latter provided the prototype for the popular
mystic al-Hujwīrī (d 469/1076) in his Kashf
Christian tale of Barlaam and Joasaph, recorded
al-Maḥ jūb, a treatise on Ṣūfism, which again uses
by the Georgian monk Euthymius (955–1028) 48
the well (or pit) symbolism:
The parable with the dragon imagery, the snakes
It is well-known that one day he fell into a pit
in the story most likely being a reflection of the
After three days had passed a party of travellers
likeness of the great dragon, thus proved to be
approached Abū Ḥamza said to himself: “I will
meaningful in the long term both within and
call out to them ” Then he said: “No; it is not
far beyond the Western Asian world This is fur-
good that I seek aid from anyone except God,
ther attested by yet another version of the parable
and I shall be complaining of God if I tell them
recorded by the court poet Manuel Philes
that my God has cast me into a pit and implore
( c 1275– c 1345) of the Byzantine emperor
them to rescue me ” When they came up and
Andronikos II, in which however the well was
saw an open pit in the middle of the road, they
represented as a tree while the dragon’s role at
said: “For the sake of obtaining divine recompense
the bottom remained a constant:
(thawāb) we must cover this pit lest anyone should
fall into it ” Abū Ḥamza said: “I became deeply
On a picture of Life which represents a tree, in
agitated and abandoned hope of life After they
which is a man gaping upwards and quaffing
blocked the mouth of the pit and departed, I
honey from above, while below, the roots [of the
prayed to God and resigned myself to die, and
tree] are being devoured by mice: On seeing this
hoped no more of mankind When night fell I
symbol of the shadow of [earthly] things, bear
heard a movement at the top of the pit I looked
in mind, O man, the end that is hidden from
attentively The mouth of the pit was open, and
you Standing upright, you are enjoying the honey
I saw a huge animal like a dragon, which let down
of pleasure, while a dragon with gaping mouth
its tail I knew that God had sent it and that I
awaits your fall to destroy you 49
should be saved this way I took hold of its tail
and it dragged me out A heavenly voice cried
The parable of the “Man in the Well” thus exem-
to me, ‘this is an excellent escape of thine O Abū
plifies the potency of the visual allegory in which
Ḥamza! We have saved thee from death by means
the dragon’s maw stands for death, imagery that
of death ’53
transcended geographic, cultural and religious
boundaries and was long shared not only by the
The pit is a metaphor for life and the dragon a
peoples of the medieval Western Asian environ-
means of achieving liberation from it 54
ment but also by those of adjacent cultures 50
Hagiographical literature also yields examples
The dragon is hence credited with the posses-
of saints receiving help from serpent jinn s as is
sion of great transformative powers The ability
illustrated by the story of shaykh Muḥammad
to metamorphose, to transcend a situation and
al-Udfūwī who once performed the pilgrimage
respond to changing circumstances, were exactly
to Mecca with a group of ṣūfī s who had no provi-
the qualities associated with the mystic A meta-
sions:
phor of change and transformation on the mystic
…so the shaykh held out a bowl and took up a
path, the great mythical beast thus functions as
collection from among them saying, “whoever
an allegory of his guardianship of heavenly trea-
has something and hopes for a divine reward in
sure and hidden mysteries, a hermeneutic tool51
recompense should put it in this bowl ” A large
of particular significance for the mystic Its affil-
snake suddenly came forward with a dirham in
