Tradition: Swiss Mythology
Alternative Names: Dragon of the Drachenloch
Category: Dragon

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The Myth

The Dragon of Burgdorf was an enormous dragon that lived inside a hollow mountain near Burgdorf in Bern. The cavern became known as the Drachenloch, or Dragon’s Cave, and the creature was said to have laid waste to the surrounding countryside.

In the year 712, the brothers Sintram and Beltram, dukes of Lenzburg, went hunting together. Deep in a wild and desolate forest they came upon a hollow mountain and discovered the dragon within. As soon as the beast saw the two men, it sprang violently toward them.

Before Beltram could escape, the dragon seized him and swallowed him alive. Sintram fought back with great courage and engaged the monster in a fierce struggle. Eventually he managed to overcome and kill the dragon.

But when Sintram cut open the dragon’s split body, he discovered something astonishing: his younger brother was still alive inside the monster. Beltram had survived being swallowed and was rescued from the dragon’s body.

To commemorate the terrible encounter and Beltram’s miraculous survival, the two princes had a chapel dedicated to Saint Margaret built at the very place where the dragon had been defeated. The story was also painted there, where it could still be seen.

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Sources

“Das Drachenloch.” SAGEN.at – Traditionelle Sagen aus der Schweiz (Bern). Reproduced by SAGEN.at.
https://www.sagen.at/texte/sagen/schweiz/bern/dasdrachenloch.html

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Tradition: Swiss Mythology
Alternative Names: The Dragon of the King’s City
Category: Dragon

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The Myth

The dragon was a terrible monster that lived in a cave near a great city. It had a horned head and was so fearsome that the people were unable to defeat it. Every day the inhabitants were forced to give the dragon a human being to devour. If they failed to provide a victim, the monster would leave its cave and rage through the country, so violently that the people considered the daily sacrifice the lesser evil.

Eventually the king’s own beautiful daughter was chosen to become the dragon’s next victim. The king had promised that whoever could kill the monster would receive his daughter and the kingdom, but no one had yet been able to accomplish the deed.

A giant and a small tailor arrived in the city and offered to kill the dragon. The giant possessed enormous strength, while the clever tailor relied on his cunning. They took a gigantic hammer and a heavy pair of tongs and travelled toward the dragon’s cave.

They decided that the giant would enter the cave and drive the dragon out with his hammer, while the tailor waited outside with the tongs and would seize the creature when it emerged. But when the giant entered the cave and attacked the monster, the dragon suddenly burst out and snapped up the tailor like a fly, swallowing him whole.

The giant immediately pursued the dragon and brought his enormous hammer down upon its horned head. The blow crushed the monster’s skull, and the dragon fell dead. The giant then cut open its body and discovered the tailor still alive inside the dragon’s belly.

The tailor, however, feared that the giant would claim the king’s daughter and kingdom for himself. He therefore told the giant that he had deliberately allowed himself to be swallowed because he intended to turn the dragon inside out from within, like a glove. The foolish giant believed him.

The two men returned to the king with the dead dragon, each claiming the reward. After the king’s advisers failed to decide who deserved the princess and kingdom, the tailor proposed that the winner should be whoever could eat the most rice porridge.

The giant eagerly accepted, since rice porridge was his favourite food. A gigantic mountain of porridge was placed before them, and the two began eating. The giant devoured enormous quantities until he could eat no more, while the tailor continued eating without stopping. Finally the giant admitted defeat.

The tailor married the king’s daughter and received the kingdom. The giant remained behind, determined to discover how the little tailor had managed to eat so much. The tailor told him that during the meal he had cut open his own stomach so that he could continue eating indefinitely.

The foolish giant believed him. One day, while eating rice porridge, he cut open his own stomach and immediately fell dead. Thus the dragon’s death brought an end to the monster that had terrorized the kingdom, while the tailor’s cunning ultimately freed the kingdom from the giant as well.

