What is it about the dragon that makes it such an iconic symbol of fantasy? Almost all the game systems I've seen (that are in a fantasy setting) feature them heavily. Hell, they show up a lot more in fiction in general than trolls or goblins or orcs.
Is it simply because of how often they were used in various legends and myths, or does it go deeper?
>>43603091
Good question. Dragons have always featured prominently in the legends and myths of major world cultures. I heard a theory that they represent a hybrid of all the predators of early man, but I think that's nonsense.
The spread has to be Tolkien's fault somehow, morphed into their current shape by DnD, just like so many other races.
This is horribly off-topic, but I'm looking for a picture where the royalty has been killed, leaving the prince to be raised by a dragon, and he then gets a massive Oedipus complex.
It's been annoying me for several days now.
>>43604352
>raised by a dragon, and he then gets a massive Oedipus complex
forwhatpurpose.jpg
>>43603091
Dracons are iconic fantasy creatures because, well, they're iconic fantasy creatures. They show up in many myths, their role as a big monster for the hero to face and defeat has been established long before modern fantasy genre was a thing (the legend of Saint George and various other stories of a hero slaying a dragon), and because of those factors they're very recogniseable. Plus they look cool.
>>43604383
I need it for my own confirmation that it existed, and that I do not actually have an Oedipus complex.
I have been trying to find it for fucking ages. I just want the satisfaction of finding that image.
>>43604489
>and that I do not actually have an Oedipus complex.
Do you really need a picture of a dragon to work that out?
Here, I'll help.
>Do you feel sexual attraction towards your mother?
>Do you feel inexplicable rage towards your father?
If you answered yes to either, then you may wish to consider therapy.
>>43604060
Are they flying with the dragon or trying to kill it?
Is this part of the most awesome air show in the world or a horrible battle?
>>43603091
Immagine a baron. A typical greedy evil baron. Actually, any noble will do.
Peasants start going about how the fucker sleeps on a pile of mone, how he is the devil itself and can breathe fire, how he's actually an alien lizard. Some drunk stories later, the evil noble becomes a dragon.
Seriously, even kidnaping young maidens and fighting valiant knights checks out.
And since fantasy is mostly ancient legends from times when people didin't know any better, and there were a lot of grumpy peasants, dragons got widespread. Bam, instant popularity.
>>43608633
That doesn't explain eastern dragons
>>43609574
Or American ones for that matter.
Here's a question, why are dragons so widespread in culture?
Almost every culture in history has had some sort of dragon mentioned.
>>43609574
Explain this dragon *unzips dick*
>>43610090
They're cool
>>43603091
Combination of several factors:
A) Dragon is about the MOST UNIVERSAL mythological creature and concept in the world. There are basically no cultures that would not have their own form of a dragon, and in every single one of them it's always an iconic being with exceptional power and position. There are some theories as to why are dragons such an amazing human universal, one of them actually assumes the connection between the co-evolution of human ancestors and predatory reptiles - it's extremely interesting, if at some points questionable.
So in that respect, fantasy, which basically is a romantic re-invention of our old mythological thinking, is bound to come across dragons once again.
The second reason I think is more prosaic - the key role in establishing common fantasy aesthetics that these stories contributed to heavily: Hobbit, Bible, the legend of Saint George in all it's variations, Nibelungenlied and all that stuff, be it historical or romantical.
So it's a combination of a more deep fascination of the image of a dragon that always was around in our mythical mindset, and a far more simple reason of a relatively small collection of works that had relatively massive impact on the genre.
>>43610090
Honestly, I think it might be a translation error. Eastern dragons are really different from european ones, and foreigners just heard the description and said "fuck it it's a dragon" and called it a day
>>43610354
It most assuredly isn't. Want a proof? Go read up Kojiki: you'll find a story of a valiant prince saving a fair maiden from I think seven or eight-headed dragon. To make it even more fun, he beats the dragon by digging a ditch, filling it with sake and leaving it as a trap for the dragon.
You have nearly the same exact story in Wells, in Sasia, in Germany, and among some mezoamerican cultures.
This is not a translation error: this shit is just human universal. And you'd be mistaken for thinking that eastern dragons are profoundly different from the western ones.
>>43610090
The most convincing argument I have heard is that people found dinosaur bones and made legends around them.
>>43610420
>>43610090
I've mentioned this in a previous post, I'll expand on it.
The most convincing theory I've heard is this an expansion on Isbell's snake/primate co-evolution theory (http://www.livescience.com/4183-fear-snakes-drove-pre-human-evolution.html) which assumes that if predatory snakes and reptilians in general were such a MASSIVE evolutionary deal for us, they had been embedded into our deepest thoughts and intuitions: the image of a dragon being abstraction of a long, evolutionary driven significance of any form of predatory reptile as "something to be always weary about".
>>43610420
I suppose, but it just doesn't add up .
Dinosaurs are not located everywhere in the world.
Plus every dragon across the board have similarities if not outright the same features. Dinosaurs differed vastly.
Where would you get wings from any sort of large dinosaur? Like a stegosaur or a brontosaur?
>>43610569
Every dragon didn't have wings
>>43607788
They're flying away from it and they still have their missiles, so I don't think it's a fight.
>>43610569
Actually, the whole "dinosaur bones" idea is completely fucking retarded because people who dug up those shattered fragments of bones thousands of years ago had NO FUCKING CLUE that the animal that it belonged to was a reptile.
They did not exactly have the popular artists producing the cannonic images of dinosaurs we have today.
The whole theory is mindboggingly retarded, to be honest.
>>43604489
>I need it for my own confirmation that it existed, and that I do not actually have an Oedipus complex.
I've seen it as well, so it's not your subconscious trying to fuck with you. I don't have it saved though.
>>43604489
>>43604352
http://www.pixiv.net/member.php?id=1110826
>>43605945
No.
Okay yay.
>>43611036
>http://www.pixiv.net/member.php?id=1110826
Thank you so much. Now my brain is at peace.
