There he lay, a vast red-golden dragon, fast asleep; a thrumming came from his jaws and nostrils, and wisps of smoke, but his fires were low in slumber. Beneath him, under his limbs and huge coiled tail, and about him on all sides stretching away across the unseen floors, lay countless piles of precious things, golf wrought and unwrought, gems and jewels, and silver red-stained in the ruddy light. Smaug lay, with wings folded like an immeasurable bat, turned partly on one side, so that the hobbit could see his underparts and his long pale belly crusted with gems and fragments of gold from his long lying on his costly bed. Behind him where the walls were nearest could dimly be seen coats of mail, helms and axes, swords and spears hanging; and there in rows stood great jars and vessels filled with a wealth that could not be guessed (Tolkien, 1978, p.184).
When thinking about a dragon, most modern (literary) imagery would come from the very notable description of Smaug, from J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit. Smaug’s description is the epitome of a western dragon; bat-like wings, “red-golden,” serpentine: “coiled tail,” a collector of treasure, and living in a cave. Later in the book, Smaug also shows intelligent qualities, something – though not always used with all dragons – that is not as rare in many dragons of both old and modern descriptions. However, dragons are actually a very vague animal, not only within description, but by characteristic, qualities, abilities or powers, and even the word dragon is actually a very ambiguous word; yes, when we say “dragon” we have an archetypical image of what a dragon is and/or looks like. However, which archetype are we thinking of? Is it the archetypical dragon image of the Asian archetype; additionally, is it the Chinese dragon (the stereotype of all Eastern Asian dragons), the Middle Eastern, or Indian nagas? Is it the archetypical dragon image of the western archetype, the European, the Aztec, the African, or the Egyptian version? On the other hand, do we think of a non-mythical creature, like that of the komodo dragon; or do we think of how the term dragon use to mean, or even still, the ethnology of the word’s meaning? In many to all cultures and languages, there is a dragon to describe this archetypical beast (mythical or no); furthermore, many to all cultures are also completely fascinated by this beast, for the mythical idea of this beast to live on even today. Yet, out of all discussed above, I like to ask [three] things, whether to ponder or to actually find said []. First question is what exactly are the physical differences between the stereotypical Asian dragon and the stereotypical European dragon? This question is directed fully on the two most archetypical dragon image due to how prominent both images are to saturate in both respective cultures as well spilling-over into other cultures. The second question is the differences in abilities or powers that each cultural dragon has, (i.e. breathing fire, transforming into a human-form, etc.,)? Finally, the third question asks, what makes a dragon, or what are the qualities of a dragon, and are these qualities universal? This question focus on the idea that, though a dragon of any culture may not have exact physical descriptions compared to other cultures, yet, nevertheless, there still a conceptual idea of a dragon within each and almost to all cultures around the world, but specifically – in this paper – to Western and Eastern cultures.
The dictionary (dictionary.com) shows how ambiguous dragon is, there are five different meanings; one, being of the mythical beast; two, being the archaic use being that of a large snake [though other dictionaries would claim also all reptiles/amphibians or dinosaurs]; three, being a biblical translation, being that of a snake or crocodile; fourth, being of another biblical meaning, referring to Satan, the Devil; and the fifth meaning is a description of a violent person. The ethnology of the word ‘dragon’ supports the archaic meaning, dragon stems from the French drakon, which stems from Greek draco; both referring to a serpent; though now, the modern usage refers to the mythical beast that both inspires and haunts dreams and literature.
Within both Jorge Luis Borges’ (1969) The Book of Imaginary Beings, and Judy Allen and Jeanne Griffiths’ (1979) The Book of the Dragon books, dragons are separated into three different sets, the classical, the European, and the Chinese (or Asian). However, in other sources (i.e. Wikipedia, the online Encyclopedia Britannica, etc.,) combines the classical and the European. The possible reasons why Jorge Luis Borges’ and Judy Allen and Jeanne Griffiths’ (and possibly more) categorizes dragons in three ways, is that with classical dragons – that of the Greek, Roman, and ancient Middle Eastern cultures – are more serpentine than any other cultural-types; yet, other than for this reason, Borges, Allen and Griffiths do not make any other reasons why they categorized dragons into three sets.
