It is commonly believed that dinosaurs went extinct 65 million years ago, while humans are thought to have evolved only a few million years ago. If this were true, our ancestors—living before the scientific study of fossils—would have had no knowledge of dinosaurs or creatures such as pterosaurs and ichthyosaurs. Yet, some remnants of ancient artwork appear to indicate the contrary.
St. David’s Dragon – A Medieval Work of Art
The last major renovation of St. David’s Cathedral took place in the 19th century, about 400 years after significant late medieval modernization, during which a dragon carving was made.
In one of the chapels, there are richly carved folding seats known as misericords. Each carving is visible when the seat is folded up. Medieval artists, while depicting various motifs, infused a certain degree of imagination into their works—animals, faces, and scenes—carved into the undersides of the oak seats.
One of the misericords depicts a creature resembling a dinosaur, with an anatomy closely resembling that of sauropods known from Jurassic fossils. While its neck is not as long as those of more famous sauropods, such as Diplodocus, its neck length is similar to that of Brachytrachelopan mesai, a sauropod dinosaur discovered in Argentina in 2005.1
Two details of the carving—ears and small wings—do not align with what fossils suggest.2 Such small wings would be biologically impractical, as they would not be capable of supporting a creature with such a large body in flight. Likewise, contemporary depictions of dragons often resemble this form. However, do these two mismatched features rule out the carving as a representation of a real creature?
Fantasy or Reality?
Did the artist invent such a strange creature? The wings could indeed be explained by the sculptor’s vivid imagination, but this theory does not account for the long tail and long neck, the legs positioned beneath the barrel-shaped body (rather than sprawled like those of lizards), the small head with a snout shaped like a sauropod, and the frills on the back like those seen on reptiles. The presence of these features suggests that the artist had knowledge of what sauropods looked like—knowledge he possessed centuries before scientists discovered their fossils.
As we lack access to the artist’s notes explaining the rationale behind his choice of details for the carving, we must consider this carefully. Across Europe, medieval depictions of dragons with wings are common, and it is possible that the wings were intended to help artists identify these creatures as dragons. In medieval Europe, the term ‘dragon’ referred to reptiles. The sauropod in St David’s Cathedral may thus represent an extinct reptile, with imagined body parts deliberately added by the artist.
Real Dragons – Could They Have Existed?
There is evidence that ancient inhabitants of Britain were familiar with flying dragons, which we now know as pterosaurs. A detailed account from 18th-century Scotland states:
‘At the turn of November and December last year, many residents of this country observed… dragons… appearing in the north and flying quickly to the east, from which they inferred—and their assumptions were correct—that a storm was coming.’3
According to a Welsh tale from approximately the 19th century:
‘The woods around Penllyne Castle in Glamorgan had a reputation for being visited by winged serpents and were a terror to both old and young… An old resident of Penllyne, who died a few years ago, said that in his childhood, the winged serpents were described as very beautiful… This old man attributed the extinction of the winged serpents to the fact that they were a “menace to farmyards and hiding places”.’4
If flying dragons were still present in Britain up until the 18th century and had long been a threat to both young and old, then it is likely that the medieval sculptors at St David’s were aware of them.
If flying dragons were more widely known than their land-dwelling counterparts, which inhabited swamps2, the artist might have added the familiar wings of a flying serpent to the body of the less familiar land dragon, ensuring that viewers would recognise the creature as a reptile.
Conclusion
If one rejects the idea that the artist added serpent-like wings to the body of the carved dragon, the explanation for the sauropod-like anatomy with a short neck at St David’s must be considered. The evidence suggests that the artist was an eyewitness to the creature he depicted in wood. This remarkable artwork challenges the secular view of dinosaurs.
By the way, we recommend reading the articles:
- The Babylonian Exile – A Historically Confirmed Biblical Prophecy
- Fish Intelligence: A Match for Apes?
- Archaeological Discoveries in Galilee Confirming Biblical Accounts
- The Origin of Music and Singing
- Geniuses and Savants: Extraordinary Minds and Evolution
- Ants: Complex Creatures
- Did Dinosaurs Coexist with Humans?
Footnotes
- Nelson, V., Dire Dragons, Untold Secrets of Planet Earth Publishing Co., Red Deer, Canada, 2012.
- A third detail of the carving—webbed feet—might represent a swamp habitat.
- Flying Dragons at Aberdeen, 1793, A Statistical Account of Scotland, 6, p. 467, quoted in Cooper, B., After the Flood, New Wine Press, Chichester, UK, p. 141, 1995.
- Trevelyan, M., Folk-Lore and Folk-Stories of Wales, EP Publishing Limited, Yorkshire, UK, pp. 169-170, 1973.
Based on: B. Thomas, “St. Davids dragon – fantasy or reality?”, Acts & Facts, Institute for Creation Research, November 2019, pp. 14-15.
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