"Here be dragons" ( la, hic sunt dracones) means dangerous or unexplored territories, in imitation of a medieval practice of putting illustrations of dragons,

sea monster Sea monsters are beings from folklore believed to dwell in the sea and often imagined to be of immense size. Marine monsters can take many forms, including sea dragons, sea serpents, or tentacled beasts. They can be slimy and scaly and are of ...

s and other mythological creatures on uncharted areas of maps where potential dangers were thought to exist.

History

Although several early maps, such as the , have illustrations of mythological creatures for decoration, the phrase itself is an anachronism. Until the

Ostrich Egg Globe The Ostrich Egg Globe is a hollow terrestrial globe made from the conjoined lower halves of two ostrich eggs. The owner of the globe claims that it was made in the early 16th century and is the first globe to depict the New World (with North Am ...

was offered for sale in 2012 at the London Map Fair held at the Royal Geographical Society, the only known historical use of this phrase in the Latin form "HC SVNT DRACONES" (i.e., , 'here are dragons') was the Hunt-Lenox Globe dating from 1504. Earlier maps contain a variety of references to mythical and real creatures, but the Ostrich Egg Globe and its twin the Lenox Globe are the only known surviving globes to bear this phrase. The term appears on both globes at the peripheral, extreme end of the Asian continent. The classical phrase used by medieval cartographers was ''HIC SVNT LEONES'' (literally, "here are lions") when denoting unknown territories on maps.

Dragons on maps

Dragons appear on a few other historical maps: * The T-O

Psalter world map The Psalter World Map or the Map Psalter is a small ''mappa mundi'' from the 13th century, found in a psalter. No other records of psalters found from the middle ages have a mappa mundi. The Psalter mappa mundi was likely used to provide contex ...

( AD) has dragons, as symbols of

sin In a religious context, sin is a transgression against divine law. Each culture has its own interpretation of what it means to commit a sin. While sins are generally considered actions, any thought, word, or act considered immoral, selfish, s ...

, in a lower "frame" below the world, balancing

Jesus Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label= Hebrew/ Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religiou ...

and

angel In various theistic religious traditions an angel is a supernatural spiritual being who serves God. Abrahamic religions often depict angels as benevolent celestial intermediaries between God (or Heaven) and humanity. Other roles inclu ...

s on the top, but the dragons do not appear on the map proper. * The Borgia map (c. 1430), in the Vatican Library, states, over a dragon-like figure in

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an are ...

(in the upper left quadrant of the map), "". ("Here there are even men who have large four-foot horns, and there are even serpents so large that they could eat an ox whole.") * The

Fra Mauro Map The Fra Mauro map is a map of the world made around 1450 by the Venetian cartographer Fra Mauro, which is “considered the greatest memorial of medieval cartography." It is a circular planisphere drawn on parchment and set in a wooden frame t ...

(c. 1450) shows the "Island of Dragons" ( it, Isola de' dragoni), an imaginary island in the Atlantic Ocean. In an inscription near

Herat Herāt (; Persian: ) is an oasis city and the third-largest city of Afghanistan. In 2020, it had an estimated population of 574,276, and serves as the capital of Herat Province, situated south of the Paropamisus Mountains (''Selseleh-ye Safē ...

in modern-day

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...

Fra Mauro Fra Mauro, O.S.B. Cam., (c.1400–1464) was a Venetian cartographer who lived in the Republic of Venice. He created the most detailed and accurate map of the world up until that time, the Fra Mauro map. Mauro was a monk of the Camaldolese ...

says that in the mountains nearby "there are a number of dragons, in whose forehead is a stone that cures many infirmities", and describes the locals' way of hunting those dragons to get the stones. This is thought to be based on

Albertus Magnus Albertus Magnus (c. 1200 – 15 November 1280), also known as Saint Albert the Great or Albert of Cologne, was a German Dominican friar, philosopher, scientist, and bishop. Later canonised as a Catholic saint, he was known during his li ...

's treatise ''De mineralibus''. In an inscription elsewhere on the map, the cartographer expresses his scepticism regarding "serpents, dragons and

basilisk In European bestiaries and legends, a basilisk ( or ) is a legendary reptile reputed to be a serpent king, who causes death to those who look into its eyes. According to the ''Naturalis Historia'' of Pliny the Elder, the basilisk of Cyrene i ...

s" mentioned by "some historiographers".Item 460 in * A 19th-century Japanese map, the '' Jishin-no-ben'', in the shape of

ouroboros The ouroboros or uroboros () is an ancient symbol depicting a serpent or dragon eating its own tail. The ouroboros entered Western tradition via ancient Egyptian iconography and the Greek magical tradition. It was adopted as a symbol in Gnost ...

, depicts a dragon associated with causing earthquakes. Psalter World Map, c

Other creatures on maps

Ptolemy Claudius Ptolemy (; grc-gre, Πτολεμαῖος, ; la, Claudius Ptolemaeus; AD) was a mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist, who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were of importance ...

's atlas in ''

Geographia The ''Geography'' ( grc-gre, Γεωγραφικὴ Ὑφήγησις, ''Geōgraphikḕ Hyphḗgēsis'', "Geographical Guidance"), also known by its Latin names as the ' and the ', is a gazetteer, an atlas, and a treatise on cartography, com ...

