It was a man who stole the word from us. Stole it right from under our noses. But his theft was so clever, so subtle, we never even knew it was gone.

In 1275, a man named Jacobus de Voragine stole the word. His book, Aurea Legenda (now known as Golden Legends) was published then, and it recounted the lives of famous English historical figures and saints. It would be published in English two hundred years later for all the native peoples of Britain to see. Within those very pages, he stole the word, threw it into the fire, changed it, and gave it back to us, in a new shape, with new meanings, with new affectations.

It was there, on page 58, that he took the word. And the word was “dragon.”

Before Christ came to Britain, the dragon was a creature of power. The peoples worshiped it as a beast of mystery and terror, but also of great beauty. It is the embodiment of primitive energies, its coils wrapping around the earth. It holds all the world in its grip, its venomous breath that can blind and burn.

In the Celtic tradition, the dragon’s coils are depicted in a maze-like shape, like a puzzle, representing the mystery the creature provides. The dragon’s coiled form represents the world itself, too vast to be seen all at once, too great to be understood. Defeating the maze brings us to the center of the riddle, where the treasure rests, where the great beast’s head rests. The hero enters the maze, finds the center, slays the dragon, and takes the treasure the dragon guards.

But these are symbols, not truths. There is no literal dragon, only a figurative one. There is no real maze, but a symbolic maze. There is no true treasure, only the metaphor of treasure. What does it all mean? What is the true power of the dragon? It’s a secret… lost because the word was stolen from us. Stolen by a man named George.

In his famous book, de Voragine associated George the Dragon Slayer with Geos, the same word that gives us “geography” and “geology:” the power of the Earth. Much like the Christ that came before him, George was a God of the Earth, a man of the field, a farmer. This portrait of him made it easy for the Britains to associate with him… to hold him close to their hearts.

The dragon, on the other hand, was described in words most foul:

And by this city was a stagne or a pond like a sea, wherein was a dragon which envenomed all the country. And on a time the people were assembled for to slay him, and when they saw him they fled. And when he came nigh the city he venomed the people with his breath, and therefore the people of the city gave to him every day two sheep for to feed him, because he should do no harm to the people, and when the sheep failed there was taken a man and a sheep. Then was an ordinance made in the town that there should be taken the children and young people of them of the town by lot, and every each one as it fell, were he gentle or poor, should be delivered when the lot fell on him or her. So it happed that many of them of the town were then delivered, insomuch that the lot fell upon the king’s daughter, whereof the king was sorry, and said unto the people: For the love of the gods take gold and silver and all that I have, and let me have my daughter. They said: How sir! ye have made and ordained the law, and our children be now dead, and ye would do the contrary. Your daughter shall be given, or else we shall burn you and your house.

And it was here, in these pages, that George first slew the dragon, doing so in a most unceremonious way. It could have been a grand battle. It could have been a magnificent sight. But, de Voragine describes it with a single sentence, almost as if the thing were an afterthought:

Then the king was baptized and all his people, and S. George slew the dragon and smote off his head, and commanded that he should be thrown in the fields, and they took four carts with oxen that drew him out of the city.

The history of Saint George goes on for many pages, describing the man’s saintly nature and his eventual martyrdom. He is killed by those who worshipped false gods while George himself is on bended knee, praying for their forgiveness. He was beheaded in the year 303, in Dacia, a land known to us now as Romania. His blood spilling in the earth, sleeping in the soil…. Later, on that same soil, in Romania, in the fortress of Sighisoara, in December 1431, a man the world will come to know as The Impaler is born. His name is Vlad Tepes. Otherwise known as Dracula. Otherwise known as “Son of the Dragon.” It is here the sacred beast has his revenge over George at last, empowering the symbol of the dragon. Later, Brahm Stoker will finish the job; making Dracula a symbol of magic.

“Stoker.” One who fans the flames. Who stokes the fire. The fire of the dragon.

* * *

Around the same time Stoker is fanning the flames, another man by the name of Jung is writing a book about dreams. In it, he includes dreams of dragons. He finds the symbol one of the most fascinating, and delving a little deeper, he comes to the conclusion that dreams of dragons are really dreams are a symbolic representation of the fight between the ego and the unconscious, a place where our deepest fears, irrationalities, passions and hidden desires lead a primitive life, as long as we have no bridge giving access to it.

The dragon is the guardian of the unconscious. The thing we must conquer to reach this ancient power. Sitting at the center of the maze, the dragon waits for us… guarding something… a secret… a treasure that we want, but do not know why we want.

