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The Dragon: Ovid

Ovid* locates the dragon slain by Cadmus in Bœotia, near the river Cephisus. He speaks of it as being hid in a cavern, adorned with crests, and of a golden colour. He, like the other poets, makes special reference to the eyes sparkling with fire, and it may be noted that a similar brilliancy is mentioned by those who have observed pythons in their native condition. He speaks of the dragon as blue,† and terribly destructive owing to the possession of a sting, long constricting folds, and venomous breath.

The story of Ceres flying to heaven in a chariot drawn by two dragons, and of her subsequently lending it to Triptolemus, to enable him to travel all over the earth and distribute corn to its inhabitants, is detailed or alluded to by numerous poets, as well as the tale of Medea flying from Jason in a chariot drawn by winged dragons. Ceres is * Metamorphoses, Book iii. 35, translated by H. J. Riley; London, 1872. † In reference to colours so bright as to be inconsistent with our knowledge of the ordinary colours of reptiles, it may be of interest to compare the description by D'Argensola-who wrote the history of the successive conquests of the Moluccas, by the Spaniards, Portuguese and Dutch-of a blue and golden saurian existing upon a volcanic mountain in Tarnate. "Il y a aussi sur cette montagne un grand lac d'eau douce, entouré d'arbres, dans lequel on voit de crocodiles azurés et dorés qui ont plus d'un brasse de longueur, et qui se plongent dans l'eau lors qu'ils entendent des hommes." - D'Argensola, vol. iii. p. 4, translated from the Spanish, 3 vols.; J. Desbordes, Amsterdam, 1706. And Pliny, Nat. Hist., Book viii. chap. xxviii., speaks of lizards upon Nysa, a mountain of India, twenty-four feet long, their colour being either yellow, purple, or azure blue.

Ovid, Fasti, Book iv. 501, further made to skim the waves of the ocean, much after the fashion of mythical personages depicted in the wood-cuts illustrating passages in the Shan Hai King.* Ammianus Marcellinus, whose history ends with the death of Valerius in A.D. 378, refers, as a remarkable instance of credulity, to a vulgar rumour that the chariot of Triptolemus was still extant, and had enabled Julian, who had rendered himself formidable both by sea and land, to pass over the walls of, and enter into the city of Heraclea. Though rational explanations are afforded by the theory of Bochart and Le Clerc, that the story is based upon the equivocal meaning of a Phœnician word, signifying either a winged dragon or a ship fastened with iron nails or bolts; or by that of Philodorus, as cited by Eusebius, who says that his ship was called a flying dragon, from its carrying the figure of a dragon on its prow; yet either simply transposes into another phase the current belief in a dragon, without prejudicing it.