Why does nearly every culture invent dragons? Three competing theories
Dragons turn up in the myths of almost every people on Earth, and the oldest ones all look like giant snakes. One anthropologist blames an inherited fear of serpents, big cats and raptors. Another scholar points to fossil bones. A third links dragons to rain, drought and rainbows.
The word itself hints at the snake origin. English took dragon from Old French in the early thirteenth century, and behind that lie the Latin draco and Greek drákōn, terms for any huge serpent, real or mythical. The Greek probably comes from a verb meaning to see, perhaps suggesting a creature with a lethal stare. Old English had its own draca, source of the modern drake, but more often called such beasts a wyrm.
David E. Jones, in An Instinct for Dragons, argues that humans, like monkeys, carry built-in fear responses. He cites a study finding roughly 39 people in a hundred afraid of snakes, a fear strong in children even where snakes are scarce. Adrienne Mayor suggests some legends grew from fossil finds, such as giant bones in the Siwalik Hills of northern India, and proposes that Greek images of the Monster of Troy may echo the skull of an extinct giraffe. Robert Blust sees dragons as early attempts to explain the mechanics of rainfall and drought.
The earliest examples come from the ancient Near East, where storm gods slaying enormous serpents is a recurring plot. Mesopotamian art from the Akkadian period onward shows the mušḫuššu, or furious serpent, with horns, a snake's neck, lion forelegs and bird hind legs, used as a protective emblem. In Egypt the serpent Apep lurked in the underworld and battled the sun god Ra every night; eclipses were blamed on its daytime attacks. The Ugaritic sea-dragon Lōtanu had seven heads, and in the Hebrew Bible Yahweh slays Leviathan.
Attitudes split sharply by region. Chinese dragons governed rain, seas and rivers and became symbols of imperial power from the Han dynasty. Greek drakontes were slain in myth yet honoured in cult as gentle bringers of healing and wealth. Western tradition, by contrast, settled on the fire-breathing monster.
Source: Dragon
