some cases resulted in corpses actually being staked and people being accused of vampirism.