# Why?



## dwndrgn (Apr 24, 2004)

Why are there so many stories, dating from way back when (or to use a fantasy phrase: from time immemorial) of dragons, giants, little people...so many and from so many distant and differing sources.  I can possibly believe stories of dragons coming from remnants of prehistoria.  I can understand stories of imps and little people and 'bogey men' to explain away the inexplicable.  But giants?  One eyed creatures?  If I did the research (I don't have to tons of people have already done it for me, thanks by the way ) I could find stories of these and other things that come from distant continents and times that have striking similarities.

What's your explanation?  I won't accept a Gondwonaland answer as we know (or think we know from the evidence - we could be wrong since we weren't there ) that tribes of human evolved separately after the separation.  So?  What the heck?  How do differently evolved peoples come up with the same stories?


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## littlemissattitude (Apr 24, 2004)

I've always figured that those sorts of stories come from known examples that are just exaggerated.  For example, I have a friend whose brother is over seven feet tall (he also eats fire and swallows swords and lays in broken glass, but that's another story).  He just comes from a naturally tall family, but pituitary problems can, presumably, occur in any group of people, and that can sometimes lead to excessive height.  That would make an impression, especially in people who are naturally not that tall.  Get a good storyteller who doesn't mind stretching things (you should excuse the expression) a little bit, and you get stories about giants.  Similarly, there have always been individuals born with birth defects of various types.  Again, apt to occur from time to time in any population.  Granted, with a lack of medical care, some of them would not have survived, but others might well have.  Again, a bit of exaggeration and we have, for example, a cyclops.

A half-man, half-horse, now, would be a bit more difficult to account for. 

Oh, and by the way, dwndrgn.  I really like the title you gave this thread.  "Why?" is my favorite question in the world; it works equally well for just about any topic that might come up.  Best way I know to drive someone crazy who has been irritating you is to ask "Why?" every time they say anything.  My, my, I'm feeling mischevious tonight.


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## polymorphikos (Apr 24, 2004)

Just look at all the strange things populating sci fi and fantasy stories. The human imagination's a great thing, and if a caveman got sick of telling people about how many rabbits he'd speared last week, the logical step would be some shaggy-dog story about the rabbit as large as a mammoth and with the wings of a bat that he had bravely defeated with a spear and a megalotherium's thigh-bone.
Then it becomes a matter of tapping into the collective psyche of a people. In other words, dragons are cool, and people would have loved hearing about them, so over time these stories became the staple of any story-teller's arsenal where-ever they arose.


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## Brian G Turner (Apr 24, 2004)

The stories of dragons certainly seems pretty widespread. My personal interpretation is that the stories grew up around periodic fossil finds. I mean, really, imagine what it would be like for someone in the ancient world to find a large fossilised skull - especially from an extinct carnosaur!

 Giants and little people etc I see as anthropomorphisms of perceived sprits, which in themselves are metaphors for various natural world processes. In simple speech: a volcano rumbles but doesn't explode - natural world process; therefore people close by, not understanding the natural process as that, confer some conscious action no the part of the volcano - perceived spirit; that in itself is hard to identify with, as what does this spirit look like? Well, if it's big enough to make a mountain rumble then it must be a giant - anthropomorphism.

 A little simplistic, but hope that helps.


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## Esioul (Apr 24, 2004)

Yeah- I expect early people did find archaeological things too. Anthropomorphism is something which early societies used to do with gods, so I suppose that makes sense. 

A lot of them could just have been made up or were so distorted from thr origninal story that they aren't at all similar anymore. For example, the Cyclops could have come from a real one eyed, tall man, or at least one in a story.


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## Brian G Turner (Apr 24, 2004)

Actually, I'm sure I remember reading somewhere - I don't remember where - a claim of the cyclops legend originating from the finding of one or more broekn mammoth skulls, because they have a massive hole in the front for the trunk - easily imagained to have been the place for an eye. Sorry - cannae find a good full frontal pic online.


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## Esioul (Apr 24, 2004)

Cool. Yeah I should think they would look like cylcops. (Cyclopei?) Bones probably did contribute a lot to mythology, and their misinterpretations about their own past.


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## littlemissattitude (Apr 24, 2004)

Actually, the two things I find most interesting in the old stories, and wonder where they came from, are:

1) People living to very advanced ages.  In the Bible, for example, there are some very long-lived people, who did some very interesting things in their old age.  Sarah gave birth, so the story says, in her nineties.  At the extreme end of the age scale, Methuselah is said to have lived to be over 900 years old.  I don't know stories from other traditions that well, but I would assume that such stories exist there as well.

2)  The idea of people being taken off the earth and out into space.  Obviously, this would have been quite foreign to any kind of experience they could have had, according to the conventional wisdom.  But they're there.

Although, I think a lot of the speculation we're doing here is just another manifestation of bias toward the imagination of human beings who live now and against the imaginative ability of ancient humans.  We think of all sorts of outlandish things; why couldn't they have as well?

Just wondering.  It's what I do when I have too much time on my hands on a weekend afternoon.


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## BlueSkelton (Jun 16, 2004)

Its all real man. Real i tell you.


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## kyektulu (Jul 18, 2005)

Because once these mythological creatures existed. Dragons still exist I have seen them! honest!
xxxkyexxx


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