iation with the notion of the ultimate transforma-
its mouth and dropped it into the bowl saying,
tive power of death converts it in the eyes of the
‘We are jinn who have come to make the pilgrim-
mystic into “the dragon of freedom and detach-
age with you this year ’55
ment ”52
In the mystical tradition the entire spectrum of
This is exemplified by the story of the Iranian
the dragon’s multivalent forces is called into play
mystic Abū Ḥamza al-Khurāsānī told by the
In the hagiography of the great Khurasani mystic
48 De Blois, 1990, p 34 Cf Der Nersessian, 1937,
53 Tr and ed Nicholson, 1976, p 96
pp 63–5; Ch’en, 1968, pp 219–21
54 Daneshvari, 1993, p 23
49 Cod Escur , Poem no 248 Cf Mango, 1972, p 247
55 Ibn al-Zāyyat, Kitāb al-Kawākib al-Zayyāra,
50 Cf Janda, 2010, ch Die Parabel vom Mann im Brunnen,
pp 157–8; also Ibn ʿUth mān, Murshid al-zuwwār, pp 271–2;
pp 174–81
al-Sakhāwī, Tuḥfat al-aḥbāb, pp 276–7; and Ibn al-Nāsikh,
51 Cf Taylor, 1999, p 139
Miṣbāḥ al-dayājī, fols 33v-34v; cited after Taylor, 1999,
52 The phrase is borrowed from Daneshvari, 1993, p 22
p 156
the dragon as symbol of transformation
201
Abū Saʿīd ibn Abi ’l-Khayr Mayhanī (357/967–
it received with great humility, rubbing its face
440/1049),56 entitled Asrār al-tawḥīd (compiled
in the dust and weeping so much that the rock
around 575/1180),57 the shaykh is said to have
where its head lay became wet Having heard all
kept company with dragons during his retreats
it went away 58
One day he asked one of his particularly unruly
The same work contains a collection of sayings
disciples to perform his ablutions at a stream and
attributed to Abū Saʿīd ibn Abi ’l-Khayr, in which
his prayers on a rock, and then wait for a “friend”
there is a passage stating that the celebrated Isla-
of his who had been with him for seven years,
mic mystic Abū yazīd (Bāyazīd) al-Biṣṭāmī
and in whose companionship he had found much
(d 261/874 or 264/877–8) is said to have mounted
comfort and relaxation, to convey him his greet-
a lion brandishing a venomous serpent as a whip 59
ings:
A depiction of the angel Abi ’l-Ḥanaf as crowned
rider on a lion holding a second crown in his
Then suddenly there was a dreadful clap and the
right hand and an upright dragon staff in his left
mountain quaked [The disciple] looked and saw
hand is found in a mid- to late thirteenth-century
an awful black dragon, the largest he had ever
Anatolian manuscript, known as Daqāʾiq
seen: its body filled the whole space between two
al-Ḥaqāʾiq, although the paintings may be of a
mountains At the sight of it his spirit fled; he
later date (fig 181) 60
was unable to move and fel senseless to the earth
Marianne Barrucand iden-
The dragon advanced towards the rock, on which
tifies the horned dragon with open mouth and
it laid its head reverently After a little while the
once looped body as a sceptre 61 In the sixth
dervish recovered himself somewhat, and observ-
volume of the Math nawī, Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī
ing that the dragon had come to a halt and was
describes the eleventh-century mystic Abu
motionless, he said, though in his terror he
’l-Ḥasan ʿAlī ibn Aḥmad Kharraqānī (d 425/1033)
scarcely knew what he said, “The Shaykh greets
in the same manner, portraying him as “the model
thee ” The dragon with many signs of reverence
of a saint who has perfectly mastered his base
began to rub its face in the dust, whilst tears
soul and is therefore master over the lower ani-
rolled from its eyes This, and the fact that it
mals in the world, who are bound to serve him
attempted nothing against him, persuaded the
just as his nafs has learned to serve him ”62 The
dervish that he had been sent to meet the dragon;
