Quote Originally Posted by Gurgeh View Post
Actually, the Alucard alias doesn't come from Bram Stoker's novel; the count travels under his own name and generally gets away with it (since nobody knows that he's a vampire for quite some time - well over half the book passes before his true nature is revealed to the characters). "Alucard" was invented by later adaptations, generally ones that took the count being outed as a vampire for granted, and use the alias to preserve some mystery.

The more general application of vampires spelling their names backwards is most often put forward by Terry Pratchett (there's certainly no evidence of it in earlier vampire works like Carmilla or Nosferatu). Not that it's a bad thing, mind.
Dracula was operating under a pseudonym in the Bram Stoker Novel, just a very subtle one. His real name is Vlad III Dracula of House Draculesti, Voivode of Wallachia; he was only pretending to be a minor count as part of whatever scheme he was planning in London that the Harkers, van Helsing and the rest disrupted. Dracula was hiding his true identity in plain sight, counting on his foes not to know the history of his people. (Pun intended. )