CH 3 (1/7) - Other Saintly Dragon Slayers

Part 1 of the third chapter of historian Frederick William Hackwood's study of dragonlore.

FULL ILLUSTRATED TEXT :
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AS dragon slaying is a common allegory to express the triumph of the Christian hero over evil, quite a number of those commemorated in the Calendar of Saints are credited with having overcome some dragon or other monstrous enemy of the Christian religion. The Saviour Himself and the Virgin Mary, if not exactly numbered among the dragon slayers, are represented as trampling underfoot the Old Serpent of Evil. St. John the Evangelist is credited with charming a winged dragon from the poisoned chalice given him to drink. Even the Puritan writer John Bunyan avails himself of the same figure when he makes Christian encounter and prevail against Apollyan.

In the early centuries of the Church's history, when Christendom was beset on many of its borders by various forms of gross heathenism, the opportunities of rising to the canonical degree of heavenly sanctity, by spiritual conquests over prevailing Evil, were always discoverable by the heroically inclined.

So firmly was the idea of religious dragon slaying impressed on the minds of the early Christians that the consideration of it as an hereditary virtue, passing from father to son, seemed quite a reasonable proposition to entertain. So we have a Sicilian legend to the effect that this country was once ravaged by a monster called Pongo, which from time to time came up out of the sea, devoured hundreds of the inhabitants, and left the region desolate. After these depredations had gone on for a long time, the country was at last saved from further ravagings by three sons of the mighty champion St. George, who went forth with their father's valour and slew the amphibious monster.

These saintly champions of old are peculiar to no Christian country, though ancient France seems to have been somewhat prolific of them. Thus St. Romain of Rouen destroyed a huge dragon called La Gargouille which ravaged the Seine ; St. Florent killed a similar dragon which haunted the Loire ; similar feats were performed in Brittany by St. Cadoc, St. Maudet, and St. Paull ; while on the eastern frontiers at Aix-la-Chapelle, the terrible dragon called Tarasque was slain by St. Martha. In England there is a legendary record of only one saintly dragon slayer - St. Keyne of Cornwall. St. Cadoc was born the son of a Welsh prince, but "entered religion" and became Abbot of Chepstow.

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