Snakes in Legend, Myth and Religion

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This picture shows Eve and Adam and the serpent, illustrating the temptation of Eve from Genesis, while this one shows all three being ejected from the Garden of Eden by an angel.  In this stained glass picture the snake appears to have the head of a woman, thus introducing two biasses in the same image.  This is reminiscent of the Fairy Melusine in A S Byatt’s book "Possession".

Click here to see another illustration of the serpent, at the rear of the Sanctuary of the Virgin Mary of Fatima, Krzeptówki, Zakopane, in Poland.

Snakes are animals which can glide gracefully along the ground, with no visible effort, climb, swim gracefully through the water, glide through the air and burrow; and can envenomate or constrict.  As such, they are bound to excite feelings of admiration, awe, fear or loathing, depending on the person and the culture in which he or she lives.  Even now, there are people who believe that snakes are slimy and disgusting.  Few of us are without a dislike of some animal.

Man’s relationship with animals and plants has been expressed in art, mythology and religion, from very early times.  A S Byatt’s book "Possession" includes a long poem about the Fairy Melusina, a creature who is part woman, part snake.  Like several other animals, snakes are included in a number of creation myths.

Vipers appear in three of Shakespeare’s most bizarre stage directions, in "Anthony and Cleopatra" – 

[To an asp, which she applies to her breast.  

[Applying another asp to her arm.  

[Applies an asp.  

These are followed shortly by this –

[Dies.

Unfortunately, after this, a guard refers to the "trail of slime" left by a snake, which is of course nonsense.  Before the tragic scene, Cleopatra refers to the snake "that kills and pains not".  She was soon to find out that "pains not" was badly wrong: death by viper bites would be very unpleasant.  Such was the state of knowledge of snakes.

In Act III of King Richard II, the King says – "O villains, vipers, damn’d without redemption!  Dogs, easily won to fawn on any man!  Snakes, in my heart-blood warm’d, that sting my heart!"

Near the end of "The Tragedy of Othello" we find –

Lodovico: Where is that viper? Bring the villain forth.    (Of Iago.)

In "The Tragedy of Macbeth" we find –

Macbeth: We have scotch’d the snake, not kill’d it.

Second Witch: Fillet of a fenny snake,    (Grass snake?)

In the cauldron boil and bake;

Eye of newt and toe of frog,

Wool of bat and tongue of dog,

Adder’s fork and blind-worm’s sting,    (Slow-worm has sight, but no venom.)

Lizard’s leg and howlet’s wing,

For a charm of powerful trouble,

Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

In "Cymbeline" –

Pisanio: Maids, matrons, nay, the secrets of the grave

This viperous slander enters.     (Viperous here probably means poisonous.)

See also –

"Snake" by D H Lawrence which is analysed by Heather Haberl.

"The Viper" by Gavin Miller

"Snake" by Emily Dickinson

"The Diamondback" by J Copek

"Rattlesnake Dreams" by Ray Gonzalez

Children’s poems about snakes from Porchester School, Nottingham

"Sendin’ the Vipers" by Mezz Mezzrow and his Orchestra

"Chant for Killing a Snake" by Nicolas Guillen – Sensemaya – Eartha Kitt

The Singing Snake by Stefan Czernecki

Snake painting

Snakes and lizards were sacred to the Egyptian god Atum.  Apep was a serpent-god, as were Mehen, Nehebkau and Uto/Wadjet, and Hathor was often depicted as a snake, as were Tefnut and Uajyt.  Meretseger was a cobra-goddess.  Quetzalcoatl was one name of the central American feathered serpent-god.  In Japan, Benten, the love-goddess, was associated with the snake and the dragon.

If you type "snake.god" in the search box of Google you will find a number of references to books and films.

Near the beginning of the Jewish Torah and the Christian Old Testament, the snake is portrayed a tempter.  From the RSV bible –

Then the Lord God said to the woman, "What is this that you have done?"  The woman said, "The serpent beguiled me, and I ate."  The Lord God said to the serpent, "Because you have done this, cursed are you above all cattle, and above all wild animals; upon your belly you shall go, and dust you shall eat all the days of your life."

Much later, we find this –

Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh and did as the Lord commanded; Aaron cast down his rod before Pharaoh and his servants, and it became a serpent.

And in the Book of Proverbs –

Three things are too wonderful for me;

four I do not understand:

    the way of an eagle in the sky,

    the way of a serpent on a rock,

    the way of a ship on the high seas,

    and the way of a man with a maiden. 

