Chinese dragon (long)
The long (龍), the dragon of Chinese myth: a long, scaled creature with horns and whiskers that lives in the waters, rises to the sky in spring and brings the rain. It was the emblem of the emperor and is a symbol of China today.
Meaning
The Chinese dragon, long (龍, lóng), is a spirit of the waters. E. T. C. Werner, in Myths and Legends of China (1922), describes it as a beneficent being that produces rain, “not a power for evil”, the chief of the 360 scaly creatures, which climbs to the sky in spring and buries itself in the deep in autumn. W. Perceval Yetts called it “essentially a national emblem”, and the Palace Museum in Beijing calls it a divine beast respected by the Chinese people and a symbol of the spirit of the Chinese nation, which emperors for thousands of years took as their sign of power and dignity. Yetts also notes the dragon’s place in the Eastern Quadrant of the sky, where it is the Azure Dragon (Qinglong); the dragon of the zodiac has its own page, Year of the Dragon.
Origin and history
Yetts, in 1912, divided Chinese dragons into the primitive, like the k’uei dragons on ancient bronzes, and the modern, whose earliest known form he found pictured in sculptures of the second century AD in Shandong. What the dragon began as was already argued over. Yetts listed four theories: a memory of fossils or a prehistoric monster, pure imagination, a borrowing from foreign myth, and the one he thought most likely, the alligator of the Yangtze, whose waking from hibernation comes with spring and the rains. The dragon was an emblem of royalty from the earliest times; Yetts suggested that as the bringer of rain it mattered above all to people who farmed. By Werner’s day the imperial dragon had five claws on each foot and other dragons four, and the V&A notes that Qing emperors wore robes known as dragon robes for their five-clawed dragons.
The nine resemblances
Chinese writers built the dragon from other animals, and the lists do not agree. Werner gives nine “resemblances”: horns like a deer’s, a head like a camel’s, eyes like a devil’s, a neck like a snake’s, an abdomen like a large cockle’s, scales like a carp’s, claws like an eagle’s, soles like a tiger’s and ears like an ox’s. The version Yetts quotes from the great Materia Medica has the antlers of a stag, the head of a camel, the eyes of a hare, the ears of a bull, the neck of a snake, the belly of a frog, scales like a fish, talons like an eagle’s and paws like a tiger’s. Both add that some dragons have no ears and hear through their horns.
Dragon kings and kinds of dragon
Werner lists a celestial dragon that holds up the mansions of the gods, a divine dragon that brings wind and rain, an earth dragon that marks out the courses of rivers, and a dragon that guards hidden treasure. The five Sea-dragon Kings live in palaces at the bottom of the sea, one at the centre and one in each of the four quarters, and feed on pearls and opals. In time of drought, he writes, the mandarins worshipped the Dragon, and if that failed they turned to the Goddess of Mercy for rain. People saw dragons in the sky: any cloud with a curious shape or a serpent’s tail was a dragon, and “We see him,” they said.
Good dragons and harmful ones
Most Chinese dragons are kind, Werner writes; the harmful ones came with Buddhism, when the Chinese applied their dragon legends to the nagas of India. The dragons of the mountains were feared, while those of lakes and rivers were friendly and helpful. The dragon of the Chinese zodiac and its difference from the dragon of European legend are on the Year of the Dragon page.
Where you’ll see it
In the Forbidden City, the Palace Museum counts more than 10,000 dragons on the Hall of Supreme Harmony and the terrace below the three great halls. Round the terrace of the Hall of Supreme Harmony more than 1,000 dragon-head spouts drain the rain, pouring water from their mouths in a storm. Dragons are shown reaching for the Flaming pearl, and at weddings the dragon is paired with the phoenix as the groom and the bride (Dragon and phoenix).
Read next
- Next in Chinese mythology and symbolsFlaming pearlThe ball wrapped in flames that Chinese dragons reach for with open jaws, usually called a pearl. What it first stood for is disputed: the sun, thunder or the moon, and for Chinese Buddhists the jewel that grants every wish.
- The same creature as the fifth animal of the zodiac.Year of the DragonThe Dragon is the fifth of the twelve animals of the Chinese zodiac, the animal of the earthly branch chen, and the only one that is not a real animal. The most recent Year of the Dragon ran from 10 February 2024 to 28 January 2025; the next begins on 28 January 2036.
See also
Yellow Dragon Flag, Azure Dragon (Qinglong), Qilin, Fenghuang (Chinese phoenix), Guardian lions (foo dogs), Pixiu (bixie).
Sources
- Myths and Legends of China (E. T. C. Werner, 1922), E. T. C. Werner, Myths and Legends of China (London: George G. Harrap, 1922), Project Gutenberg ebook 15250, George G. Harrap, ch. XI, The Dragons; The Dragon-kings
- Symbolism in Chinese Art (W. Perceval Yetts, 1912), W. Perceval Yetts, “Symbolism in Chinese Art”, read before the China Society, 18 January 1912 (Leyden: E. J. Brill, 1912), The China Society, pp. 22–23
- Spot the Sacred Animals in the Imperial Palace (The Palace Museum), The Palace Museum, Beijing, “Spot The Sacred Animals In The Imperial Palace”, Google Arts & Culture, The Palace Museum, Dragons; Dragon spouts
- Dragon robe for a man (Victoria and Albert Museum), Victoria and Albert Museum, London, dragon robe for a man, Qing dynasty, Tongzhi period (1862–74), Victoria and Albert Museum, summary description
The same shape elsewhere
Browse symbols formed from curves and waves.
Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 10, 2026. How we research
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