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The Serpent as Ultimate Good

The
snake was associated with the Goddess of the Mediterranean who
flourished around 4500 years Before the Present [BP}.  Images of her
and her priestesses were found in the ruins of Mycenae on Crete, and
Thera (today known as Santorini.)

In Kerala state in India, the goddess Manasha is still
worshipped.  The cobra is sacred to her, and during a week-long
festival every year, cobras are captured, kept to be fed with milk in her
honour and then released.

The
cobra with spread hood appears as part of the uraeus, a golden band
worn around the brow by Egyptian kings and queens as a sign of blessing
upon the throne of the Pharoah.

Even after the Greek Ptolemies (including Cleopatra) acquired
that throne as a result of Roman political expedience, they kept the
ancient 2-snake emblem.

This
winged naga
represents the life goddess, Buto or Uazet
[Wadjet].

She appears with her sister, goddess of the afterlife, on either side
of the sun disc.  With Nekhebet, more often
depicted in her form as Vulture Goddess, the two form the Ur-Uatchti.  This emblem of Horus'  victory over Set,
the Adversary and Trickster god, appears as an amulet on
temples.

In the Tu'at or Underworld, one of the 4 deities associated with the
11th sector or "hour," is Nebt-khu. Snakes come forth daily from
her feet and she lives upon their voices.

Creator-Sustainer

Enki (lord of stormy waters) lived with his mother, Nammu (lady
of abzu or sweet underground waters,) in a cave in Sumer, ancient
Mesopotamia.  He was transformed into a flying serpent; that is, a
dragon.  Kingu is another Mesopotamian dragon-figure whose
body was sacrificed by Marduk to form creation as a punishment for having
fought on the side of Tiamat, the primeval chaos/mother also a
serpentine being.

The Romans brought from Syria, a goddess (Dea Syria) whom they called
Artagatis.  She is depicted as a woman in her 60's at
attention, immobile as a tree, with a python balanced on its tail twined
once around her, its head at her heart looking at her face.

Rainbow and Cosmic Serpents

In north Africa, a cosmic serpent named Minia is honoured.
Her head is the sky and her tail is in the waters that are believed to lie
under the earth.  The Fon and Bantu peoples further to the south,
believe that Mawu-Lisa formed the earth, and a creative power
called Da Ayido Hwedo flows like a snake through creation.
This serpent has held the earth together since that time.

In Central Africa, Chinawezi, the Rainbow King plays a similar
role.  He is reminiscent of the cosmic serpent known as Shesha
or Ananta [Endless] upon whose coils the Hindu creator, Vishnu,
rests between cycles of creation. Olokun, ruler of the sea is
a central African naga king who once
attempted to conquer the earth by means of the Great Flood.

The serpent also plays an important role as the creator of
humankind.  The Ashanti of Africa tell how the Creator Python
come from the heavens and settled in the river.  A couple from the
heavens and a couple from the earth were introduced to each other, but
neither pair could have children until the python sprayed them with water
from his mouth, saying "Kus, Kus."  This is what made them fertile,
and able to populate the earth.

In Mexico, it was believed that Quetzalcoatl, the feathered
serpent, was one of the four gods to create humanity. With his twin,
Xolotl, he went to the underworld to collect the bones of a man and woman
who had died in earlier, unsuccessful creations.  As he tried to
escape the wrath of the Lord of the Underworld, he dropped some of the
bones, shattering them.   The Earth Goddess ground them up with
some of Quetzalcoatl's own blood which restored them, and imbued them with
life.

In the Popul Vuh, the creation myth of the Quiche Maya (in
Guatemala,) there also appear twin serpents with green feathers, male and
female, called Xpiyacoc and Xmucane.

The feathered, plumed or flying serpent unifies qualities of heaven
with those of the earth.  Indigenous people of Australia honour
Almudj, the Rainbow Snake a.k.a. Warnayarra whose body parts
are the features of the land.

