In German folklore a Nachzehrer (“after-consumer”; also Nachtzehrer, “night-consumer”) is a kind of Wiedergänger, a revenant believed able to drag the living after it into death, whether from malice or from a wish to be near those it loved. The word came into use in the nineteenth century, but the belief precedes it by centuries. It was prominent in northern Germany, and also in Silesia and Bavaria; the word was used for a similar creature among the Kashubes of northern Poland.
Like the Slavic vampire it was a recently deceased person who returned to attack family and village acquaintances, but the nachzehrer was thought to drain its victims’ life-force remotely. Devouring its own shroud and clothing in the grave was held to be a very common sign. The danger was greatest if the living had given the dead some of their own possessions as grave goods, and a person whose name was not removed from their burial clothing could become one.
Open eyes or mouth, red lips, a soft corpse, and a thumb held in the opposite hand were all signs of a nachzehrer. It was associated with epidemic sickness, though an epidemic was not necessary for its existence.