Blue Ben (of Kilve)

Local legend situates Blue Ben in the past as a dragon that lived in shale caves along the Kilve coastline. Variants relate that he bathed in nearby waters to cool himself after breathing fire and that, according to folk explanation, he built a limestone causeway to avoid the mud flats between his lair and the shore. In some tellings the Devil captured and rode him; in others the dragon became stuck in the extensive mud flats and was consumed by them. During early nineteenth-century quarrying of the Blue Lias shale near Kilve a fossilized ichthyosaur skull was uncovered and has since been identified in local tradition as the dragon's skull; sources note the skull's museum display and record disagreement over which local museum holds it.

Accounts give only a conventional dragon-like profile: a fire-breathing creature dwelling in coastal shale caves that enters the sea to cool itself. Sources do not provide consistent details of coloration beyond the proper name 'Blue Ben', nor measurements, wingspan, scale pattern, or limb count. The fossil ichthyosaur skull is sometimes pointed out in local narrative as belonging to him.

Traditional elements attributed to Blue Ben include breathing fire and frequenting the sea to cool after doing so. Folk narrative attributes to him the creation of a limestone causeway as an explanatory act to avoid local mud flats (a folkloric attribution rather than a documented engineering behavior). In some versions the Devil captured and used Blue Ben as a mount, implying the dragon was powerful enough to be sought as a steed; the tale describes the Devil riding him through the fires of Hell until the dragon escaped. The legend also preserves his vulnerability to the local landscape—accounts state he became stuck in the mud and was consumed.