The Penguin Book of Dragons

<p><b> The definitive global anthology of writings about dragons, from Ancient Egypt to the modern day</b><br><br>Since the earliest moments of human history, dragons have occupied a place in our imaginations. Bringer of night in Ancient Egypt; mortal enemy of the elephant in South Asia; slain by a god in Sanskrit hymn. In the Book of Revelation, there is the Leviathan; in Loch Ness, a monster. Their crushing coils and their treasure hoards are found throughout literature and language: in the Old English of <i>Beowulf</i>, in the Elvish of Tolkien, in the far-flung travels of Marco Polo.<br><br><i>The Penguin Book of Dragons</i> is the definitive collection of all this and more: two thousand years of legend and lore about the menace and majesty of dragons.</p> <b>Two thousand years of legend and lore about the menace and majesty of dragons, which have breathed fire into our imaginations from ancient Rome to <i>Game of Thrones</i><br><br>A Penguin Classic</b><br><br>The most popular mythological creature in the human imagination, dragons have provoked fear and fascination for their lethal venom and crushing coils, and as avatars of the Antichrist, servants of Satan, couriers of the damned to Hell, portents of disaster, and harbingers of the last days. Here are accounts spanning millennia and continents of these monsters that mark the boundary between the known and the unknown, including: their origins in the deserts of Africa; their struggles with their mortal enemies, elephants, in the jungles of South Asia; their fear of lightning; the world’s first dragon slayer, in an ancient collection of Sanskrit hymns; the colossal sea monster Leviathan; the seven-headed “great red dragon” of the <i>Book of Revelation</i>; the Loch Ness monster; the dragon in <i>Beowulf,</i> who inspired Smaug in Tolkien’s <i>The Hobbit</i>; the dragons in the prophecies of the wizard Merlin; a dragon saved from a centipede in Japan who gifts his human savior a magical bag of rice; the supernatural feathered serpent of ancient Mesoamerica; and a flatulent dragon the size of the Trojan Horse. From the dark halls of the Lonely Mountain to the blue skies of Westeros, we expect dragons to be gigantic, reptilian predators with massive, bat-like wings, who wreak havoc defending the gold they have hoarded in the deep places of the earth. But dragons are full of surprises, as is this book.<br><br>For more than seventy-five years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 2,000 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.