A tree – a fruit – a serpent – a woman – a man – the temptation of Eve from Genesis.  In the story, Adam is tempted as well, and bites the fruit, but the story is still referred to as the temptation of Eve.  The serpent in the coloured picture has the head of a woman.  Thus the tale is not only biassed against snakes – it is biassed against women as well.

Click here to see another serpent, at the rear of the Sanctuary of the Virgin Mary of Fatima, Krzeptówki, Zakopane, in Poland.

Here is a list of references in the Bible –

Genesis 3.1 – Now the serpent was more subtle than any other wild creature

Genesis 3.13 – The woman said, "The serpent beguiled me, and I ate."

Genesis 49.17 – Dan shall be a serpent by the way, an adder in the path, that bites

                         the horse’s heels

Exodus 4.3 – He cast it on the ground, and it became a serpent

Exodus 7.12 – Every man cast down his rod, and it became a serpent

Numbers 21.6 – The Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the

                         people

Numbers 21.8 – The Lord said to Moses, make a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole

Numbers 21.9 – Moses made a serpent of brass and put it on a pole: if a serpent had

                         bitten any man, he beheld the serpent of brass

Deuteronomy 8.15 – a great and terrible wilderness, wherein were fiery serpents

Deuteronomy 32.24 – I will also send the poison of serpents upon them

2 Kings 18.4 – Hezek brake in pieces the brazen serpent that Moses had made

Job 20.16 – He will suck the poison of asps; the tongue of the viper will him

Job 26.13 – his hand hath formed the crooked serpent / pierced the fleeing serpent

Psalm 58.4 – Their venom is like the venom of a serpent, like the deaf adder that stops

                         its ear

Psalms 91.13 – Thou shalt tread on the lion and the adder, the young lion and the

                         serpent thou shalt trample under foot

Psalm 140.3 – They make their tongue sharp as a serpent’s, and under their lips is the

                         poison of vipers

Proverbs 23.32 – At the last it biteth like a serpent and stingeth like an adder

Proverbs 30.19 – too wonderful for me . . . . the way of a serpent upon a rock

Ecclesiastes 10.8 – whoso breaketh an hedge, serpents shall bite him

Ecclesiastes 10.11 – If the serpent bites before it is charmed, there is no advantage in

                         a charmer

Isaiah 14.29 – out of the serpent’s root shall come forth a cockatrice: his fruit shall be

                         as a fiery flying serpent

Isaiah 27.1 – The Lord shall punish Leviathan the fleeing serpent, Leviathan the

                         crooked serpent, and he will slay the dragon that is in the sea

Isaiah 30.6 – Through a land of trouble and anguish, from whence come the viper and

                         the fiery flying serpent

Isaiah 41.24 – your work is worse than of a viper

Isaiah 65.25 – The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, the lion shall eat straw like

                         an ox, and dust shall be the serpent’s meat

Jeremiah 8.17 – behold, I will send among you serpebts, adders that cannot be

                         charmed, and they shall bite you, says the Lord

Jeremiah 46.22 – She makes a sound like a serpent gliding away / The voice thereof

                         shall go like a serpent

Amos 5.19 – It is darkness and not light, as if . . . he went into the house and leaned

                         with his hand on the wall, and a serpent bit him

Amos 9.3 – I will command the serpent and he shall bite them

Micah 7.17 – They shall lick the dust like a serpent

Matthew 3.7 – O generation of vipers / You brood of vipers

Matthew 7.10 – If he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent?

Matthew 10.16 – Be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves

Matthew 23.33 – Ye serpents, ye brood of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of

                         hell?

Luke 10,19 – I give unto you the power to tread on serpents and scorpions

Luke 11,11 – What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish

                         give him a serpent?

John 3.14 – As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of man

                         be lifted up

Acts 28.3 – A viper came out because of the heat and fastened on Paul’s hand . . . 

                         He shook of the creature into the fire, and suffered no harm . . .

                         They changed their minds and said that he was a god

1 Corinthians 10.9 – We must not put the Lord to the test, as some of them did, and

                         were destroyed by serpents

James 3,7 – for every kind of beasts and of serpents is tamed

Revelations 9.19 – Their tails were like unto serpents, and had heads, and by means of

                         them, they wound

Revelations 12.9 – And the great dragon was thrown down, that old serpent who is

                         called the devil and satan, 20.2

Revelations 12.14 – The woman was given the two great wings of the great eagle that

                         she might fly from the serpent into the wilderness

Revelations 12.15 – The serpent cast out of his mouth water as a flood, to sweep her

                         away

Revelations 20,2 – And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil

                         and satan, and bound him for a thousand years

The serpent is mentioned in the third chapter in the Bible, and in the third chapter from last, so it spans almost the whole book.

