The End of Monstrous Races

      In most medieval themed books such as Game of Thrones, History of the Great Kings of Britain, Lord of the Rings, etc. We see a common theme among the monstrous races that exist in these different universes. In all of these books, creatures like giants, dragons, shape shifters, etc. all existed at some point in time. They act as vestiges of an old world that no longer exists; a way of life that has been forgotten and will not move forward in the contemporary sense.


     The first we learn about these monstrous races are in HKB, where we learn of Brutus's travels to Briton and killing the giants the reside there. The giants in HKB represent savagery and strength and Brutus and his people cannot settle in Briton while they occupy the island. They've been there for what is understood as centuries and their way of life cannot coexist with the new way that is being forced upon them by Brutus. In The Travels of Sir John Mandeville, we see a similar trend, but it's presented in a slightly different way. The creatures that are present in Mandeville's travels exist in the contemporary time, but do not live anywhere near mankind. They instead live on the far reaches of the world. This theme of monstrous races being killed off or being forced to live far from mankind occurs in several different modern novels that take inspiration from these old medieval texts.


     We'll start with the hit TV series and novel, Game of Thrones. In this series, there are several races that are going into the point of extinction during the present time period of the novel. Dragons, a popular topic in the novel, play a huge role in the past, as well as the present. We learn all throughout the series that dragons were used by great kings to win wars and conquer cities, but time turned them into dust and the dragons were thought to have died out. Now, when three dragon eggs are discovered and given to a Targaryen, shit starts to hit the fan. Most people refuse to believe that they exist anymore, and the people in high power attempt to either take the dragons or kill them off entirely. We don't learn too much about the past of dragons, but they must've had a huge impact in history for them to be reacted to in this way.


     Giants that only live north of the wall only have a few left in existence, and we even see the last of their kind killed off during one of the battles in the series. It's understood that giants used to be in far greater numbers, living in clans north of the wall. They speak an old language called the "old tongue" and follow an old religion that most other going-extinct races follow called the "old gods of the forest". There are also ancient beings that live even further north called the "children of the forest" that follow the same religion as the giants who have been said to be the original inhabitants of Westeros. In the series, one of the final groups that existed were also killed off making the children of the forest become seemingly extinct.



   
     Game of Thrones is the more popular topic when it comes to contemporary medieval texts, but this reoccurring theme of monstrous races is also apparent in the Lord of the Rings. Old Elven kingdoms are shrinking at steady rate. We learn about a man named Beorn who is the last skin changer due to his kind being killed off. We learn of dragons that are very few in existence, and we also know that wizards like Gandalf or Saruman also are very few in existence.


     In most medieval texts, there are lots of non human races that have existed at one point in time. And in most medieval texts these races are killed off to the point of extinction because the old world cannot change with the new.