Dragon days of summer

Believe it or not, August is Dragon Awareness Month. Yes, dragons: Those massive, winged, scaly, fire-breathing, dinosaur-looking creatures that pervade human folklore without limits of time or geography. Very popular mythical creatures.

Or are they?

Bestselling author-scientist Carl Sagan believed they were real. Sort of.

"The pervasiveness of dragon myths in the folk legends of many cultures is probably no accident," wrote Sagan in his book, "The Dragons of Eden."

He explained this pervasiveness in part on real-life experiences of pre-historic man and certain species of flying dinosaurs, such as pterodactyls. He called it fossil memory - sort of an imprint in our genetic material of real experiences in earlier millennia, an innate knowledge sprinkled with imagination. Indeed, old editions of Encyclopedia Britannica described certain dinosaurs as "dragonlike," and some paleontologists apparently used the words dragon and dinosaur interchangeably. Archaeologists have uncovered dragon-shaped skulls and other bones which give some credence to the image.

Even with the decline of dinosaurs in Earth's history, flying reptiles such as pterosaurs provided fodder for fear and fascination, as dragon myth and legend developed. Embellish with a few extra spikes (think modern bearded dragons and iguanas, whose ancestors were perhaps a little larger) and fire breath and voila, dragon legend takes root.

Dragons make consistent appearances throughout folklore and literature from Beowulf to Harry Potter, as well as reports of real-life accounts. A giant guardian dragon starred in The Epic of Gilgamesh, written around 2,000 B.C.E. The Bible describes Daniel killing one. After Alexander the Great swept through India, he claimed to have seen one in a cave, hissing at him. Greek historian Heroditus described "griffins" guarding their eggs, and other Greek accounts claim that dragons were imported to Greece from Ethiopia.

Roman consul Regulus in the Second Century and his soldiers were said to have killed and skinned a dragon during battle with Carthage. They skinned it and sent the hide to the Roman senate, where it was measured and recorded as 120 feet long.

Then of course there are the more modern and recognizable volumes of creatively depicted dragons in cultures of the Far East, where dragons are often considered sacred and, centuries ago, very real. Explorer Marco Polo wrote that he witnessed huge serpents with small legs in China, with jaws wide enough to swallow man. Ancient Chinese books describe healers who used dragon blood to cure the sick.

Ancient Egypt and other African and Arab cultures have tales of sightings throughout the centuries too, generally of the flying variety. Scandinavian tales describe sea dragons as late as the 18th century. Of course some people even now claim the sea monster (or maybe her great-great-grandmonsters) swims today in Scotland's Loch Ness.

True or false, real or imagined, feared or enamored - dragons are here to stay.

Sholeh Patrick is a columnist for the Hagadone News Network. Contact her at [email protected].