49 Fun Facts About Dragon

'Dragon' entered English in the 13th century via Old French from a Latin word meaning what?

Latin draco meant 'huge serpent'; the word reached English around 1220 through Old French, and its Greek root drakon is thought to derive from a verb meaning 'I see'.

Which hero sowed a dragon's teeth to raise the first warriors of Thebes?

Cadmus slew the dragon guarding a spring near the future Thebes and sowed its teeth; armed men called the Spartoi sprang from the ground and became the city's founding nobles.

Chinese dragons were traditionally thought to govern what?

Chinese dragons ruled rain, the sea and other water: farmers prayed to them for rainfall, and the Dragon Kings of the Four Seas each governed an ocean.

Under the Ming and Qing dynasties, a dragon with how many claws was reserved strictly for the emperor?

The five-clawed dragon was reserved for the emperor under the Ming and Qing; princes and high nobles were limited to four-clawed dragons, lesser officials to three.

Per the Han scholar Wang Fu, a Chinese dragon's scales resemble those of which animal?

Wang Fu's nine resemblances give the dragon the scales of a carp, plus a stag's antlers, a camel's head, a demon's eyes, an eagle's claws, a tiger's soles and a cow's ears.

Which coloured dragon appeared on the first Chinese national flag under the Qing dynasty?

The Qing 'Yellow Dragon Flag', adopted as the national flag in 1889, showed an azure dragon chasing a red pearl on a yellow ground.

The Dragon is which animal in the 12-year cycle of the Chinese zodiac?

The Dragon is fifth, after the Rat, Ox, Tiger and Rabbit; birth rates in Chinese communities measurably rise in Dragon years because such children are considered lucky.

The Dragon Boat Festival commemorates which ancient Chinese poet-statesman?

Qu Yuan, a poet and minister of the state of Chu, drowned himself in the Miluo River around 278 BC; legend says locals raced out in boats and threw rice to protect his body.

In 2009 the Dragon Boat Festival became the first Chinese holiday recognised by UNESCO on which list?

UNESCO inscribed the Dragon Boat Festival on its Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2009, the first Chinese festival to be listed.

The red dragon on the flag of Wales fights an invading dragon of which colour in the Mabinogion?

In the tale of Lludd and Llefelys the white dragon stood for the Saxons and the red for the Britons; the red dragon later became the badge of Henry VII.

Wales's red dragon flag became the country's official flag in which year?

The red dragon became the official national flag of Wales in 1959 by proclamation of Queen Elizabeth II; Henry VII had borne a red dragon banner after Bosworth in 1485.

The 13th-century Golden Legend places Saint George's dragon-terrorised city in which country?

Jacobus de Voragine's Golden Legend sets the story at the city of Silene in Libya, whereas the earliest 11th- and 12th-century versions had placed it in Cappadocia.

In the Old English epic Beowulf, what provokes the dragon that the aged king finally fights?

Beowulf kills it with the help of young Wiglaf but dies of his wounds fifty years after beating Grendel's mother.

Which of Beowulf's followers alone dares to help him against the dragon?

Wiglaf, a young kinsman of Beowulf, alone stands by him when the other retainers flee; he stabs the dragon's belly and receives the dying king's collar and armour.

In Norse legend, Fáfnir became a dragon to guard a hoard taken from which dwarf?

Loki seized the dwarf Andvari's gold, including a cursed ring, as weregild for Ótr; Fáfnir killed his father Hreiðmarr to keep it and was later slain by Sigurð with the sword Gram.

Jörmungandr, the Norse World Serpent, is the child of Loki and which giantess?

Angrboða, a giantess of Jötunheimar, bore Loki three children: the wolf Fenrir, Hel who rules the dead, and the serpent Jörmungandr, whom Odin cast into the sea around Midgard.

What does Jörmungandr do that makes him an example of an ouroboros?

Jörmungandr grew so large that he encircles Midgard and bites his own tail, the tail-eating loop that defines an ouroboros; his letting go is a sign of Ragnarök.