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Sources

“Der Riese Schneiderlein.” SAGEN.at – Traditionelle Sagen aus der Schweiz. Reproduced by SAGEN.at.
https://www.sagen.at/texte/sagen/schweiz/allgemein/riese_schneiderlein.html

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Tradition: Swiss Mythology
Alternative Names: The Dragons of the Faßbinder
Category: Dragon

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The Myth

The dragons were two enormous and hideous creatures that lived deep beneath the mountains of Lucerne, inside great caves hidden at the bottom of a deep, muddy pit. They were among the dragons and worms believed to have inhabited the Swiss mountains in ancient times, creatures that could sometimes descend violently into the valleys and bring destruction with them.

In the year 1420, according to the church records, a cooper from Lucerne went into the wilderness searching for wood with which to make his barrels. He became lost in the lonely mountains after nightfall and suddenly fell into a deep pit, sinking down as though into a muddy well. At the bottom he discovered entrances leading into two enormous caves.

When he went closer to investigate, two dreadful dragons emerged from the caves. Terrified, the man prayed fervently, but the dragons did not attack him. Instead, they repeatedly wrapped their enormous bodies around him without harming him.

The unfortunate cooper remained trapped with the dragons from November 6 until April 10. He survived by feeding upon the same salty moisture that sustained the dragons, which seeped from the walls of the caves.

When winter finally ended, the dragons sensed that spring had arrived and prepared to leave their underground dwelling. One of them suddenly flew out with a tremendous rushing sound. As the second dragon prepared to follow, the cooper seized its tail and held on tightly. The dragon carried him up and out of the deep pit.

Once they reached the surface, the man released his grip and escaped. He returned safely to Lucerne, having survived months underground in the company of the two dragons.

To preserve the strange event, he had the entire story embroidered onto a priestly vestment. The embroidered account was said to remain visible in the Church of Saint Leodegar in Lucerne.

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Sources

“Der Drache fährt aus.” SAGEN.at – Traditionelle Sagen aus Deutschland. Reproduced by SAGEN.at.
https://www.sagen.at/texte/sagen/grimm/derdrachefaehrtaus.html

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Tradition: Swiss Mythology
Alternative Names: Maltschül Fire Dragon, Buchs Dragon
Category: Dragon

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The Myth

Beneath the Red Plate on the Maltschül Alp lives a fiery dragon. The creature is said to appear only before a flood.

In 1762 and again in 1764, a fiery man was seen riding through the Buchserbach gorge upon the dragon. Soon afterward, the waters rose violently, sweeping away houses and barns and devastating fields and meadows.

Another tradition tells that the dragon lived on the Alp of Buchs, where it breathed fire and smoke and lured cattle toward a rocky plate. The animals would then slip from the rock and fall into the dragon’s reach, becoming its prey.

Whenever the dragon appeared, the stream was said to burst its banks and bring destructive floods. According to later tradition, the dragon is now dead and lies buried beneath the rock where it once dwelled.

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Sources

“Der feurige Drache.” SAGEN.at – Traditionelle Sagen aus der Schweiz (Kanton St. Gallen). Reproduced by SAGEN.at.
https://www.sagen.at/texte/sagen/schweiz/st_gallen/feurige_drache.html

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Tradition: Swiss Mythology
Alternative Names: Sumpfdrache of Waltensburg
Category: Dragon

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The Myth

On a mountain near Waltensburg lies a seemingly bottomless swamp. Deep within it dwells an enormous dragon.

The creature is said to remain hidden in the swamp until one day it rises from the depths and descends toward the village. When the dragon finally emerges, it will cause a great flood, sending the waters down the mountain and bringing devastation to Waltensburg.

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Sources

“Der Sumpfdrache.” SAGEN.at – Traditionelle Sagen aus der Schweiz (Graubünden). Reproduced by SAGEN.at.
https://www.sagen.at/texte/sagen/schweiz/graubuenden/dersumpfdrache.html

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Tradition: Swiss Mythology
Alternative Names: Lindworm of Wyl, Dragon of Ödwyl
Category: Dragon

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The Myth

In ancient times, a terrible Lindworm lived in a cave above the village of Wyl in Unterwalden, beside Lake Lucerne. Its body was covered in scales and it possessed razor-sharp claws. When it shot through the air from its cave, it looked like an enormous flying crocodile, while flames poured from its jaws.

