A lot of the time when you read about African dragons online, people talk about cryptids like the Kongamato, Mokele-Mbembe or the Das-Adder. Most of these creatures, while originating in local folklore or mythology, have been warped beyond recognition by European accounts and in many cases are also not particularily dragon-like aside from being reptilian and sometimes being associated with water.
So for this African History Month, I decided to do a series of posts about African mythical creatures that actually are very similar to dragon myths and probably have a common origin or are at least connected through mutual influences.
The first such dragon is Arwë (also known as Wainaba). This giant serpent is said to have been worshipped in Ethiopia before king Ezana of Axum embraced Christianity in the 4th century.
According to legend, a stranger came to Arwë's land and met a woman who cried because her daughter was about to be sacrificed to the dragon. The stranger asked her for a white lamb and the juice of the poisonous Euphorbia tree. Then he offers the lamb and juice to Arwë, who is poisoned and dies. The people of Ethiopia make the man their king, and after his reign he is followed on the throne by his daughter, the Queen of Sheba. With king Solomon she becomes the mother of Menelik I., the first historical king of Ethiopia.
There are many alternative versions of the tale. In one of them, the stranger is a wizard who fires flame from his palms to kill the serpent, while in another version one of the seven saints of Ethiopia, Abba Mentelit, kills the dragon with his cross.
In the versions of the story that include human sacrifices, one can clearly see parallels to the legend of St. George, who was and still is a very popular saint in Ethiopia.
Sources:
Edward Ullendorff (1956), The Contribution of South Semitics to Hebrew Lexicography, Vetus Testamentum, https://www.jstor.org/stable/1515723
Ernst Hammerschmidt (1965), Jewish Elements in the Cult of the Ethiopian Church, Journal of Ethiopian Studies, https://www.jstor.org/stable/1515723
Dorothea McEwan (2007), Sebetat: the Many Lives and Deaths of a Monster, Journal of Ethiopian Studies, https://www.jstor.org/stable/41988222
How Makeda Visited Jerusalem, and How Menelik Became King in Anthonia C. Kalu (2007), The Rienner Anthology of African Literature, Lynne Rienner Publishers, ISBN 9781588264916
Andrea Manzo (2014), Snakes and Sacrifices: Tentative Insights into the Pre-Christian Ethiopian Religion, Aethiopica, Vol. 17, https://doi.org/10.15460/aethiopica.17.1.737, ISSN 2194-4024
Wainaba, the Serpent Ruler, Oxford Reference
Enno Littmann (1904), The Legend of the Queen of Sheba in the Tradition of Axum, BiblioLife (2009), ISBN 978-1103925988