'' (originally 2nd century, taken up again in the 15th century) warns of

elephant Elephants are the largest existing land animals. Three living species are currently recognised: the African bush elephant, the African forest elephant, and the Asian elephant. They are the only surviving members of the family Elephantidae ...

hippos A hippo or hippopotamus is either of two species of large African mammal which live mainly in and near water: * Hippopotamus * Pygmy hippopotamus Hippo or Hippos may also refer to: Toponymy * The ancient city of Hippo Regius (modern Annaba, Al ...

and

cannibals Cannibalism is the act of consuming another individual of the same species as food. Cannibalism is a common ecological interaction in the animal kingdom and has been recorded in more than 1,500 species. Human cannibalism is well documented, bo ...

. * The ''

Tabula Peutingeriana ' (Latin for "The Peutinger Map"), also referred to as Peutinger's Tabula or Peutinger Table, is an illustrated ' (ancient Roman road map) showing the layout of the '' cursus publicus'', the road network of the Roman Empire. The map is a 13th-ce ...

'' (a medieval copy of Roman map) has "", "" and "" ("in these places elephants are born, in these places

scorpion Scorpions are predatory arachnids of the order Scorpiones. They have eight legs, and are easily recognized by a pair of grasping pincers and a narrow, segmented tail, often carried in a characteristic forward curve over the back and always en ...

s are born, here Cynocephali are born"). * Cotton MS. Tiberius B.V. fol. 58v (10th century),

British Library The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British ...

Manuscript Collection, has "hic abundant leones" ("here lions abound"), along with a picture of a lion, near the east coast of Asia (at the top of the map towards the left); this map also has a text-only serpent reference in southernmost

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

(bottom left of the map): "Zugis regio ipsa est et Affrica. est enim fertilis. sed ulterior bestiis et serpentibus plena" ("This region of Zugis is in Africa; it is rather fertile, but on the other hand it is full of beasts and serpents.") * The Ebstorf map (13th century) has a dragon in the extreme south-eastern part of Africa, together with an asp and a

. * Giovanni Leardo's map (1442) has, in southernmost Africa, "Dixerto dexabitado p. chaldo e p. serpent". *

Martin Waldseemüller Martin Waldseemüller (c. 1470 – 16 March 1520) was a German cartographer and humanist scholar. Sometimes known by the Latinized form of his name, Hylacomylus, his work was influential among contemporary cartographers. He and his collaborator ...

's ''Carta marina navigatoria'' (1516) has "an elephant-like creature in northernmost

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the ...

, accompanied by a legend explaining that this 'morsus' with two long and quadrangular teeth congregated there", i.e. a

walrus The walrus (''Odobenus rosmarus'') is a large flippered marine mammal with a discontinuous distribution about the North Pole in the Arctic Ocean and subarctic seas of the Northern Hemisphere. The walrus is the only living species in the fami ...

, which would have seemed monstrous at the time. * Waldseemüller's ''Carta marina navigatoria'' (1522), revised by Laurentius Fries, has the morsus moved to the

Davis Strait Davis Strait is a northern arm of the Atlantic Ocean that lies north of the Labrador Sea. It lies between mid-western Greenland and Baffin Island in Nunavut, Canada. To the north is Baffin Bay. The strait was named for the English explorer John ...

. * Bishop

Olaus Magnus Olaus Magnus (October 1490 – 1 August 1557) was a Swedish writer, cartographer, and Catholic ecclesiastic. Biography Olaus Magnus (a Latin translation of his birth name Olof Månsson) was born in Linköping in October 1490. Like his elder ...

's ''

Carta Marina ''Carta marina et descriptio septentrionalium terrarum'' (Latin for ''Marine map and description of the Northern lands''; commonly abbreviated ''Carta marina'') is the first map of the Nordic countries to give details and place names, created by S ...

'' map of

Scandinavia Scandinavia; Sámi languages: /. ( ) is a subregion in Northern Europe, with strong historical, cultural, and linguistic ties between its constituent peoples. In English usage, ''Scandinavia'' most commonly refers to Denmark, Norway, and Swe ...

(1539) has many monsters in the northern sea, as well as a winged, bipedal, predatory land animal resembling a dragon in northern Lapland. * On European maps of Africa, up until the

Berlin Conference The Berlin Conference of 1884–1885, also known as the Congo Conference (, ) or West Africa Conference (, ), regulated European colonisation and trade in Africa during the New Imperialism period and coincided with Germany's sudden emergenc ...

and the subsequent Scramble for Africa produced accurate cartographic representations of Africa, elephants replaced dragons as placeholders for unknown regions. An excerpt from ''On Poetry: a Rhapsody'' by the Irish satirist

Jonathan Swift Jonathan Swift (30 November 1667 – 19 October 1745) was an Anglo-Irish satirist, author, essayist, political pamphleteer (first for the Whigs, then for the Tories), poet, and Anglican cleric who became Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, Dubl ...

states: "So geographers, in Afric maps, With savage pictures fill their gaps, And o'er uninhabitable downs, Place elephants for want of towns".

References

Notes Bibliography *

External links

''Myths & Legends On Old Maps'' (Chapter 10)

* ttp://herebedragonsmovie.com/ "Here Be Dragons: An Introduction to Critical Thinking" by Brian Dunning from Skeptoid
"Here Be Dragons" by Brian Dunning – Spanish Subtitled Version (Versión Subtitulada al Español de "Aquí Hay Dragones" por Brian Dunning)"No Old Maps Actually Say 'Here Be Dragons' -but an ancient globe does"
{{DEFAULTSORT:Here Be Dragons Cartography English phrases Dragons Folklore

History

Dragons on maps

Other creatures on maps

See also

References

External links