* * *

The word “dragon,” according to the Oxford English Dictionary (1966), is derived from the Old French, which in turn was derived from the Latin dracon (serpent), which in turn was derived from the Greek Spakov (serpent), from the Greek aorist verb, Spakelv (to see clearly). It is related to many other ancient words related to sight, such as Sanskrit darc (see), Avestic darstis (sight), Old Irish derc (eye), Old English torht, Old Saxon torht and Old High German zoraht, all meaning clear, or bright.

The Oxford English Dictionary points out that Spakelv is derived from the Greek stem Spak meaning strong. The connection with dragons is obvious. According to the OED, the word was first used in English about 1220 A.D. It was used in English versions of the Bible from 1340 on.

* * *

George defeats the dragon, but he does not do it for any treasure. He does it because the dragon terrorizes the people with its foul, poisonous breath. He does it not as the British ancients did, to find the center of the maze and the dragon’s treasure, but for the Glory and Mercy of God.

Just as his compatriot Patrick chased all the snakes out of Ireland (and what are snakes, if not little cousins of the coiled wyrm?), George killed not just the body of the dragon, but it’s spirit as well. Destroyed the meaning of the symbol, changing it from something mysterious and grand to something vulgar and base.

No longer would the dragon be a symbol of mystery, but would now and forever be seen as another monster to be slain, its treasure stolen, its body left to rot. George didn’t just kill the body of the dragon; he killed its soul as well.

* * *

In early Celtic legends, the hero Utherpendragon conquered all of Britain with the sword Excalibur at his side. Upon his death, the king put the sword into a stone that only the rightful king of Britain could retrieve. That man would be his son, Arthur. Arturus. “Follower of Thor.”

Soon, young Arthur would also wield Excalibur and bring peace and unity to Britain. He would be called King Arthur. Arthur, the Pendragon.

* * *

The hero enters the maze to defeat the dragon, a creature guarding the power of the unconscious. The power of dreams. Is it any wonder he shows up there? That’s because he was chased out of our waking minds by that Saint and his sword. But he found a new home, deep in the dark land of our slumbers. It is here that he guards the treasure we seek. That same treasure he guarded more than a thousand years ago. This great, powerful beast at the center of the labyrinth.

The hero enters the maze. We are the hero. We walk through the land of dreams until we come to the entrance of the cave, the entrance of the labyrinth. We can hear the dragon’s breath, can smell the poison. We enter, but we do so carefully. We have our sword and we have our courage, but nothing else. Nothing else.

We know the way for countless heroes have walked this way before. The tried and true path is worn out by millions of feet all seeking the same thing: the dragon’s treasure. Soon enough, we turn a corner, and there, in the center of the maze lies the terrible beast. The thing guarding the gateway to the source of dreams. But what do we find when we come to the center? What shape does the dragon take? Is it a coiled serpent of legend, with great claws and teeth? No. What we see is something we did not expect. What we see is ourselves.

For we are the guardians of our own unconscious. The dragon is a symbol. We are the meaning of the symbol. We are creatures of the world. We are the dragon. The dragon is ourselves.

We know now the secret George stole from us. The heroes of old did not come to slay the dragon, but to see it. See it whole. See the coils and scales, the endlessness of it. The power of it.

George sought to slay the dragon, but we come to defeat it. Not destroy it, but defeat it. Defeat. Disfacere. From the Latin, “to overcome.” Not destroy. But to overcome. To make it our own. To embrace it. To give it a name. All the great horrors are nameless. It is only when we name them that we tame them.

We do not come to destroy the dragon, but to learn its secret name. So, we ask it, and it tells us… and we learn that the dragon’s name is our name. The dragon is the power of the world. We are the power of the world. This is the treasure we sought from the dragon.

The dragon is no monster. We are the dragon. The dragon is a symbol of power. We are that symbol. We, ourselves.

That we are the dragon. That the treasure it guards is our own selves.

* * *

And so when the hero slays the dragon, he slays himself. He destroys himself. He goes into the maze a child and exits the maze an adult. He has drunk the dragon’s blood and been transformed by it. This is the symbolism of the dragon, the ultimate secret truth:

The dragon wants us to enter the maze. It wants us to destroy it. For we are the dragon. And we must drink its blood to become the dragon. And when we do, we will see the dragon is no monster. It is ourselves. We destroy ourselves. And the strength we gain from the journey will transform us into something greater.

We emerge from the labyrinth, not as Georges, but as Pendragon. Pan dragon. Pan = all and dragon = power. The Pendragon of Britain. All powerful.

We have been to the center of the labyrinth. We have seen the dragon there. We touched it’s mien and tasted its breath. It did not kill us. But it did whisper something to us. It’s name. Our name.

We are the dragon. And no George can ever take that away from us.