depiction of the mystic riding a dangerous animal
he therefore delivered the Shaykh’s message, which
such as a lion or a dragon thus symbolises his
56 For a monograph on the mystic, see Meier, 1976
instance, on the obverse of a copper coin of 585/1189 struck
57 Barthold, 1958, p 311; Ritter, “Abū Saʿīd Faḍl Allāh b
by ʿImād al-Dīn Abū Bakr ibn Qara Arslan (581/1185–
Abī ’l-Khair,” EI 2 I, p 145b
600/1203–4) of Khartpert, see Spengler and Sayles, 1992,
58 Nicholson, 1967, pp 70–1 Cf Gohrab, 2000, p 85
p 61; What the Coins Tel Us, 2009, p 101) and on the above-
59 Muḥammad ibn al-Munawwar ibn Abī Saʿīd, Asrār
discussed Samanid-period bowl (fig 55) In the Shāh-nāma
al-Tawḥīd fī Maqāmāt al-Shaykh Abī Saʿīd, Tehran 1313, repr
the hero Rustam is also describes as riding on a dragon (see
1366–7, tr O’Kane, J , The Secrets of God’s Mystical Oneness,
p 112) This may be compared to king Ṭahmūrath using
New york, 1992; Gohrab, 2000, pp 85–6
Iblīs as mount; see p 134, n 12
60 Rogers, “Saldjūḳids,” EI 2 VIII, 936a See also Süslü,
61 Barrucand, 1990–1, p 141
1984, p 173, and pl LXXX, fig 8 A related depiction in a
62 Mathnawī VI 2120–1, as cited in Schimmel, 1980,
late fourteenth-century Persian drawing, probably from
repr 1993, p 313 The motif is also used on talismans as
Shiraz, Muẓaffarid period, shows a man riding a lioness
exemplified by the representation of a woman clad in red
with a snake around his waist, another in his left hand and
knee-length pantaloons riding a lion and holding a serpent
holding on to a further snake wound around the lioness’s
in the left hand, a seal of the planet Mars, illustrated in the
neck Preserved in Istanbul, Topkapı Sarayı Museum,
Dahīra al-iskandarīya, 24a, -3 to 24a, -3; cf Ruska, 1926,
Library, Album H 2152, fol 2r; Raby, 1981, p 160 and
pp 98–9, with the title, Ṣanʿat al-haraz al-ṭilasmiyya al-nāfiʿa
fig 479, where a relationship between this drawing and
min al-amrāḍ al-ʿasīrat al-burʾ, as cited in Ullmann, 1972,
the motif of the snake-wielding demon Tarish (Grube and
p 419 and n 4 It is noteworthy that this imagery was
Johns, 2005, p 216, fig 70 8) is suggested The miracle of the
known in the Jewish tradition; the Talmud mentions that
snake-wielding and lion-riding mystic appears also in the
king Nebuchadnezzar rode a lion and held in his hands, as
cult of the siddha s (mythical originators of a popular religio-
a bridle, a serpent ( Sabbath 150a) The same animals, the
magical movement popular among the Hindus in northern
very deadliest creatures, lions and poisonous serpents, are
India in the eleventh and twelfth centuries), as recorded
mentioned in biblical references, for instance “Thou shalt
in the legends of the 84 siddha s of the Hindu Buddhist
tread upon the lion and adder [a venomous snake]; the young
tradition In one of the legends Guru Ḍombipa, a king who
lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet” (Psalm
was forced to abdicate because he chose a low-caste woman
91, 13), symbolising Christ’s triumph over evil Van Henten
as his consort in Tantric exercises, retires to the wilderness
(1995, repr 1998, p 266) interprets this combination of the
After twelve years of practice the king in union with his
dragon and the lion as a result of Iranian influence It may,
consort emerges on a young pregnant tigress, holding a
therefore, not be irrelevant to note that in Zoroastrianism,
poisonous snake as a whip Grünwedel, 1916, pp 137–228,
both lion and serpent figure prominently in Pahlawī literature
esp p 148; and Buddha’s Lions, tr Robinson, 1979, p 35
as creatures of Ahriman, the first as main representative of
The motif of the dragon-rider appears on Artuqid coins (for
the “wolf species,” the second most deadly of the khrafstra s
202