The rainbow serpent, a mythical creature widespread throughout the continent of Australia, is said to live in water. A closer look at it reveals that these great serpent-like creatures, usually associated with the rainbow, seem to bear the closest resemblance to the Chinese mythical dragon. The rainbow serpent is commonly depicted in its terrifying animal form, with a serpent-like body, kangaroo or horse-like head, crocodile teeth, ears or crown of feathers, long, spiked body and fish tail. Similarly, the form of the Chinese dragon is also a compound of species: the body of a serpent with the scales of a fish, the claws of an eagle, and the horns of a deer. There are also much deeper connotations of the two figures which suggest the links between myths in Australia and China. The Aborigines have inhabited the continent of Australia for at least 40,000 years. Human evolution could not have taken place separately in Australia because there is no evidence of the existence of the ape-like predecessors of Homo sapiens. Therefore, the first Aborigines must have come from elsewhere. No authority disputes that the Australians came from Southeast Asia, arriving somewhere on the northwest of the continent. It is even argued that the ancestors of the Australian Aborigines could have arrived in Australia from mainland Asia, especially China, as the Australian Encyclopaedia described in its fifth edition. This hypothesis that there must be close historical connections between these two peoples is strengthened by some parallels between the myths from the Australian Aborigines and those of the ancient Chinese people. The rainbow serpent, for example, is strongly associated with water, life, and of course the arching rainbow in the sky.

The connection of rainbow and serpents in China is also recorded in the character of "rainbow" on bones and tortoise shells, taking the shape of two serpents. (The inscriptions on bones and tortoise shells are ancestor of modern Chinese script, dating back to 15th-12th century BC.) The current Chinese character of "rainbow" (hong) takes the radical of "worm" (chong), which etymologically means "serpents." In addition, the Aboriginal people believe that the rainbow serpent is the creator of human beings. The counterpart in Chinese myth could be the goddess Nuwa, who, with serpent-like body, created human beings out of yellow earth and mud. Moreover, in Chinese myth, serpents and dragons are often identical.

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