The Western dragon is heavily influenced both by the classical dragons, from Roman, Greek and the Christian religion’s influences, and by the northwestern dragon, from dead pagan northern European religions – such as the Norse and Anglo-Saxon religions. Therefore, Western dragons are more reptilian, all scales, most have horns, sometimes with bat like wings, some with bird-like wings, sometimes without wings. Most to all Western dragons have the large bodies and all Western dragons (as well as Eastern) have tails. Most European dragons do have legs, stout legs, like that of an elephant (or dinosaurs) but feet and claws like either a birds or lizards (even sometimes that of large predatory cats). Some Western dragons may have either two or four legs; though there are some Western dragons that do not have legs. In the more contemporary tales of Western dragons, the dragons are more “heavy, evil, earthbound, and hideous, the complete antithesis of the airy, benevolent, elegant dragons of the east” (J. Allen & J. Griffiths, p.46). In modern media and literature, the western-style dragon has been shown as either a scientifically explained biological destructive force (Reign of Fire, 2002) or a magical intelligent beast that could be either good or evil (Dragonheart, 1996; & Pete’s Dragon, 1977).
Western dragon had only mainly fire as an ability or power; though more notable dragons in both literature and media were dragons that intellect and wits as a way to confuse humans. Western dragons also had their strength and massive size as well as their wings to use when defending or attacking. All of which makes Western dragons to be more of a – in a way – believable physical creature rather than the Eastern dragon attributes, which are more magical and incredible.
When describing the Asian-style dragon, Jorge Luis Borges explains that the Chinese dragon is either the cosmological entity – that of both the spiritual and/or philosophical – or the mythological being that is both part spiritual and part physical. Chinese dragons are associated with clouds and bodies of water; a single river, stream, lake, pond, ocean, sea, or even a well has its own dragon or dragon king with a dragon family. The appearance of a Chinese dragon is actually a chimera of different animal features. According to H.J. Joly – via Judy Allen and Jeanne Griffiths’ The Book of the Dragon – the Chinese dragon and Japanese dragon have similar physical features, which being:
It is the largest of scaly animals, and it has nine characteristics. Its head is like a camel’s, its horns like a deer’s, its eyes like a hare’s, its ears like a bull’s, its neck like an iguana’s, its belly like a frog’s, its scales like those of a carp, its paws like a tiger’s, and its claws like an eagle’s. It has nine times nine scales, it being the extreme of a lucky number. On each side of its mouth are whiskers, under its chin a bright pearl, on the top of its head the ‘poh shan’ or foot-throat are reversed. Its breath changes into clouds from which come either fire or rain. The dragon is fond of the flesh of sparrows and swallows, it dreads the centipede and silk dyed of five colours. It is also afraid of iron (p. 34).
In most Chinese and Japanese literature, dragons either are benevolent beings or were benevolent beings that have become terrible demons that feast on humans. In addition, Chinese (and Japanese) dragons are able to change into a human-form and back to their true or dragon-form in a instant; other dragons – in different pieces of Chinese literature – can change in any form by either choice or forced by gods. For example, in the Journey to the West – a classical and very well-known, through-out all of Asia, piece of Chinese literature – the main character Tang Sanzang (the Tang Monk) has a total of four disciples: Sun Wukong (the Monkey King), Zhu Bajie (Pig of the Eight Prohibitions), Sha Wujin (Sand Awakened to Purity), and Yulong Santaizi. The latter, Yulong Santaizi, is the third prince of a dragon-king, and was forced into being the Tang Monk’s horse – after eating the monk’s original horse – but also during one of their adventures, Yulong (the dragon-horse) changed from his horse-form into a lovely young maiden to sneak into a castle where his three companions were captured. Yulong, a young dragon, was able to change from a male human, to a horse, to a female human, and of course his dragon form throughout the entire series of the Journey to the West.
In the example of Chinese dragons being terrible demons, the Moss Roberts (1979) collection Chinese Fair Tales and Fantasies, the story the Sea Prince, tells of an island where a young man, Chang, ventures to; he find the island beautiful as well as a young maiden who accompanies him. The young maiden tells him about how she got on the island by way of a sea prince (a dragon); but as they talked:
As he was thinking a wind sprang up and rustled the trees, which leaned and bent with its force. “The sea prince!” cried the maid. Chang clutched his clothes and looked in astonishment: the maid was gone! Then he saw a giant serpent emerge from the trees, its body was a large bamboo. Hoping it would not notice him, Chang hid behind the tress, but it drew closer and began wrapping itself coil by coil around both the man and tree… The serpent raised its head and jabbed at Chang’s nose with its tongue. Blood poured out of his nose and formed a pool on the ground, and the serpent leaned down to drink it… It was more than a month before he [Chang] fully recovered from the attack by the beautiful girl who was a serpent spirit (p. 16).
