Dragon Spotlight 20: Lac Long Quan

This week's myth comes from the Vietnamese people - or, more accurately, the Vietnamese people come from this myth. It is the origin story of the Vietnamese and their 100 clans.

It all begins with Lac Long Quan's grandparents. His grandfather, King Minh, was himself descended from the son of a princess and a heavenly dragon, and King Minh met and married the beautiful immortal Lady Vu. King Minh and Lady Vu had a son, Loc Tuc, and the King hoped that Loc Tuc would rule over the kingdom. However, the kindly Loc Tuc wanted his brother Nghi to inherent, so the kingdom was split in half.

Loc Tuc ruled over the south, and one day met Long Nu, a daughter of a dragon. The two had a son who would become known as the great Lac Long Quan. Lac Long Quan had magical qualities, most notably living underwater, but perhaps his greatest ability was his benevolent rule. He brought order without cruelty, and always worked for his people. Unfortunately, his uncle Nghi had given birth to a very different son. Lac Long Quan's cousin King Lai ruled over the north, and one day found out that Lac Long Quan was spending time underwater. King Lai took advantage of this opportunity and began to oppress the south, abandoning his lovely wife Au Co to do so. At that time, the people of the south called out to Lac Long Quan and he appeared, seeing Au Co and falling in love immediately. She loved him in turn, and eventually gave birth to a sack of 100 eggs, each of which grew into a handsome son. But Lac Long Quan still had to travel back and forth to his underwater realm, and Au Co grew to miss her mountain home, so despite their love they eventually parted, with each taking 50 sons to their homeland.

Rachel's drawing of Lac Long Quan highlights his connection to the sea, with waves crashing around him.

The main inspiration for this dragon is the Asian Vine Snake, or Ahaetulla, pictured below. Not only do they have unique "flat" looking bodies, but their eyes are keyhole shaped, an extremely unique shape in the reptile world.

From http://www.backwaterreptiles.com/images/snakes/Asian-vine-snake-for-sale.jpg

Dragon Spotlight 19: Ulilang Kaluluwa

     The dragon team is back together at UMass for the spring semester!  The course on dragon mythology is running for its second semester in a row as we finalize our collection of dragon myths.

     This week we focus on another myth from the Southeast Asia section.  Part of Philippine mythology, the tale of Ulilang Kaluluwa is one part of the story of creation.

     In the beginning, there were three great beings: Bathala, creator of life who lived on earth, Ulilang Kaluluwa, a great serpent in the clouds, and Galang Kaluluwa, a winged being who loved the water.  On the day that Ulilang Kaluluwa first saw Bathala, he was displeased that there was a god as great as he and attacked Bathala on the spot.  The battle between them lasted for days, until finally Bathala won and in his anger, burned Ulilang Kaluluwa's body.

     Later in his travels, Bathala met Galang, who was overjoyed to have a friend with whom he could share his days.  They were very happy spending time with each other for many years, until one day Galang became sick.  Galang had heard of Bathala's dream of creating life on earth, and gave him instructions that when he died, Bathala was to take Galang's body and bury it where he had burned Ulilang Kaluluwa.  When the sad day came, Bathala did as he was told.  Not long after, a tree emerged from the ground - the first coconut tree.  Its leaves reminded him of Galang Kaluluwa's wings, and its round nuts which seemed to have eyes reminded him of his friend's face.  But the body of the tree was just like the tough scales of Ulilang Kaluluwa.  Bathala knew that the tree would provide everything for the creatures he had imagined, and set about making the first humans.

     For the intensely jealous Ulilang, Rachel's illustration relied on the dog-toothed cat snake (Boiga cynodon).  Not only does this snake slither around the tops of trees in forest canopies in many parts of Southeast Asia (including the Philippines), but he also has scales like tree bark, making him the perfect fit for Ulilang Kaluluwa.

     Here is a picture of our lovely inspiration, the dog-toothed cat snake.

     And here you can see the roughness of its scales, making it a good stand-in for Ulilang.

     Join us again next week for more dragon myths!

Dragon Spotlight 18: Biwar's Dragon

This week’s dragon doesn’t have a name of his own, but was slain by a legendary warrior whose name he will forever be associated with.

One day, a village in New Guinea formed a group to go and find sago, a kind of flour made from the centers of palm trees.  Twelve boats were made ready, and after three days the boats were nearly filled.  On their way home, they passed over a dragon, who began whipping his tail around creating huge waves.  Not only did many of the boats capsize, but the village itself was flooded.  One pregnant woman held onto a tree to survive, eating its fruit and roots.  When her son Biwar was born, there were so few villagers left that she had to raise him on her own away from the village.

Biwar was a talented young man.  He could start fires and create weapons, and he was also a great sailor.  One day, he came home with so many fish that his mother asked where they came from.  When he told her, she begged him to never go there again, for that was where the dragon had emerged and killed so many of her fellow villagers.  Hearing the tale, Biwar began setting up a trap for the dragon in the mouth of a cave.  He lured the dragon into the cave, and when the dragon’s head creeped in Biwar’s traps set off.  Arrows fired, spears were thrown, clubs rained down, and daggers flew through the air at the dragon.  Biwar ran home and told his mother that the dragon was dead.

The next day, Biwar and his mother sailed to home village of Mimika.  Everyone welcomed them back and celebrated Biwar, who had defeated the dragon that nearly killed him before he was even born.

Rachel’s drawing of Biwar uses a monitor lizard native to New Guinea (pictured below), grown to enormous proportions.  You can see his tail churning the water behind him.

Dragon Spotlight 17: Souvan and Soutto, the Mekong River Dragons

Welcome back from the holiday break, everyone!  Since last week probably revolved around food, and may have featured some bickering, we’ve decided to give you the story of Souvan and Soutto this week.

