Did Morgoth create 🐲dragons

[Vorondil]

Did Morgoth create dragons? Or are they some form of corrupted thing? Wasn't Morgoth unable to create things from scratch?

 

[Tyelkormo the Fair]

They were all unable to create sentinent beings from scratch,and as we know dragons in Tolkien were intelligent creatures and definitely sentinent.

 

[Aldarion]

I always thought dragons were, like balrogs, spirits given (and then trapped in) a physical form. So not new life, just a "mutation" (mutilation) of an existing being.

 

[Ent]

I'd need to check. I don't recall reading anywhere the dragons were spirit-filled... just corruptions, bred and fed and nurtured to become the monsters they became. And yet... how did at least the one of them get the hypnotic eye power he was given, if not from some source other than a gigantic worm?

Clearly Morgoth couldn't create or improve on brains. He had so few himself... all he ended up with is fury, rage and hatred, though originally the 'greatest' of them with 'a part of all their abilities'. (See what happens when we squander what we're given?)

 

[Aldarion]

I'd need to check. I don't recall reading anywhere the dragons were spirit-filled... just corruptions, bred and fed and nurtured to become the monsters they became. And yet... how did at least the one of them get the hypnotic eye power he was given, if not from some source other than a gigantic worm?

That is probably what made me conclude that. Power to dominate human minds was elsewhere seen in Ainur (Morgoth, Sauron, One Ring - which is basically a portion of Sauron's soul, Saruman), so the fact that dragons have similar ability would suggest that they are of similar nature.

 

[Ent]

suggest

Yeah. this being the key word... good for the Great Halls of Speculation... given it's unclear.

The only thing we truly "know" with regard to the original post is no, he did not 'create' dragons. He could create nothing.

 

[Olorgando]

I don't recall having read something like the following thought on any of the three JRRT forums I've been active on. OK, I haven't read every post in every active thread in TTF, and never mind the archives.

I'll give an SMS version of the Ainulindalë:

Eru proposes themes.
The Ainur sing.
Eru creates Arda according to the singing of the Ainur.

And this is the important point: including Melkor's discords!
He didn't throw out the discords.

Point in question: there is somewhere in JRRT's writings as edited by Christopher (and perhaps others) where Eru is talking to Ulmo, whose theme was water.
Melkor's discords were very much about (destructive) excesses, for example of heat and cold.
Well, Eru points out to Ulmo that the heat produced clouds - not something Ulmo had thought and sung about.
And the cold produced ice, and more to the point, snowflakes. Again no "Ulmo copyright".

None of the Ainur created anything. Everything was created by Eru. Including Dragons etc. - or at least what Melkor could then pervert into Dragons etc.

 

[Vorondil]

I'm sure I remember in The Children Of Hurin that Glaurung 'spoke by the spirit that was in him', or something along those lines (I might be completely mistaken however).

 

[Aldarion]

I'm sure I remember in The Children Of Hurin that Glaurung 'spoke by the spirit that was in him', or something along those lines (I might be completely mistaken however).

You are not:

And now he stood alone, for the few that had followed him had fled into hiding. But in that moment Glaurung the fell issued from the gaping Doors of Felagund, and lay behind, between Túrin and the bridge. Then suddenly he spoke by the evil spirit that was in him, saying: 'Hail, son of Húrin. Well met!'