This is thought to be based on Albertus Magnus's treatise De mineralibus.

In an inscription near Herat in modern-day Afghanistan, Fra Mauro says that in the mountains nearby 'there are a number of dragons, in whose forehead is a stone that cures many infirmities', and describes the locals' way of hunting those dragons to get the stones. 1450) shows the 'Island of Dragons' ( Italian: Isola de' dragoni), an imaginary island in the Atlantic Ocean. ('Here there are even men who have large four-foot horns, and there are even serpents so large that they could eat an ox whole.') 1430), in the Vatican Library, states, over a dragon-like figure in Asia (in the upper left quadrant of the map), ' Hic etiam homines magna cornua habentes longitudine quatuor pedum, et sunt etiam serpentes tante magnitudinis, ut unum bovem comedant integrum'. 1250 AD) has dragons, as symbols of sin, in a lower 'frame' below the world, balancing Jesus and angels on the top, but the dragons do not appear on the map proper. The Psalter world map with dragons at the baseĭragons appear on a few other historical maps: The classical phrase used by medieval cartographers was HIC SVNT LEONES (literally, 'here are lions') when denoting unknown territories on maps. The term appears on both globes at the peripheral, extreme end of the Asian continent. Earlier maps contain a variety of references to mythical and real creatures, but the Ostrich Egg Globe and its twin the Lenox Globe are the only known surviving globes to bear this phrase.

Until the Ostrich Egg Globe was offered for sale in 2012 at the London Map Fair held at the Royal Geographical Society, the only known historical use of this phrase in the Latin form 'HC SVNT DRACONES' (i.e., hic sunt dracones, 'here are dragons') was the Hunt-Lenox Globe dating from 1504. History Īlthough several early maps, such as the Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, have illustrations of mythological creatures for decoration, the phrase itself is an anachronism. ' Here be dragons' ( Latin: hic sunt dracones) means dangerous or unexplored territories, in imitation of a medieval practice of putting illustrations of dragons, sea monsters and other mythological creatures on uncharted areas of maps where potential dangers were thought to exist. The text Hic Sunt Dracones on the Hunt–Lenox Globe, dating from 1504

Here Be Dragons by Bill Fawcett