I hope you all enjoyed “The Red Dragon and the Gold,” the latest episode of HOUSE OF THE DRAGON Season 2. Many of you have been eager for more action, and this episode certainly delivered with the spectacular Battle of Rook’s Rest, a true clash of dragons in the skies.
It begs the question: has there ever been a dragon battle quite like it on screen before? Perhaps REIGN OF FIRE featured a larger scale dragon scene, with possibly dozens soaring across the sky. So, while that might have been a scene with more dragons, was it a better dragon battle? I’m inclined to think not. Our team really outdid themselves with this one. They clearly embraced the challenge. And the dragons… magnificent.
Of course, dragons are creatures of myth. In our reality, the world we inhabit outside the pages of books, dragons have never existed. Yet, remarkably similar creatures populate legends across countless cultures worldwide. Some theories suggest these tales might have sprung from the discovery of dinosaur bones by farmers centuries ago. Regardless of their origin, dragons have become a cornerstone of the fantasy genre for ages, and I’ve personally been captivated by them for as long as I can remember.
Funnily enough, I’m even named after a dragon slayer – St. George. And despite shifts in sainthood over the centuries, St. George and his dragon remain, perhaps suggesting dragons have a certain timeless appeal, even papal approval. My own fascination led me to write dragon stories long before A GAME OF THRONES ever took shape. “The Ice Dragon” and “The Way of Cross and Dragon” stand out as two of my earlier works exploring these fantastic beasts.
Dragon lore is incredibly diverse across cultures. Chinese dragons, for example, are typically depicted without wings and are not associated with fire-breathing. Instead, they are seen as symbols of good luck and prosperity. Traditional Western dragons, however, are more often associated with fire and destruction. But modern fantasy authors have played with these tropes extensively, creating a wide spectrum of dragon portrayals. Consider the dragons in ERAGON or HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON. They are vastly different from the dragons in my A Song of Ice and Fire series. (Toothless, in particular, is undeniably cute).
Toothless from How to Train Your Dragon, a cute and friendly dragon, highlighting the modern fantasy take on dragons.
Tolkien’s dragons, in The Lord of the Rings, were consistently portrayed as evil, serving the dark forces of Morgoth and Sauron. They were akin to his orcs and trolls, embodiments of malevolence. J.R.R. Tolkien didn’t create friendly dragons. However, his dragons were intelligent. Smaug, for example, is capable of speech. He also possesses a massive hoard of gold, a classic dragon characteristic, and famously slumbers upon his treasure for years on end.
Smaug from The Hobbit, a classic depiction of a greedy and powerful dragon guarding his treasure hoard.
Before Peter Jackson’s cinematic Smaug, the most impressive dragon on film, in my opinion, was Vermithrax Pejorative from DRAGONSLAYER. With two legs and two wings, Vermithrax was dangerous, fire-breathing, and a formidable flier, yet non-verbal and uninterested in gold. Vermithrax served as a significant inspiration for many dragon enthusiasts.
Vermithrax Pejorative from Dragonslayer, a realistic and fearsome dragon with two legs and two wings, a benchmark in dragon design for film.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, we have the dragon in DRAGONHEART (voiced by Sean Connery). This dragon was fat, four-legged, talking, and, surprisingly, a benevolent character who befriends the hero. While charming, it’s a much less compelling dragon in a considerably weaker film. Bah, indeed.
When I began crafting A SONG OF ICE & FIRE, my aim was to fuse the enchanting elements of epic fantasy with the stark realism found in the best historical fiction. Magic exists in my world, but it’s less prevalent than in many fantasy settings. (Tolkien’s Middle-earth also maintained a relatively low magic profile, and he was a key influence). I wanted Westeros to feel tangible and grounded, evoking the historical periods of the Crusades, the Hundred Years’ War, and the Wars of the Roses, just as much as it drew from Tolkien’s hobbits and magical rings.
Dragons were always going to be a part of this world, partly inspired by my dear friend, the late Phyllis Eisenstein, a brilliant fantasy and science fiction writer whom I deeply miss. However, I wanted my dragons to possess a sense of realism, to be as believable as fantastical creatures could be. I meticulously designed them. They fly and breathe fire – these were essential attributes. They have two legs (never four) and two wings. And crucially, large wings. Many fantasy dragons are depicted with comically small wings that would never realistically allow such a creature to take flight. And only two legs; the wings are the forelegs. Four-legged dragons are purely a heraldic invention. No animal in Earth’s history has ever possessed six limbs. Birds have two legs and two wings, bats follow the same pattern, as did pteranodons and other flying dinosaurs.
Much of the confusion surrounding the number of legs on a dragon stems from medieval heraldry. Initially, both two-legged and four-legged dragons appeared on shields and banners. But as heraldry became more standardized, heralds began to distinguish between them, calling the four-legged creatures dragons and their two-legged counterparts wyverns. Of course, no one had actually seen a dragon or a wyvern; both were mythical. This distinction was somewhat arbitrary, and medieval heralds weren’t exactly renowned for their zoological accuracy, even with real-world animals. Just consider their depictions of seahorses!