The dragon devastated the beautiful countryside around Wyl and filled the inhabitants with terror. It devoured livestock as well as shepherds, and even children tending their animals were not safe. A shepherd boy carrying a full milk pail could be quietly making his way through the hedges and woods when the Lindworm would suddenly swoop down and carry him away. Once, two poor girls gathering berries in the pasture were attacked by the beast and only escaped by hiding among the ferns. Because neither people nor animals were safe, Wyl eventually became known as Ödwyl, the deserted Wyl.

At last, a knight named Struthan Winkelried, of the family of Winkelried, offered to fight the monster. He had previously been banished from his homeland because of an unintentional killing, and demanded that he be allowed to return if he succeeded in destroying the Lindworm. The people of Unterwalden agreed.

Struthan returned to the land and went to Ödwyl, where the dragon lived. He wore a coat of armor and wrapped his lance in a thorn bush.

Suddenly, the Lindworm burst from its cave breathing fire and charged directly at the knight. The people watching from the surrounding woods believed that Struthan was doomed. Instead, he held the thorn-covered lance before him. Blinded by its fury, the dragon charged straight into the weapon. After a short but violent struggle, the Lindworm became entangled and suffocated upon the thorn-covered lance.

The people rushed forward cheering when they saw the monster dead. But as Struthan, exhausted and covered in sweat, pulled his lance from the dragon’s body, some of the creature’s blood splashed onto his bare arm. Although he immediately washed it away, the dragon’s blood was deadly, and Struthan soon died as well.

The people mourned the man who had saved them from the Lindworm. At the place where he had slain the dragon, they built a chapel in his memory.

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Sources

“Drachenried.” SAGEN.at – Traditionelle Sagen aus der Schweiz. Reproduced by SAGEN.at.
https://www.sagen.at/texte/sagen/schweiz/allgemein/drachenried.html

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Tradition / Region: Swiss Mythology
Alternate Names: Dragon of Hirschensprung
Category: Dragon

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The Myth

In the narrow pass known as the Hirschensprung, where the land road is forced between steep rock faces to avoid the flood-prone Rhine plain, an old legend tells of a monstrous dragon that once lived among the cliffs.

The place itself already carried a name tied to danger and escape. It was said that a stag, hunted and cornered, once leapt across the chasm to evade its pursuers—an impossible jump that gave the site its name: Hirschensprung, the “stag’s leap.”

But long after that, something far worse inhabited the pass.

A dragon took up residence among the rocks, a grotesque and terrifying creature that threatened everything living in the area. It haunted the narrow route, making travel dangerous and filling the surrounding lands with fear. Neither man nor beast could pass safely while it remained.

The local farmers, unable to endure the threat any longer, devised a practical but brutal solution. Rather than confronting the creature with weapons, they used cunning.

They heated a ploughshare—an iron blade used for cutting earth—until it glowed red-hot. Then, approaching the dragon, they provoked it into opening its jaws. At the right moment, they hurled the burning iron straight into its mouth.

The dragon, driven by its insatiable hunger, swallowed it instantly.

Moments later, the heat consumed it from within. After a brief but violent death struggle, the creature perished.

Yet the story does not end with its death.

The dragon, according to local belief, still remains at Hirschensprung—but no longer alive. Its body turned to stone in the place where it died. Even now, people claim that its form can be seen in the rock itself: its head and gaping jaws protruding from the cliff face, while its tail stretches across the landscape toward the pass.

The position of the stone formation suggests that, in its final agony, the dragon twisted violently before becoming fixed forever in the mountain.

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Sources

sagen.at contributors. (n.d.). Der Drache am Hirschensprung. In sagen.at, from https://www.sagen.at/texte/sagen/schweiz/st_gallen/hirschensprung.html

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