Saint Patrick is said to have had the authority to have the snakes driven out of Ireland, as a symbol of his power over evil.  The picture in this link shows a snake.  In another version of the legend, the snake is a pagan symbol.

The western basilisk and dragon are more recent developments.  Greek mythology includes the nine-headed Hydra and the Medusa, with a head covered in snakes.  The Medusa is portrayed as female, reflecting perhaps a male fear of femaleness.  In Lord of the Rings, predominantly a story about males, the giant and sinister spider Shelob is also female.  She is, however, balanced by the benign characters of Arwen and Galadriel.

In Walt Disney’s "Jungle Book", in the song "Trust in Me", the snake is a wily, untrustworthy character.  We still sometimes use the phrase "snake in the grass", though in fact snakes are probably no more untrustworthy than chaffinches, chinchillas or chimpanzees.  The concepts of conscious deceit and dishonesty probably require higher intelligence than that of snakes, and, strangely enough, these rather unintelligent animals were often associated with knowledge and cunning.  Perhaps this tells us something about some people’s view of intelligence.

Sometimes we associate honesty with words such as "straight" and "upright".  We can be exhorted to "walk tall" and "keep your chin up".  What could be more different from a vertical animal than a creature that lies on the ground and is "bent" or "crooked", words we use to denote dishonesty.  The word "insinuate", coming from the same root as "sinuous" and "sine", also implies deviation from the straight and narrow, like the word "devious".  We refer to some people as "creeping" or "crawling", more pejorative words.  "Low cunning" has the same kind of connotation.  Another negative word is "backsliding".

The word "draconian" derives from the Latin word "draco", a dragon or snake.  Where does this occur in Harry Potter?

Baden-Powell’s book "Scouting for Boys" included pictures of a smoker and a non-smoker.  The non-smoker was a an upright blond youth, chest thrust out, back ramrod straight.  The smoker, cigarette dangling from lower lip, was portrayed as a skinny person with a hollow-chested profile and a curved spine, almost a parody of the S-curve used to portray elegant ladies in Japanese prints.

In "Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone", J K Rowling seems to remain true to the unpopular image of snakes.  Of the four houses in Hogwarts, the one associated with cunning has a name that seems to hint at both "sly" and "slither".  If you haven’t read the book, you can probably guess which animal is the symbol of the house.  And the name of the teacher who apparently dislikes Harry Potter seems to be an amalgam of "snake" and "snipe".  Do snakes appear elsewhere in the Harry Potter books?  If so, in what context?  Are they ever treated as positive symbols in the books?  This is not a criticism of J K Rowling: the books are written by a person for other people, and they reflect some of the biasses of people. That is not to say that all the biasses expressed by some of the characters are those of the author: patently they are not.

Snakes and dragons are sometimes seen as the guardians of treasures, as recently as J R R Tolkiens’ book "The Hobbit", in which the dragon, Smaug, is deprived of the Arkenstone, a great gem, provoking great anger in Smaug, who comes out of the mountain to attack a town.  In "The Lord of the Rings", the name Wormtongue is based on the old use of "worm" for a serpent.  In order to take the Golden Fleece, Jason had to get past a dragon.

On a lighter note, in the game of Snakes and Ladders, it is the snakes that send you sliding backwards towards the start.

On a more positive note, the snake has been seen as a medicinal symbol, for example as Asklepios or Aesculapius.

Finally, the ouroboros must be mentioned.  What is it?  it is a snake with its tale in its mouth, a symbol which occurs in many cultures.

See "Snakes – A Natural History", edited by Roland Bauchot, for much more information on this subject, as well as on the lives of snakes.

Where snakes live

Snakes live between snail and snap, in an English dictionary, and these are surrounded by many other words beginning with "sn".

Let’s make some lists –

snap-dragon   snazzy   snog   snug

snack   snaffle   snap   snap-fastener   snapper   snapping turtle   sneeze   snip   snipe   snood  snooker   snooze   snorkel   snort   snout   snow   snuff   snuffle   snuggle

snag   snaggle-tooth   snap   snare   snarl   snatch   sneak   sneer   snicker   sniff   sniffy   snigger   snipe   snitch   snivel   snook   snoop   snooty   snore   snort   snub

It has been said that words beginning with "sn" tend to have negative connotations.  The three lists attempt to group the words into positive, neutral and negative, respectively.  Do you agree?  Is this significant?  Are these words derived mainly from French or Latin, or from other sources?

Two English land animals have names beginning with sn – snail and snake.  The English could have chosen a French derivation, as they did with many other words, such as squirrel, and called them "escargot" and "serpent".

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