# Here There Be Tygers

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/here-there-be-tygers/87309>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [October 14, 2001, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/here-there-be-tygers/87309 "2001-10-14T00:23:33Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![SuperNova](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ea666f/32.png) [@SuperNova](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SuperNova)\
**Post date:** [October 14, 2001, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/here-there-be-tygers/87309/1 "2001-10-14T00:23:33Z")

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What is the origin of this phrase,  
**Here There be Tygers**?  
And also, what does it mean?

I first saw this in a Ray Bradbury short story in his collection “R is for Rocket”. Later it caught my eye as a short story in “Skeleton Crew” by Stephen King. After a few quick web searches, I found James Gunn had also written a short story with that title. It seems of those references Bradbury is the oldest. But I doubt he is the one who coined the phrase.

So who out there can help me? Where’s it from, and what’s it mean?

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**Author:** ![aseymayo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a88e57/32.png) [@aseymayo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aseymayo)\
**Post date:** [October 14, 2001, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/here-there-be-tygers/87309/2 "2001-10-14T00:47:41Z")

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I believe it’s an allusion to the phrase “Here Be Dragons,” which was supposedly found on old maps. According to [this site](http://www.maphist.nl/extra/herebedragons.html), those words don’t actually appear on any maps in English, but they can be found on the Lenox Globe (c.1503-07) in Latin.

I haven’t read the story, so I can’t say how tigers or tygers, real or metaphorical, come into it.

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**Author:** ![everton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ecb155/32.png) [@everton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/everton)\
**Post date:** [October 14, 2001, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/here-there-be-tygers/87309/3 "2001-10-14T23:32:40Z")

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I don’t know if Ray Bradbury, Stephen King or James Gunn knew it, but spelt with a “y” there’s a creature in heraldry that looks like [this](http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Studios/1940/htyger.html). More like the dragons of ancient maps than the tigers we’re familiar with.

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**Author:** ![D18](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c57346/32.png) [@D18](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D18)\
**Post date:** [October 15, 2001, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/here-there-be-tygers/87309/4 "2001-10-15T01:01:17Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by everton \*  
> \*\*I don’t know if Ray Bradbury, Stephen King or James Gunn knew it, but spelt with a “y” there’s a creature in heraldry that looks like [this](http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Studios/1940/htyger.html). More like the dragons of ancient maps than the tigers we’re familiar with. \*\*

[hijack] I didn’t know that! And is that the critter that Blake would have been talking about in “The Tyger”? Somehow, it seems to make sense that it would be. [/hijack]

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**Author:** ![everton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ecb155/32.png) [@everton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/everton)\
**Post date:** [October 15, 2001, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/here-there-be-tygers/87309/5 "2001-10-15T01:36:57Z")

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Well, I don’t claim to be an expert on William Blake, but although he would have been familiar with real tigers, you have to look much deeper for allegorical and metaphysical significance of his Tyger as with all his works.

[This](http://www.english.uga.edu/~wblake/SIE/42/42borowsky.bib.html) cite does a better job than I ever could.