Joao:
>What is the origin of Medieval dragons? These dragons are like
>giant snakes or lizards, but with claws, ears, horns, like a
>composite animal. [...]
>Why Dragons became so popular in Medieval Europe? Oriental origin?
Cort:
>I think one possibility could be Mesopotamian and Anatolian composite
>monsters.
Dragons are merely a subclass of these "composite monsters".
However, that doesn't answer where or how it first started.
The reason for blending different animals together is not
merely artistic, nor is it because these creatures once
existed.
In fact, these creatures are really themselves the product
of the larger habit since neolithic times to overlay multiple
symbols on top of each other to form what appear to us now
as senseless hodge-podge icons, creatures, gods and goddesses.
We could lump other questions to the one above like: Why is
Hathor a cow? Why does Athena burst out of Zeus' head? Why
does the world hatch out of an egg? Were neolithic people on
hallucinogenics? Probably, but the real reason is because these
are visual symbols that sprang out of common sense conclusions
about the world in which neolithic people found themselves in.
Bull horns, for example, relate to the crescent moon in shape.
Thus, bull horns are a symbol of lunar phases and the moon was
important to the first farmers to know when to plant crops.
Getting back to the question of dragons, again these are merely
symbols that appear mysterious to us only because we have very
different world views than those who created these symbols in
the first place. We have to readjust our thinking to understand
their origin. Dragons, lizards and especially snakes can be
taken as a water symbol. Waves look like slithering serpents
and this is certainly one valid interpretation of the snake
imagery in the Middle-East and Europe. In fact, it then starts
to make sense why the snake often is countered with a bird --
the snake, the waters below; the bird, the skies above.
So, we may now explain away the mystery of dragons. The reptilian
component of dragons symbolize the waters, while bird claws
symbolize the sky. Stopping there we see now what dragons
represent. They represent water from the sky -- the rain. Other
additions added further meaning to the icon. Bull horns or ears
emphasize a connection with the moon and with agriculture.
(Afterall, you need rain to grow crops!)
I believe that the dragon icon first started in Anatolia in the
Neolithic and spread to Europe as agriculture began to be adopted
there. It also spread into India and then to the rest of Asia.
From there, the thunderbird spread into North America.
- gLeN
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