the overcoming of several beasts of familiar species but unique notoriety:
the Nemean Lion, the Cerynian Hind, the Erymanthian Boar, the Cretan
Bull, the mares of Diomedes. Theseus captures the Marathonian Bull. The
expedition against the Calydonian Boar, in which Meleager proved himself,
was one of the major Greek heroic legends. Odysseus as a youth killed a great
boar on Parnassus (Od. 19. 428–58). Boar hunts are also a theme in Welsh and
Irish saga. Arthur fought the boar Twrch Trwyth for nine nights and nine days
(Culhwch and Olwen 1072). Diarmuid is drawn into the hunt for the Wild
Boar of Benn Gulbán and is killed by it. A Fenian poem describes another
great boar hunt, with a catalogue of the men who took part in it.^64
The hero has a still greater opportunity to win fame where there is a
dragon or monster to be dealt with. Now, of course, dragons are a protected
species and it is illegal to harm them, but in the mythical era it was a pest that
had to be eradicated. Heracles destroys the many-headed Hydra of Lerna.
Perseus kills a monster to save a princess, a motif also to be found in
Armenian and Lithuanian tales.^65 The theme of the dragon that guards
treasure and is killed in order to obtain it is particularly characteristic of
Germanic tradition.^66
The archetypal Indo-European dragon-slaying myth is presumably the one
discussed in Chapter 6, where the victor is the thunder-god and his victim
the monstrous serpent that blocks the waters. We saw reason to think that
Heracles took over features from the thunder-god and that his battle with the
Hydra was an echo of the cosmic conflict. In this case we can see the divine
myth transposed to the heroic plane. I do not suggest that all dragon-slaying
heroes are faded thunder-gods, only that –– seeing that dragons or colossal
serpents are not a feature of the real world –– the concept of slaying one as a
heroic feat may have originated with the cosmic myth.
The hero in dialogueAt this point we may note a couple of typical formulae that may appear when
someone encounters a person unknown to him or her. Even –– indeed, espe-
(^64) Tóruigheacht Dhiarmuda agus Ghráinne, summarized in Dillon (1948), 43–8; Duanaire
Finn 17 (ed. E. MacNeill (Irish Texts Society 7, London 1908), 39–41 (text), 141–4 (trs.) ).
(^65) Sassountsy David 94–6 (brothers kill a dragon that guards a spring and exacts maidens as
tribute); Schleicher (1857), 57 f.
(^66) Beowulf 886 f., 2211ff., 3051–7; Skáldsk. 40 (Sigurd and Fáfnir); Saxo 2. 1. 1–3 pp. 36 f., 6. 4.
10 p. 150; Grimm (1883–8), 689–91, 977–80, 1493 f., 1599 f.; de Vries (1956), i. 493 f.; Schramm
(1957), 111. But a treasure-guarding snake can already be found in an ancient fable, Phaedrus
430 11. King and Hero