Fighting Dragons: A Comparative Mythology

Dragons are everywhere in mythology, including religious mythology. In this video we will look at the main dragon myth that circulates around the largest religions, dragon stories such as Saint George and the Dragon, and then compare two of the most well known serpents, by looking at the Rig Veda and Enuma Elis, Tiamat and Vrtra, to see what would happen if they fought each other.

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*References:*
Ancient Near Eastern Texts relating to the Old Testament, Edited by James B. Pritchard, Akkadin Myths and Epics, translated by E.A.Spicer
Landsberger, B. “The Fifth Tablet of Enuma Eliš.” Journal of Near Eastern Studies 20, no. 3 (July 1961): 154–79. https://doi.org/10.1086/371634.
Lahari, Ajoy Kumar. Vediv Vrta. Motilal Banarsidass, Dehli. 1984.
Lincoln, Bruce. “The Indo-European Cattle-Raiding Myth.” History of Religions 16, no. 1 (August 1976): 42–65. https://doi.org/10.1086/462755.

Use of maps from https://indo-european.eu/ is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.

And for those who read this, I had to put a picture of Anzu up instead of Tiamat, as there are no decent pictures I could use, and you all keep telling me to put more pictures in my videos. It is sometimes really hard to do this accurately when discussing pre-history and so you sometimes have to have some editorial leeway. Thanks, Jon

Chapters
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0:00 Introduction
1:43 St George and the Dragon
3:06 Cattle Raiding
5:49 Rescuing a Princess
8:36 Comparing Two Mythological Dragons
11:14 Vrtra
13:35 Tiamat
16:04 Tiamat vs Vrtra
17:03 Water Serpents
17:47 Extinguishing Life
19:03 The Head of the Dragons
19:44 The Gods are Afraid
20:30 Intoxicating Drinks
21:44 The Beautiful Hero
23:09 The Hero is King of the Gods
23:48 The Hero represents Truth
24:19 Incredible Weapons
25:21 Using the Wind
26:13 Chariots
26:58 The Evil Dragon
27:28 Gods of Vegetation
29:07 Gods of War
30:44 Crushing the Head of the Enemy
30:56 The Creation of Heaven and Earth
31:29 The Truth about Tiamat and Vrtra
32:41 The Origin of this Myth
33:31 How the Myth spread