Fafnir is one such dragon who guards a treasure. Found in stories of Norse mythology, the beast is armored with scaly skin and the sharp edge of whose teeth inflicts fear on any onlooker when it parts its jaws.
With his formidable bulk and fire breathing ability, Fafnir is certainly a worthy sentry to guard a treasure. Not necessarily because one is trying to hide something from others, but because the fundamental reasoning behind many of the human thoughts remain muddled even to the one who harbors such thoughts.
The reason for this is that this is the age of information saturation. Thanks to the ubiquity of the internet- and a global cultural affinity for smartphones- we muck up a lot of information- be it through news channels or social media platforms- to such a degree that many significant aspects of our mind get buried under that load of largely irrelevant information. Put another way, because of the consistent state of distraction in which your mind exists faced with this unceasing flow of information, you tend to lose sight of some important things.
One of the most significant of these is your True Personal Vision. True Personal Vision is the vision that resides in your self and which could be found nowhere else. Unique and formidable, this vision acts as a destination you could guide your team or organization towards. Fafnir's hoard, which Tolkien would have been well aware of , an in-universe explanation is also appropriate.
Dragons in Tolkien do gather treasure; his other major dragon from the legends of the First Age - Glaurung - did the very same after he sacked Nargothrond - piled up all the treasure and sat on it. In the Third Age Scatha the Worm is also mentioned as having a hoard, which led to a fued between the Northmen and the Dwarves the horn that Merry was given is mentioned as having come from this hoard.
As creatures of Morgoth there is very likely an element of his spirit in them this is nowhere confirmed in canon, but I'm imagining Morgoth feeding reptiles to create dragons in much the same way as he fed a wolf to create Carcaroth, although their obvious intelligence and sentience suggests a possible Maiar source I'm deliberately ignoring the Lost Tales concept of dragons here ; either way we don't know and we've moved away from the topic a bit now ; when Morgoth lusted after and stole the Silmarils from Formenos, he also took a lot of other jewels with him, which he also did not need and which he begrudged having to feed to Ungoliant.
So there's a clear element of basic avarice, especially avarice for items one does not actually need, running through Morgoth and his dragons. Collecting something you value is an intrinsically motivated act. You build up a collection of things you enjoy purely because you enjoy them. The opinions of others have no impact.
To collect something valued by others shows extrinsic motivation. Not only do you deprive others of the contents of your collection, but by gaining their admiration or envy, you gain power over them. Tolkien's day job was as a teacher of Old English literature, among other things. The dragon emerged and devastation ensued. Eventually the dragon is slain, but the hero dies. The idea of dragonish desire for treasure was certainly present in literature before AD, and was also picked up in C.
Lewis' Voyage of the Dawn-Treader. Perhaps it was all metaphorical for humans with an overwhelming lust for glittery stuff. We all know some bling-heads! They probably had them back then too. Some of the Anglo-Saxon gold-work with enameling and carnelian insets are unbelievably intricate and beautiful, check the Sutton Hoo treasure on google images. I can see why dragons would covet it.
There are a lot of scholarly articles on the dragons of Old English literature, try google scholar. The bibliographies of a few articles should get you on the road to a better answer. Not a Tolkien source, but I fondly remember the explanation used in The Flight of Dragons , a favorite movie when I was a boy. Breathing fire, dragons tend to burn up bedding made from conventional materials.
They make their beds of gold as it is a softer metal that won't ignite. Wikia states no Tolkien quote that there was one side benefit to the hoarding possibly not intentional - the jewels stuck to Smaug's scales when he was lying atop of his treasure, making him even less vulnerable to damage than scales alone. A collection is meant to get the attention of mates and show that he is strong enough to collect it. That's the way it works for many birds. Some grow tail feathers that are counter productively long in a display that says that he is strong enough to fly even with those 2 foot long feathers.
Bird songs also show that the bird has the energy to chirp all day long and is in a good enough position that they don't have to fear predators. However, it is possible that the reason why Smaug is so grumpy is that lady dragons would prefer collections of something useful like food sources or defenses for hatchlings.
Smaug may be so invested in this method of attracting a mate that, since it doesn't seem to be working, he just tries harder at it. I totally am. Imagine collecting Star Wars stuff. That never works. However, my collection of Babylon 5 stuff totally worked. For the same reason people need gems, diamonds, gold, oil, watches, luxury racing cars, houses with 25 rooms and 5 bathrooms.
Dragons are very much like humans, greedy. I dunno. The Tolkien explanation is fine and all, based on historical literature.
I've even read online that Tolkien had elements of the dragons reproducing on their own to some extent. Though Smaug is mentioned as being especially greedy, there are at least two other specific examples of dragons hoarding treasure Glaurung and Scatha , as well as a vague mention that many dwarvish halls in the Grey Mountains had been attacked by dragons seeking treasure.
Dragons steal gold and jewels, you know, from men and elves and dwarves, wherever they can find them; and they guard their plunder as long as they live which is practically forever, unless they are killed , and never enjoy a brass ring of it.
Thorin makes some good points.
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