Here, the young maiden was the dragon (or sea serpent), but also described as a serpent spirit, noting on both the physicality and spirituality of the being. Most often, in Chinese fairy-tale literature, any heavenly being can become a demon if the being is thrown out of heaven or its original spiritual home (e.g., under the sea with the Dragon King), because of its mischievous deeds. Being banished was a way to teach the spirit to become humble and repentant, however, many spirits become demons and feed off humans, which results in becoming a demon.
Eastern dragons had many abilities and powers. All Eastern dragons could fly but without wings, which denotes on the use of magic or that they are spiritual beings. However, depending on whether the dragon was a heavenly dragon or a water dragon – such as both the Dragon King and his third prince Yulong in Journey to the West – which were also spiritual, also depended on their abilities. Heavenly dragons had the abilities to bring about earthquakes, lightening, fire, and even the rain. Water dragons brought about droughts, floods, rain, and even fire. All dragons, more especially the water dragons, had special pearls, which had special powers, each pearl had different magic powers. One, described in Journey to the West, held and preserved decaying – of death – from a king that was killed by a demon. The demon stole the pearl from a local dragon king within a well of the king’s court; after killing the king the demon placed the pearl in his mouth and left him at the bottom of the well, so that the demon could take the king’s place and image. Because the king did not age (decay), Sun Wukong (the Monkey King) found a way to resurrect the king and expose the fake, which then saved the kingdom. Some pearls had the dragon’s fire or lightening powers, while others were minor pearls that were given to mortals so that they can breathe underwater. One such pearl was given to a man so that he could live with a dragon princess that fell in love with him.
When comparing the Western and Eastern dragon, there are obvious differences; yet there are also several similarities. One similarity is that both – Western and Eastern dragons – are serpentine. The Western dragon was more serpentine than the Eastern, described as having scaly skin – like that of a snake; but the Eastern dragon did have many serpentine qualities, which do stand out. A second similarity is that both dragons could fly. Western dragons could fly by way of leathery bat-like wings; yet the Eastern dragon – though possessed no wings of any kind – could lift their bodies by way of magic. A third similarity is that both types of dragons had the use of fire; Western dragons were able to breathe fire, by blowing it out they could fight against knights in shining armor. Eastern dragon could use fire too; however, in the literature, it was very rarely mentioned, especially whether or not if the dragons breathed out like their Western cousins.
All in all, dragons do have a type over-encompassing conceptual archetype. However, what that original archetype was and if there ever was an original archetype that instilled both wonder and fear into humanity, will never be known. Furthermore and finally, it is known that dragons exist, if not only in humanity’s dreams – and nightmares – and will forever enrapture story-telling for generations to come.
References
Allen, J. & Griffiths, J. (1979). The book of the dragon. London: Orbis Publishing Limited.
Borges, J.L. (1969). The book of imaginary beings. (N.T. di Giovanni, Trans.). Toronto: Clarke, Irwin & Company Limited. (Original work published 1967).
Courtland, J., Miller, R. W. (Producer), & Chaffey, D., & Bluth, D. (Director). (1977). Pete’s dragon [Motion picture]. United States: Buena Vista Distribution Company.
De Laurentiis, R. (Producer), & Cohen, R. (Director). (1996). Dragonheart [Motion picture]. United States: Universal Pictures.
Roberts, M. (Trans. & Eds.). (1979). Chinese fairy tales & fantasies: The pantheon fairy tale and folklore library. Toronto: Pantheon Books.
Wu, Chengen (1993). The journey to the west. (W.J.F. Jenner, Trans.). Beijing: Foreign Languages Press.
Zanuck, R.D., Zanuck, L.F., Birnbaum, R., & Barber, G. (Producer), & Bowman, R. (Director). (2002). Reign of fire [Motion picture]. United States: Touchstone Pictures.