The mighty dragons Souvan and Soutto lived in a huge lake, too distant to visit every day but close enough to be great friends.  On one visit, Soutto brought Souvan elephant meat, and in return Souvan wanted to send a gift to Soutto.  However, the hunting went poorly and Souvan only caught a porcupine, so he sent the porcupine meat along with some of its quills, which were very beautiful.  Soutto was quite angry, for he felt that Souvan had cheated him.  After all, an animal that produces hairs as long and quick as a porcupine’s quills must be an enormous creature!  Souvan tried his best to explain the true size of porcupines, but Soutto would not admit to having never seen one and insisted he had been wronged.  He brought an army of dragons against Souvan and his dragons, and their fight threw mud onto the land and eventually blocked out the sun.  It only ended when the gods become so frustrated with the feuding dragons that they intervened, and punished them both by making them create rivers.  Soutto made the Mekong River and Souvan created the Nan, and even though the dragons became friends again, the water from those rivers is said to remember the feud so that putting water from each river in the same bottle will crack or even shatter glass.

In Rachel’s illustration, you can see Soutto furiously accusing Souvan of short-changing him.

Dragon Spotlight 16: Baruklinting

You may have noticed that there was no post last week - the semester is certainly beginning to “drag on.”  Get it?  “DRAG-ON”?  OK, we’ll get right to the myth.

This week we are focusing on a myth from Java about 1 shepherd boy who was picked on by the 9 other shepherd boys from his village.  One day this unpopular boy was resting under a tree, when he heard the other 9 boys planning to come pelt him with cow dung to drive him away.  Before they could throw the cow patties at him, just as he prepared to run, the sky opened up and rain poured down on them all.  The unpopular shepherd, a clever boy, found a cave to hide in.  The others followed him and shoved him out into the rain, laughing as his clothes were drenched.  But they only laughed for a few seconds, because suddenly the cave snapped shut!  It was not a cave at all, but the mouth of the dragon Baruklinting, who had received a vision that nine shepherds would be delivered to his great mouth.

The last remaining shepherd ran back to his village in horror.  He rallied the villagers, who grabbed weapons and prepared to fight the dragon.  But when they ran to the place where Baruklinting had been, the dragon was gone and the sun was shining.

For this drawing, Rachel chose to focus not on an indigenous species but on the cave formations Baruklinting would have had to imitate.  Stalactites form his upper row of teeth and stalagmites form his bottom teeth.

In some versions of the myth, Baruklinting is actually the unloved shepherd boy and not the dragon, begging the question - is something more sinister going on?  Is Baruklinting both the boy and the cause of the other, cruel shepherds’ demise?  Since we’re just on the other side of Halloween, we’ll let you ponder the question!

Dragon Spotlight 15: Bakunawa

This week we’re departing from India and the Middle East to cover Southeastern Asian dragon myths!  There are some great ones ahead, so give yourself permission to get just a little bit excited.

Our first dragon is the bakunawa, a dragon indigenous to the Philippines who is famous for trying to eat the moon.  In fact, the stories say that there were once seven moons who the moon goddess Bathala created - but this was before the bakunawa ate them.  Bakunawa has two sets of wings, whiskers on his face, a red tongue, and an enormous mouth.  In most stories he is a serpent, but in some he is more like a shark.

There are several stories about Bakunawa, and why he ate most of our moons.  Some say he was irresistably attracted to the moons and their beauty.  Others say he was angry over the death of his sister, a sea turtle who laid her eggs and caused the tides to gradually rise until one night, the humans on the island she visited captured and killed her.  The goddess Bathala sided with Bakunawa, touched by his grief, and refused to punish him for eating six moons.  In another story, Bakunawa fell in love with a human woman, and their happiness was destroyed when the villagers found out and burned her home to the ground.  Bakunawa ate the moons in a fit of rage and vengeance, and Bathala punished him, banishing him to the sea.

But Bakunawa is not content to stay at sea.  Often the waters rise as he tries to come back home, and whenever there is an eclipse of the moon, it is said that he is trying to eat the last one.  In some places, the tradition is for people to bang pots and pans at an eclipse, driving the bakunawa away.

Rachel’s illustration of the bakunawa is based on a basking shark, since some descriptions of bakunawa make him seem shark-like.  The basking shark, as seen below, has a massive mouth (the better to swallow the moon with) and are found in the waters off of the Philippines.  She also gave it bioluminescent patches, like many creatures who live in dark deep-sea waters have, to help it in both its aquatic environment and during its missions to the darkness of outer space.

Dragon Spotlight 14: Vritra

In India, there is a Hindu god named Indra who brings rain and ensures the health of the land.  This mighty warrior god has an archnemesis in the powerful demon Vritra.

A snake so large his head reached into the clouds, Vritra is the demon of drought, a title he gained by stealing all of the world’s water.  He channeled all of the water in the world and kept it contained in a mountain without concern for the people of the world who were dying of starvation and thirst.  Despite how terrible the drought was, no warriors wanted to challenge Vritra - but Indra rose to the challenge.  He armed himself with several lightning bolts and rode an elephant to Vritra’s mountain.  There, the young storm god fought the great snake for many hours.  Vritra clawed at him, and he threw lightning at the dragon.  Finally, Vritra came too close to Indra and Indra struck at his legs, severing them.  As Vritra let out a terrible cry, Indra finished the dragon by cutting him in half.  He then released the water back into the world.

In this sneak peek of our illustration, you can see the water gushing out of Vritra’s mouth.  Rachel’s drawing of Vritra takes inspiration from both Indian statues and the bizarre horned toad species of Southeast Asia, pictured below.  

In recent pop culture, Vritra has been featured in the game Puzzle & Dragons as - fittingly - a dark dragon.