CHAPTER XI
THE WORLD OF SPIRITS AND MONSTERS
THE ARMENIAN world of spirits and monsters teems with elements both native and foreign. Most of the names are of Persian origin, although we do not know how much of this lore came directly from Iran. For we may safely assert that the majority of these uncanny beings bear a general Indo-European, one might even say, universal character. So any attempt to explain them locally, as dim memories of ancient monsters or of conquered and exterminated races will in the long run prove futile. One marked feature of this vital and ever-living branch of mythology is the world-wide uniformity of the fundamental elements. Names, places, forms, combinations may come and go, but the beliefs which underlie the varying versions of the stories remain rigidly constant. On this ground mythology and folklore join hands.
The chief actors in this lower, but very deeply rooted stratum of religion and mythology are serpents and dragons, good or evil ghosts and fairies, among whom we should include the nymphs of the classical world, the elves and kobolds of the Teutons, the vilas of the Slavs, the jinn and devs of Islam, etc.[1]
At this undeveloped stage of comparative folklore it would be rash to posit a common origin for all these multitudinous beings. Yet they show, in their feats and characteristics, many noteworthy interrelations and similarities all over the world.
Leaving aside the difficult question whether serpent-worship precedes and underlies all other religion and mythology, we have cumulative evidence, both ancient and modern, of a world-wide belief that the serpent stands in the closest rela-
