theload:

maz-gth:

dimetrodone:

theload:

dullorama:

chickadee-sun:

theload:

It has come to my attention that many people don’t know shit about dragons, so let me help you out.

Dragon: 4 legs, 2 wings.

Also Dragon: 2 legs, 2 wings

Also Dragon: 4 legs, flightless

Also Dragon: Limbless

Also Dragon: 4 legs, can fly

Also Dragon: 0 legs, 2 wings

Also Dragon: 0 legs, 0 wings

“But wait!” You, my hypothetical Strawman wail. “I thought that was a wyvern/wyrm/drake! Does this mean tumblr and pop culture has been lying to me this entire time?”

Not exactly, but it has been getting things not 100% right either.

Dragon an Umbrella Term, meaning there are a lot of creatures that fall under that heading. Something with two wings and two legs is a Wyvern, but that doesn’t mean it has stopped being a dragon.

So why the confusion? Part of it has to do with the fact fiction is free to define these terms how they want. In the context of D&D a Wyvern isn’t a dragon, but D&D is borrowing these creatures from myth, and doesn’t make the rules when it comes to interpreting said myths.

Another part of the issue is that Dragon, referring to the subtype with four legs and two wings, has no other name. It shares the name of the group. An example I use to demonstrate a similar case is Tigers vs Cats. Tigers are a species of cat, no one will deny this. Tigers are not, however House Cats. See what I mean? Wyverns are Dragons (The Group) but they are not Dragons (the subtype with four legs).

Additionally, because I have seen this a bit, unless you are using Wyrm as a synonym for Dragon: The Umbrella Term, do not call East Asian dragons Wyrms. The term Wyrm is heavily steeped in European tradition, while East Asian dragons are heavily steeped in their own. At best it’s ignorant, at worst it’s culturally insensitive. If you want a name for East Asian dragons, use one of the native terms. Which, now that I’ve confused you with the pictures, here are some terms.

• Dragon- Umbrella Term for entire Group.
• Dragon-Four legs, wings.
• Wyvern- Dragon with two legs, wings.
• Drake-Wingless, flightless dragon. Alternatively, synonym for Dragon.
• Wyrm-Limbless dragon. Alternatively, archaic word for any dragon.
• Long/Lung- Chinese Dragon.
• Ryu/Tatsu-Japanese Dragon.
• Yong/Ryong-Korean Dragon.
• Rong-Vietnamese Dragon.
• Naga-Indian Serpent/Cobra Dragons.
• Amphiptere-Dragon with wings, no legs.
• Linnorm-Dragon with two legs, no wings. Alternatively, Scandinavian term for dragon.
  

The Chinese dragons as wyrms especially bugs me because “wyrm” has such a negative connotation. “Dragon” historically did, but in modern fiction dragons are pretty cool and often Mary Sue-ish. But when something is called a wyrm in modern fiction, it’s often closer to negative Medieval depictions of dragons: non-sapient, crawling on the ground or burrowing (the Dune sandworms are a science fiction variation,) mindlessly destructive. So applying the English word wyrm to Chinese long or Japanese tatsu or whatever isn’t really the same as applying the Enlish word dragon. Yeah, let’s take one of the few words for dragon that still sounds negative and classify the not-us people’s dragons as that. Even though it doesn’t quite fit because wyrm usually meaning limbless dragon and most Asian dragons have limbs.

If someone says to you that something isn’t a dragon, you can tell them that dragons don’t exist.

In real life no, but they are something in culture, and that’s what we’re looking at. Culturally, in the original myths, all these things are very clearly just regional variants on the same sort of creature. The idea of types of dragons comes later.

So while you do have a point, at the same time them being mythical doesn’t give a person free range to call, say, The Minotaur a dragon. See what I mean?

The thing about “Dragons” is that they’re kindof a mythological equivalent of a polyphylic clade, in that they likely “evolved” independently many times in different cultures from accounts/exaggerations of reptiles (mainly snakes, most pre medieval western dragons were limbless and associated with poison as opposed to limbed, the first known mention of a fire breathing dragon was in Beowulf and even then it was still most likely serpentine)

The Chinese long and other similar East Asian dragons were likely developed (initially) independently from Western Dragons, in the same way that the Chinese “unicorn” (Qilin) and “phoenix” (Fenghuang) arnt really the same things as the western “equivelents. The fact that we call them “dragons” is because it was how Westerners traveling in China interpreted and described the scaly horned creatures in their art.

This practice of “dragonfying” other culture’s big reptiles isnt exclusively a European thing either. A similar “mix-up” in associating happened in China with the Indian Nāga, and the two initially separate critters began to share more traits and even merge them together with the move of Buddhism through Eastern Asia.

Now the deal with the Wyvern. The idea of a strict division between a two legged repto-beast as a “Wyvern” and not a “dragon” mostly spread through (and is more important in) heraldry rather then folklore, and also only really in Britain and after the Medieval Ages. Other places also had similar two legged dragons, but they werent considered a separate entities for the most part.

Worms/wurms/”wyrms” are actually just old, Germanic-rooted terms for dragons. The term “dragon” in the English language didnt appear until later when it was borrowed from the french word for them (which stemmed from the Latin draco and originally from the Greek word drakōn). Both worm and drakōn were also used as general terms for serpents, including snakes and real life worms we know now, and initially dragons were just big snakes, legs and wings weren’t popular until later. Because of the shift in both language and looks of a dragon, the older, serpentine dragons in folklore had the name worm, while newer ones were given the newer term dragon. 

Tldr Dragons have a long history hat resulted from lots of cultural exchange and therefor their classification is tricky.

Also Dragon

@maz-gth

This is the best addition to my post yet.