I've done extensive research on dragon sightings throughout history. Most were not stories of fire-breathing creatures, but rather their descriptions
depict dinosaurs. They are described in both art and literature, and it is clear that our ancestors saw dinosaurs, and simply named them "dragons".
Not all dragons were fire-breathing. Dragon simply means 'large serpent'
Brachiosaurus
Utah's White Canyon Region
Amazon Rain Forest Basin in Northern Peru
El Toro Mountain part of the "Acambaro Figurine" collection found by Waldemar Julsrud
Mesopotamian Cylinder Seal of Uruk currently housed in the Louvre
Housed at the British Museum
By the North American Anasazi in the area now known as Utah. A natural brownish film over top the cave drawing authenticates its age.
A mysterious excavation in Tucson Arizona unearthed 31 Roman-style artifacts. One of which was this sword.
Protoceratops
Hongshan carvings approximately 4,000 years ago China
It is also important to note that the average dinosaur was approximately the size of a full grown dog.
Stegasaurus
Girifalco region of Southern Italy.
Tyranosaurus Rex
Holy Trinity Church built in the 1300s in the country of Georgia.
These dinosaurs are not limited to physical depictions. They have also been written about. Extensively. Here is a beast from Beowulf, the Anglo-Saxon
Epic:
"
Grendel's swift hard claws
snatched at the first Geat
He came to, ripped him apart,
cut
His body to bits with powerful jaws,
Drank the blood from his veins and bolted
Him down, hands and feet; death
And Grendel's great teeth came together,
Snapping life shut."
"
but their weapons
Could not hurt him,
the sharpest and hardest iron
Could not scratch at Grendel's skin"
“
The fiend reached for him with his claw, but he grasped it with set purpose, and
threw his weight on Grendel’s arm.”
This creature had
huge jaws that could devour people whole, was
bipedal with arms, and
tough
skin. This quite accurately describes a tyrannosaurus rex, or more accurately the Megalosaurus which fossils have been found in the
Anglo-Saxon area. In Beowulf, Grendel, which means “to Below” (like you would imagine a T-rex-like creature would), even had a mother of the same
kind, insisting it was a real biological creature.
This may be shocking. But scientific observation insists on the co-existence of humans and dinosaurs. Here is a picture of some red blood cell
fragments and soft tissue (indicated by the arrow) found in Tyranosaurus Rex remains:
The Anglo Saxon language had many words to describe the various types of large reptilian creatures. The following is from “A Concise Anglo-Saxon
Dictionary” by John R. Clark Hall:
Ûhtfloga: twilight−flier dragon
Wîdfloga: wide−flier dragon
Draca: sea−monster dragon
Eorðdraca: dragon that lives in the earth.
Lyftflog: generic flying dragon
Nîðdraca: hostile dragon
sædraca: sea−dragon.
Wyrmhord: hoard of dragons
The Brachiosaurus was also written about. The writer of the book of Job clearly describes the attributes of a brachiosaurus and calls it
‘Behemoth’ (or ‘Bahamut’ for FF7 fans), a chief of the creations of God:
Job 40:15-23
“Lo, I pray thee, Behemoth, that I made with thee:
Grass as an ox he eateth.
Lo, I pray thee, his power [is] in his loins, And his strength in the muscles of his
belly.
He doth bend his tail as a cedar, The sinews of his thighs are wrapped together,
His bones [are] tubes of brass, His bones [are] as a bar of iron.
He [is] a beginning of the ways of God, His Maker bringeth nigh his sword;
For food do mountains bear for him, And all the beasts of the field play there…
Lo, a flood oppresseth -- he doth not haste, He is confident though Jordan Doth
come forth unto his mouth.”
This shows Behemoth was an
Herbivore,
had a tail the size of a large tree,
and was very
large. There is only one animal like this in the history of the world. The Brachiosaurus. As shown in the Mesopotamian cylinder seal and the
Egyptian plates, the brachiosaurus was a known creature in the region where Job would have been living.
Other well known historians have depicted dinosaurs in a very matter of fact manner.
Herodotus – 5th Century B.C.
“There is a place in Arabia, situated very near the city of Buto, to which I went,
on hearing of some winged serpents; and when I arrived there, I saw bones and
spines of serpents, in such quantities as it would be impossible to describe. The
form of the serpent is like that of the water-snake; but he has wings without
feathers, and as like as possible to the wings of a bat.”