A 'zombie' (also known as Zeds, Walkers, Roamers, Lurkers, Biters, Zak, Meat Bags, Freak Bags, and Z's) is the term associated with a person (often, but not always infected by a virus of some sort), that reposes the brain and shuts down the internal systems of the victim, basically transforming them into one of the walking dead. After this mutation occurs, the victim is no longer a person, but instead a mindless shambling corpse with an insatiable hunger for flesh. In contemporary versions these are generally reanimated or undead corpses. Stories of zombies are as old as the human race, with mentions of them in the oldest known work of literature, the Epic of Gilgamesh. Furthermore, Zombies can't be thought of as the existence of life (or at least animation) after death because then people will think they won't hurt anyone.
Other more macabre have become a staple of modern horror fiction, where they are brought back from the dead by supernatural or scientific means, and eat the flesh of the living. They have very limited intelligence, and may not be under anyone's direct control. This type of zombie, often referred to as a for the filmmaker that defined the concept, is .
Rarely, Zombies can also be animals, though this is scarcely recognized by Zombie enthusiasts. It is unknown which particular animals are susceptible to the disease, or if they are at risk at all.
Most Zombies can be found roaming around their places of death in search of living organisms to feed on. The zombies will walk around, searching for food until it locates a living being at which point it will raise it's arms and form a guttural moaning deep in its throat, attracting other zombies in the area.
In a first world country (and many second/third world countries), most people showing symptoms of infection (fever, disorientation) will be brought into the closest hospital. After a few hours (depending on the severity of the infection) the infected will "die" and then reanimate, a fully developed zombie.
Contrary to popular belief, a graveyard is usually a safe haven from zombies. It takes a few hours at most from "death" to reanimation and as it takes a few days at the very least for a burial to be organized, there have been no reports of a zombie reanimating in a coffin. In fact, zombies tend to avoid graveyards as it is simply wide stretches of abandoned land. Even if a zombie did reanimate here, the only danger would be if it reanimated during the burial. It would most likely animate in the coffin where, to get out, it would have to claw through a foot of steel and six feet of dirt.
Zombies in voodoo
According to the tenets of , a dead person can be revived by a or Voodoo sorcerer. Zombies remain under the control of the bokor since they have no will of their own. "Zombi" is also another name of the voodoo snake god Damballah Wedo, of origin; it is akin to the word Nzambi, which means "god." There also exists within the voudon tradition the zombi astral which is a human soul that is captured by a bokor and used to enhance the bokor's power.
In 1937, while researching in , Zora Neale Hurston encountered the case of Felicia Felix-Mentor, who had died and been buried in 1907 at the age of 29. Villagers believed they saw Felicia wandering the streets in a daze thirty years after her death, as well as claiming the same with several other people. Hurston pursued rumors that the affected persons were given powerful , but she was unable to locate individuals willing to offer much information. She wrote:
"What is more, if science ever gets to the bottom of Vodou in Haiti and Africa, it will be found that some important secrets, still unknown to medical science, give it its power, rather than gestures of ceremony."
Several decades later, Wade Davis, a Canadian , presented a pharmacological case for zombies in two books, (1985) and Passage of Darkness: The Ethnobiology of the Haitian Zombie (1988). Davis traveled to Haiti in 1982 and, as a result of his investigations, claimed that a living person can be turned into a zombie by two special powders being entered into the blood stream (usually via a wound). The first, coup de poudre (French: 'powder strike'), induced a 'death-like' state because of (TTX), its key ingredient. Tetrodotoxin is the same lethal toxin found in the Japanese delicacy , or . At near-lethal doses (= 5-8 µg/kg), it can leave a person in a state of near-death for several days, while the person continues to be conscious. The second powder, composed of like datura, put the person in a zombie-like state where they seem to have no will of their own. Davis also popularized the story of , who was claimed to have succumbed to this practice. There remains considerable about Davis's claims, and opinions remain divided as to the veracity of his work, although there is wide recognition among the Haitian people of the existence of the "zombi drug". The vodoun religion being somewhat secretive in its practices and codes, it can be very difficult for a foreign scientist to validate or invalidate such claims.