In fact, in many places the rainbow is thought of as a multi-coloured
or brilliantly plumed serpent.  It is this serpent that appears in
conjunction with life-giving rain; the dry land comes alive with colour
and the promise of plants for food.

The Pitjantjatjara and Yankunytjatjara peoples of Central Australia
tell about Kuniya (Woman Carpet-python) whose story appears on
Uluru [Ayers Rock].  Her myth exemplifies the Dreamtime or, Tjukurpa,
cosmogony.

Immortality

The snake seems to be able to come back to life.  It lies dull and
immobile for long periods, and then in a period of an hour or so, sloughs
off its dry old skin to emerge from its hiding place shining with an
opalescent gleam.  The Greek word geras [cf. geriatrics]
denotes the cast-off skin.

Since the old skin may be sloughed off in one piece like an inside-out
discarded glove, it can seem as if the old form has been left
behind.  This has been seen as evidence of the possibility of rebirth
for other creatures, too.

Barbara Walker (The
Woman's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets) points out that in
Melanesia, the expression that is used to refer to the Christian concept
of  eternal life is "to slough one's skin." The Chinese image
used to symbolize eternal life is an old man exchanging his skin for a new
one.

In Italian there is the phrase "older than a serpent."

Sexuality

The Pelasgian Great Goddess, Euronyme, danced with the Wind to produce
Ophion who mated with Her to produce the World Egg.

In the South-west of North America, the pregnant belly of the earth is
thought by aboriginal people to be the site called Great Serpent
Mound.

The serpent is associated with sexuality only partly because of its
obvious resemblance to the male organ of reproduction. Classical mythology
recounts how the Tiresias, the prophet who had predicted the
misfortunes of the family of Oedipus (who killed his father and went on,
unknowingly to marry his mother, Jocasta,) was himself a victim of the
god's capriciousness.

Entwined Serpents

As a young man, Tiresias was going through the woods one day when he
happened upon two snakes winding around each other in the process of
copulating.  He was startled and blindly struck both of them with his
walking stick and instantaneously, he was transformed into a woman.
He experienced life as a female for the next 7 years.

In the 8th year, he came upon the two serpents once again.  This
time without emotion, he struck them intentionally.  And was returned
to his former state.  However, he soon annoyed the Queen of Heaven,
Juno [Gr.: Hera], by revealing to her husband Jove [Zeus] the fact that
women derive more pleasure from the sexual act than men.  He was
cursed with blindness for the rest of his days.

The
actions of Tiresias are preserved in the form of the caduceus that
Hermes [Latin:  Mercury] carries as he leads the dead to the
Underworld.   There are the two snakes twined around the moving
staff.  It is not surprising to find that this emblem also depicts
twin channels that wind up through the chakras of the psychophysical
body with the spine the central rod that terminates in the spherical
head.

On the 3-sided blade of a Tibetan Buddhist phurba [pron. p'urba]
that is sometimes referred to as a spirit nail, we again see the
pair of interwined snakes.

Harmonia, wife of Cadmus (who slew the dragon of Ares and founded the
city of Thebes) received as a wedding gift  from Aphrodite, a
special necklace.  This Golden Necklace was in the form of an
amphisbaina -- a two- headed serpent  with open mouths
clasping in their jaws a golden eagle, whose wings were  decorated in
yellow jasper and moonstone.  Over many generations, the necklace
(with an accompanying robe) was the source of terrible conflict.

At Echmiadzin, the religious center of the Armenian Apostolic
Church, there is a priest's staff decorated the heads of two serpents or
dragons.  There is also a type of Armenian carpet called
vishapagor which depicts one or more serpents, or makes use of a
serpent motif. ~ Anahit:Visit Armenia (formerly at
OneWorld.com)

Outside certain Hindu temples, mainly in south India, small sculptures
in various forms of serpents are set up at the foot of sacred trees.
Many of these snake stones depict the familiar braided form of two
copulating snakes which has come down to us as the emblem of the medical
profession.  These rupas [images] are offered in gratitude by
couples whose wish for children, especially sons, has been granted by the
deities to whom the snake is a sacred animal.

