Research source

It will be readily understood that these traditions and fables would combine to 'hedge about a king' by…

Date of account: Published 1879
Source: Demonology and Devil-lore
Reference: Demonology and Devil-lore · selected passage 234
Rights: public_domain
Language: English
Record updated: 2026-08-24

Record summary

Published source text

Read the available text below. Archive transcriptions may contain OCR errors; later context is labelled separately. A recorded claim is not a finding that it happened.

Source passage

Source text · mention only

It will be readily understood that these traditions and fables would combine to 'hedge about a king' by ascribing to him familiarity with a monster so formidable to common people, and even investing him with its attributes. The dragon's name, drakôn, derived from the Sanskrit word for serpent (drig-visha), came to mean 'the thing that sees.' While this gave rise to many legends of præternatural powers of vision gained by tasting or bathing in a dragon's blood, as in the poem of Siegfried; or from waters it guarded, as 'Eye Well,' in which Guy's dragon dipped its tail to recover from wounds; the Sanskrit sense of eye-poisoning was preserved in legends of occult and dangerous powers possessed by kings,--one of the latest being the potent evil eye popularly ascribed in Italy to the late Pius IX.

Historical context

Contextual commentary · mention only

This material belongs to a folklore tradition. Story type, collector, community, transmission and literary editing matter when comparing it with other sources.

Modern context

Contextual commentary · mention only

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