History

   In early Egypt, the Dragon was chiefly a representation, albeit with some embellishments, of the snake. In Egyptian myth Re, the sun god, travelled through Duat, the underworld, each night. Whilst travelling through the underworld Re reaches a two open doors guarded by snakes, some having human heads and four legs others having three snake heads and wings. Re passes by these without incident as they are only guards. Later Re observes the demise of Apophis, the giant serpent representing chaos, whose severed coils are bound by Aker, a Dragon representing the earth. There are many occurrences of Dragons in Egyptian mythology, another example being Denwen.

   The Chinese Lung, in contrast to the Egyptian image of the destructive serpent, was more benevolent. The Lung has its origins in the oracle bones of the Shang and the I'Ching, and was ascribed lizard like qualities before it's later association with rain. The Dragons hibernate over the winter in pools, then in summer they take to the sky bringing on the rains. Azure Dragons were symbols of spring, the sighting of one heralded the onset of the spring thunderstorms and the end of hibernation. The horse-dragon, a creature with hooves on its four legs and curly hair on its back which could walk on water as well as fly. It featured prominently in Chinese mythology emerging from the Yellow River to give the 'River Map' to the legendary Emperor Fu Xi which formed the basis of the I'Ching. The first images of the Lung were actually half-man, half-fish creations, but this soon took on the more lizard like look of the current Chinese Dragons. These representations of Dragons also occur in ancient Japan and Korea, both in the Shinto beliefs and Buddhism

    In early India, images of the Dragon were in some ways similar to the Egyptian ones in that they represented the form of the snake. There were those, however, that represented the form of the crocodile, such as the makara. We see through Hindu myth that the Indians identified the Dragon with nature. One of the Indian Dragons, Vritra, caused drought by withholding water in its body until it is slain by Indra, god of rain,with a bolt of lightning thus starting the monsoon. While there are many similarities with the Egyptian images, we can also see influences from the Chinese Lung. The obvious conclusion is that the Indian Dragon had the same background of early snake worship, and to a lesser extent crocodile cults, but was later influenced by the Chinese images.

    Taking much from the Greek and Arabian legends, the Christians were responsible for turning the Dragon into the image we generally associate with it, that of the fire breathing monster. The Christians used the image of the Serpent, or Dragon, to represent evil, and commonly Satan himself. They drew much from the cultures of the lands they encountered - the legend of St George and the Dragon is taken from the Near East. The Christian image of the Dragon, however, is a perverted one being set up in opposition of the pagan religions such as snake worship. The snake is seen as the Devil in the Garden of Eden, the Dragon is seen as the incarnation of evil in many horrific forms to be vanquished by the hero representing the virtues of God. It is known that the early Christians brought people into their religion by all manner of ways, building churches on old pagan sites for example, and casting the pagan Dragon as the personification of evil and having it defeated by the Christian Hero was a typical ploy.