A dragon is the central mythological creature in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Farmer Giles of Ham.
Farmer Giles of Ham is a comic fantasy tale first published in 1949. Its protagonist, Farmer Giles, accidentally drives away a giant and is later celebrated as a hero when a dragon named Chrysophylax Dives threatens the region. The story plays with the conventions of heroic legends and medieval romance.
Unlike The Hobbit, the story is not set in Middle-earth. It has a mock-medieval setting and a humorous tone, with a narrator who treats grand adventure and local farming concerns as parts of the same world. The dragon is intelligent, vain, and interested in treasure, but the tale uses those familiar traits for comedy.
The title’s “Ham” refers to a place in the story, not to a character or food. Tolkien’s use of a dragon here shows how he could adapt traditional legendary creatures for different moods and purposes outside his main mythology.