The Hydra slain by Heracles as his second labour lived at Lerna, reputedly an entrance to what?

Lerna's bottomless lake was reputed to be an entrance to the Underworld, which the Hydra guarded; Heracles's nephew Iolaus cauterised each neck so the heads could not regrow.

According to Hyginus, which goddess hurled the dragon Draco into the sky, where it froze at the pole?

In Hyginus's Astronomica, Athena (Minerva) snatched the dragon the Giants hurled at her and flung it spinning into the heavens, where it froze around the celestial pole.

Which star in Draco served as the northern pole star from around 3942 BC to 1793 BC?

The Egyptian pyramids' entrance passages were aligned so it would be visible at night.

Leviathan, the sea dragon of the Hebrew Bible, reflects which older Canaanite monster defeated by Baal?

Lotan, a seven-headed sea serpent smitten by Baal in the Ugaritic Baal Cycle, is the linguistic and mythic ancestor of Leviathan; Hobbes borrowed the name for his 1651 treatise on the state.

Which ruler founded the Order of the Dragon, the source of Vlad Dracul's name?

Sigismund of Luxembourg, King of Hungary and later Holy Roman Emperor, founded the Order of the Dragon in 1408 to defend Christendom; Vlad II was inducted in 1431 and took the name Dracul.

A wyvern differs from a classic heraldic dragon in having how many legs?

A wyvern has two legs and a pair of wings, whereas the classic heraldic dragon has four legs; the name comes via Old French wivre from Latin vipera, 'viper'.

The Komodo dragon is native to islands of which country?

Komodo dragons live only on Komodo, Rinca, Flores and a few neighbouring Indonesian islands; the world's largest living lizard first reached Western science in 1910.

Young Komodo dragons live in trees and roll in what to deter cannibalistic adults?

Juveniles roll in faeces so that adult Komodo dragons, which readily eat young of their own species, will not treat them as prey; they stay up in trees until they are too big to be swallowed.

The first two live Komodo dragons in Europe went on show at which zoo's new Reptile House in 1927?

London Zoo's new Reptile House opened in 1927 with a pair of Komodo dragons, the first seen alive in Europe; curator Joan Procter famously walked one around the grounds on a leash.

Roughly how many facets, or ommatidia, does each of a dragonfly's compound eyes have?

Each compound eye holds roughly 24,000 ommatidia, some species approaching 30,000, giving dragonflies near all-round vision; damselflies fold their wings at rest while dragonflies hold theirs out flat.

Smaug in The Hobbit is killed by Bard the Bowman when a thrush reveals what?

Bilbo had spotted the gap while trading riddles with the dragon.

How many years before The Hobbit's events did Smaug seize the dwarf kingdom of Erebor?

Smaug took Erebor in Third Age 2770 and Bilbo's journey came in 2941, 171 years later; on the same day the dragon laid waste to the neighbouring town of Dale.

Who voiced Smaug, with performance capture, in Peter Jackson's Hobbit films?

Benedict Cumberbatch voiced Smaug and performed motion capture for him, and also supplied the voice of the Necromancer (Sauron) in the Hobbit trilogy.

Which Longfellow poem, where a bird reveals a weak spot, has been suggested as a source for Smaug's death?

In The Song of Hiawatha a woodpecker tells Hiawatha to aim at the one unprotected spot, the tuft of hair, on the wampum-armoured Megissogwon; critics have likened this to the thrush and Smaug.

The How to Train Your Dragon films are based on books by which British author?

Cressida Cowell wrote the twelve How to Train Your Dragon novels, beginning in 2003, about young Hiccup on the Viking island of Berk; the 2010 DreamWorks film adapted them loosely.

Toothless in How to Train Your Dragon belongs to which rare breed?

Jay Baruchel voiced Hiccup in the animated trilogy.

How much story time passes between the first and second How to Train Your Dragon films?

The sequel is set five years on: Hiccup has grown from fifteen to twenty, and director Dean DeBlois framed the trilogy as his coming of age.