Dragons do exist in Westeros (and wyverns as well, in Sothoryos). Therefore, my Westerosi heralds had no such excuse for confusion. Consequently, in my books, the Targaryen sigil rightly features two legs. Why would anyone in Westeros depict a dragon with four legs when they could observe the real creatures and count their limbs? My wyverns also have two legs. They differ from dragons primarily in size, coloration, and their inability to breathe fire. (It’s important to note that while the Targaryen sigil correctly has two legs, it’s not entirely anatomically accurate. The wings are disproportionately small compared to the body, and of course, no dragon has three heads. That element is purely symbolic, representing Aegon the Conqueror and his two sisters).
Interestingly, the TV shows got it partially correct (both GAME OF THRONES and HOUSE OF THE DRAGON). GAME OF THRONES used the correct two-legged sigil for the first four seasons and most of the fifth. However, when Daenerys’s fleet appeared, suddenly all the sails displayed four-legged dragons. Someone likely became careless or consulted a heraldry book and grasped just enough to make a mistake. A little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. Years later, HOUSE OF THE DRAGON decided to maintain consistency with GAME OF THRONES heraldry… but unfortunately, they chose the incorrect four-legged sigil instead of the correct one. The sound you might have heard was me shouting, “no, no, no!” These extra legs have even crept onto the covers of my books, despite my strong objections.
CORRECT
Targaryen Sigil with two legs, the accurate representation of dragons in A Song of Ice and Fire.
INCORRECT
Targaryen Sigil with four legs, an inaccurate representation of dragons, often mistakenly used.
Valyrian dragons also differ from dragons like Smaug, Toothless, and Vermithrax in other significant ways.
My dragons do not speak. They possess considerable intelligence, but they remain beasts.
They form bonds with humans… certain humans… and the intricacies of how and why this occurs, and its origins, will be further explored in THE WINDS OF WINTER, A DREAM OF SPRING, and to some extent in FIRE & BLOOD. (Septon Barth understood much of it). Similar to wolves, bears, and lions, dragons can be trained but never fully tamed. They will always retain an element of danger. Some are inherently wilder and more stubborn than others. They are individuals with distinct personalities… and these personalities often mirror those of their riders, a reflection of the profound bond they share. They have no interest in gold or jewels, just as a tiger wouldn’t. Unless, perhaps, their rider was obsessed with such things, and even then…
Dragons require sustenance. They need water as well, but they lack gills. They need to breathe air. Legends say Smaug slept for sixty years beneath the Lonely Mountain before Bilbo and the dwarves disturbed him. The dragons descended from Valyria cannot do that. They are creatures of fire, and fire needs oxygen. A dragon might dip into the ocean to snatch a fish, but they would quickly resurface. Submerge them for too long, and they would drown, just like any other land-based animal.
My dragons are predators, carnivores with a preference for well-done meat. They can and do hunt their own prey, and they are territorial. They establish lairs. As creatures of the sky, they favor mountaintops, particularly volcanic mountains. Being beings of fire, they are not suited to the cold, damp caverns that some fantasy authors use as dragon dwellings. Man-made structures, like the stables of Dragonstone, the towers of the Valyrian Freehold, and the Dragonpit of King’s Landing, are acceptable – and often conveniently come with humans who provide food. If these aren’t available, young dragons will find their own lairs… and defend them fiercely.
My dragons are creatures of the sky, capable of flight across vast distances, traversing mountains and plains for hundreds of miles… but they typically don’t unless their riders guide them. They are not nomadic. During the height of Valyria, there were forty dragon-riding families and hundreds of dragons. But (aside from the Targaryens), they all remained close to the Freehold and the Lands of the Long Summer. Occasionally, a dragonrider might visit Volantis or another Valyrian colony, or even settle there for a time, but never permanently. Consider this: if dragons were nomadic, they would have overrun much of Essos, and the Doom would have only eliminated a fraction of them. Similarly, the dragons of Westeros rarely stray far from Dragonstone. Otherwise, after three centuries, dragons would be commonplace throughout the realm, and every noble house would possess a few. The three wild dragons mentioned in Fire & Blood have lairs on Dragonstone. The rest reside in the Dragonpit of King’s Landing or in deep caverns beneath Dragonmont. Luke flying Arrax to Storm’s End and Jace flying to Winterfell were rider-directed journeys; the dragons wouldn’t have flown there independently, except under extraordinary circumstances. You won’t find dragons naturally roaming the riverlands, the Reach, the Vale, the North, or the mountains of Dorne.
Fantasy, to be truly engaging, needs to be grounded. It’s not simply a free pass to disregard all logic. Smaug and Toothless are both dragons, but they are fundamentally different. Ignoring established canon within a created world risks undermining its believability and coherence.
Current Mood: thoughtful
Tags: a song of ice and fire, canon, dragons, fire & blood
