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Conference thebay::joyoflex

Title:	The Joy of Lex
Notice:	A Notes File even your grammar could love
Moderator:	THEBAY::SYSTEM

Created:	Fri Feb 28 1986
Last Modified:	Mon Jun 02 1997
Last Successful Update:	Fri Jun 06 1997
Number of topics:	1192
Total number of notes:	42769

1129.0. "Here be dragons" by PEKING::SULLIVAND (Not gauche, just sinister) Tue Jan 10 1995 06:10

    Can anybody enlighten me as to the origin of the phrase "Here be
    dragons"? It's not in my quotation dictionary. I thought that it might
    either be biblical, or perhaps the origin was those old cartographers
    who wrote "Here be dragons and all manner of straunge beastes" on the
    bits of the map that were still unexplored.
    
    nothing to do with Pern...                 :-)

T.R	Title	User	Personal Name	Date	Lines
1129.1		LJSRV2::KALIKOW	Pentium: Intel's Blew-Chip Special	`Tue Jan 10 1995 06:44`	1
	I always thought the cartographers were responsible for that phrase.
1129.2		SMURF::BINDER	gustam vitare	`Tue Jan 10 1995 08:25`	15
	It actually originates in Mediaeval religious beliefs based on the Bible. Cartographers did "invent" it, using as their justification widely held adherence to the premise that the following verse was literally true: 1 In that day the LORD with his hard and great and strong sword will punish Leviathan the fleeing serpent, Leviathan the twisting serpent, and he will slay the dragon that is in the sea. (Isaiah 27:1, RSV). When Europeans were just getting their feet wet, as it were, in the navigation business, a fairish number of them went out and didn't come back; it was only natural in that superstitious age to assume that some beastie had done them in.
1129.3		CLPR01::MAILLARD	Denis MAILLARD	`Tue Jan 10 1995 10:52`	4
	Another interpretation that I've heard is that Roman and high middle age maps were only marked "hic sunt leones" (here be lions) for the inland (unknown) part of Africa. Denis.
1129.4		JRDV04::DIAMOND	segmentation fault (california dumped)	`Tue Jan 10 1995 20:06`	5
	Here there be tygers, Ray Bradbury. Here there be bunnies, Hugh Hefner. Here there be bugs, Grace Hopper.
1129.5	Y ddraig goch ddyry cychwyn...	PEKING::SULLIVAND	Not gauche, just sinister	`Tue Jan 17 1995 10:21`	4
	There's a mediaeval Welsh romance called "Here be Dragons" by Sharon Kay Penman, apparently (it's a romance about mediaeval Wales, not one written in mediaeval Welsh!).
1129.6		NOTIME::SACKS	Gerald Sacks ZKO2-3/N30 DTN:381-2085	`Tue Jan 17 1995 10:35`	1
	In a fight between dragons and w[h]ales, who wins?
1129.7		JRDV04::DIAMOND	segmentation fault (california dumped)	`Tue Jan 17 1995 23:12`	6