In Game of Thrones, how does Daenerys hatch her three dragon eggs?

At the end of season one Daenerys places the eggs on her husband Khal Drogo's funeral pyre, with the witch Mirri Maz Duur bound to it as blood magic, and walks out of the flames unburnt with three hatchlings.

Which actress plays Daenerys Targaryen, the Mother of Dragons, on Game of Thrones?

Emilia Clarke played Daenerys across all eight seasons from 2011 to 2019, earning four Emmy nominations; Tamzin Merchant had held the role in the unaired pilot.

Mushu, the small dragon in Disney's Mulan, was demoted from family guardian for what?

Mushu lost his guardian post after failing to protect the ancestor Fa Deng, who lost his head, and was reduced to gong-ringer; the dragon was invented for the film and dropped from the 2020 remake.

Who voiced Mushu in the 1998 Mulan?

Eddie Murphy voiced Mushu in 1998, his first animated role; Mark Moseley imitated him for the direct-to-video Mulan II in 2004.

The Dragon in Shrek ends up marrying which character?

Dragon falls for Donkey when he flatters her in the castle, swallows Lord Farquaad at the wedding, and the pair have six dronkey babies by the end of Shrek 2.

'Puff, the Magic Dragon' was based on a poem by a 19-year-old student at which university?

Leonard Lipton, a 19-year-old Cornell student, typed the poem on fellow student Peter Yarrow's typewriter, inspired by Ogden Nash's 'The Tale of Custard the Dragon'.

In 'Puff, the Magic Dragon', what is the name of Puff's human playmate?

Little Jackie Paper brings Puff strings and sealing wax until he grows up and stops coming; the pair had frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honalee.

Charizard, the dragon-like Pokémon, actually has which two in-game types?

Charizard is Fire and Flying type despite its looks; only its Mega Charizard X form gains the Dragon type. Its Japanese name is Lizardon.

Historian Adrienne Mayor argues which real discovery may have inspired ancient dragon stories?

In The First Fossil Hunters (2000) Adrienne Mayor argues that fossils of dinosaurs and mammoths, such as Protoceratops skulls seen by Scythian gold miners, inspired griffin and dragon legends.

In ancient Greek cult, as opposed to myth, drakontes were gentle figures associated with what?

Cult drakontes were benign figures of healing and wealth: the healer Asclepius was embodied by a sacred drakon at Epidaurus, and Zeus Meilichios and the Agathos Daimon, givers of wealth, were worshipped in drakon form.

Which of these famous serpent-dragons comes from Aztec, not Old World, culture?

Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Serpent of the Aztecs and earlier Mesoamerican peoples, was worshipped at Teotihuacan by about AD 200; Vṛtra is Vedic, Níðhöggr Norse and Kulshedra Albanian.

Which country is known in its own Dzongkha language as the 'Land of the Thunder Dragon'?

Bhutan calls itself Druk Yul, 'Land of the Thunder Dragon'; its kings are the Druk Gyalpo, 'Thunder Dragon Kings', and the name comes from the Drukpa lineage of Tibetan Buddhism.

In Egyptian myth, which giant serpent of the underworld did the sun god Ra battle every night?

Apep (Apophis), the serpent of chaos, attacked Ra's solar barque each night on its passage through the Duat and was cut down by Set and the crew; Egyptians blamed eclipses on his daytime assaults.

In Korean folklore, a lesser serpent-like dragon that hopes to become a true dragon is called what?

An imugi is a hornless proto-dragon of Korean lore; in one telling it must wait a thousand years, in another catch a Yeouiju orb fallen from heaven, before it becomes a true dragon.

The Romans' one notable original dragon myth has Regulus's army fighting a giant serpent at which North African river?

At the Bagrada river, the modern Medjerda in Tunisia, in 256 BC, Regulus's men, as Livy and Pliny tell it, killed the serpent with catapults after javelins failed; its 120-foot skin was sent to Rome.