Alchemy and the Snake

The serpent has long been associated with the practice of alchemy, an
ancient specialization of European and Asian scholars.  The objective
was to discover a way to transmute base metals into gold, and to find the
fabled elixir of immortality.  Many contemporary researchers feel
that the procedures described in alchemical texts were actually coded
references to spiritual practices, rather than a form of elementary
chemistry.

The endless serpent is
one important image found in these alchemy books.  It first
appeared on a page in Kleopatra's book of 10th century CE.  In the
space bounded by the snake holding its tail in its mouth was inscribed,
"One is the All, and by it, the All, and in it, the All, and if it does
not contain the All, then it is Nothing."

This image, called the Ourobouros, appears also in the Codex
Marciannus [Mark's  reference is to alchemical procedures such as
distillation, condensation, 'sublimation' and transformation.

Kekule [1829-1896], the German chemist, had a lucid dream about
Ourobouros (while riding on a bus, it is said) that has often been
referred to as the most "brilliant piece of  prediction" in all
organic chemistry.  It  revealed to him the long-sought carbon
ring structure of the benzene molecule.

The endless serpent signifies that all matter is basically
interchangeable, and that forms are not absolute.  In fact, we have
in the Ourobouros the symbol for what is known in Buddhist philosophy as
shunyata [Sanskrit] or Emptiness.

The Codex explains that Ourobouros:

in its ensemble it is devoured, melted, dissolved and transformed by
the process of putrefaction [decay]. It becomes a deep green, and the
colour gold is derived from it.  [Then] is derived the red called
the colours of cinnabar.

. . . its head is deep green.  Its four feet are the tetrasomei
[4 base metals:  copper, iron, lead and tin.]  Its 3 ears are
the sublime vapours:  sulphur, mercury, orpiment.

The One furnishes the Other in blood; the One gives birth to the
Other.  Nature rejoices in nature; nature triumphs over Nature . .
.  .

. . . my dear friend, apply thy intelligence to these matters, and
thou wilt not fall into error; but work seriously and without
negligence, until thou hast seen the end of the Process . . .  .

A serpent is stretched, guarding this temple, and he who has subdued
it commences by sacrificing it, then roasts it, and after removing its
flesh from its bones, make of it a step to the entrance of the
temple.  Mount upon it and thou shalt find the object sought.
For the priest becomes at first a man of silver, a few days later, thou
wilt find him changed into a man of gold.

The student of
tantric yoga will surely recognize these references ~ alchemy is not
solely about transforming what is outside us.

Two for the Price of One!

The serpent is the ancient sign for the metal mercury, and is the
oldest of alchemical symbols.  It, like the ancient Mesopotamian
serpentine goddess Tiamat, stands for the prima materia out of which all
else is made, for so the earliest chemists believed. As late as the
18th century, in an alchemical treatise called Figurum Aegyptorium
Secretarum, the substance mercury was depicted as an "hermaphrodite"
that is the substance out of which all else was made and which, over time,
becomes a stone.  Since it is metal, yet liquid; cold yet fiery;
poisonous yet used for its medicinal qualities, it unites the opposites --
it is Ourobouros.  In other words, in alchemy the endless snake is
mercury which embodies the essential two-in-one nature of all
existence.

Reflections on the worthiness of the snake, despite "dissenting from
the serpent as deity:" comments on Marianne
Moore's 1927 article in The Dial.

The Mysterious Dragon

Don't forget Nagas

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[ Serpents,
Part I ]

[ The Bear ]
[ Cattle:  Cow, Bull & Calf ]
[ Deer ]
[ Dog ]
[ Elephant ]
[ Goat & Sheep ]
[ Hare & Rabbit ]
[ Horse ]
[ Lion ]
[ Monkey ]
[ Pig, Sow & Boar ]
[ Rhinoceros ]
[ Serpent ]
[ Birds ]
[ Tortoise ]
[ Fish ]

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