Serpent symbolism
The serpent, or snake, is one of the oldest and most widespread mythological symbols. The word is derived from Latin serpens, a crawling animal or snake. Snakes have been associated with some of the oldest rituals known to humankind.
They represent dual expression of good and evil.
The historian of religions Mircea Eliade observed in The Myth of the Eternal Return that "the serpent symbolizes chaos, the formless and nonmanifested".
In The Symbolism of the Cross, Traditionalist René Guénon contended that "the serpent will depict the series of the cycles of universal manifestation", "the indefinitude of universal Existence," and "the being's attachment to the indefinite series of cycles of manifestation."
Recent academic book-length treatments of serpent symbolism include James H. Charlesworth's The Good and Evil Serpent and Charles William Dailey's The Serpent Symbol in Tradition.
Across cultures, the serpent has been revered and feared as a symbol of duality, transformation, and the eternal cycle. In Hindu and Buddhist traditions, serpents appear as nāgas—guardians of treasures and waters—and are linked to kundalini energy, the spiritual force coiled at the base of the spine. In Mesoamerican mythology, the feathered serpent Quetzalcoatl symbolizes renewal, wisdom, and the union of earth and sky. The African Vodun tradition reveres the rainbow serpent Dan as a cosmic balancer, while Aboriginal Australian mythology sees the Rainbow Serpent as a creator being central to Dreamtime stories.
In psychology, Carl Jung interpreted the serpent as an archetype of the unconscious and personal transformation.
The alchemical symbol of the ouroboros—a serpent eating its own tail—represents eternal return, unity of opposites, and the cyclic nature of the cosmos.
These representations reflect the serpent's enduring presence in religious, mystical, and philosophical thought as a symbol of power, rebirth, and the unknown.
Evolutionary origins
The anthropologist Lynne Isbell has argued that, as primates, the serpent as a symbol of death is built into our unconscious minds because of our evolutionary history. Isbell argues that for millions of years snakes were the only significant predators of primates, and that this explains why fear of snakes is one of the most common phobias worldwide and why the symbol of the serpent is so prevalent in world mythology; the serpent is an innate image of danger and death.Furthermore, the psychoanalyst Joseph Lewis Henderson and the ethnologist Maude Oakes have argued that the serpent is a symbol of initiation and rebirth precisely because it is a symbol of death.
Using phylogenetical and statistical methods on related motifs from folklore and myth, French comparativist Julien d'Huy managed to reconstruct a possible archaic narrative about the serpent. In this Paleolithic "ophidian" myth, snakes are connected to rains and storms, and even to water sources. In regards to the latter, it blocks rivers and other water sources in exchange for human sacrifices and/or material good offerings.
Values
Fertility and rebirth
Historically, serpents and snakes represent fertility, health, or a creative life force. As snakes shed their skin through sloughing, they serve as symbols of rebirth, transformation, immortality, and healing. The ouroboros is a symbol of eternity and continual renewal of life.In some Abrahamic traditions, the serpent represents sexual desire. According to some interpretations of the Midrash, the serpent represents sexual passion. In Hinduism, Kundalini is a dormant energy lying like a coiled serpent.
The Hopi people of North America performed an annual snake dance to celebrate the union of Snake Youth and Snake Girl and to renew the fertility of Nature. During the dance, live snakes were handled, and at the end of the dance the snakes were released into the fields to guarantee good crops. "The snake dance is a prayer to the spirits of the clouds, the thunder and the lightning, that the rain may fall on the growing crops." To the Hopi, snakes symbolized the umbilical cord, joining all humans to Mother Earth.
Guardianship
Serpents are represented as potent guardians of temples and other sacred spaces. This connection may be grounded in the observation that when threatened, some snakes frequently hold and defend their ground, first resorting to threatening display and then fighting, rather than retreat. Thus, they are natural guardians of treasures or sacred sites which cannot easily be moved out of harm's way.At Angkor in Cambodia, numerous stone sculptures present hooded multi-headed nāgas as guardians of temples or other premises. A favorite motif of Angkorean sculptors from approximately the 12th century CE onward was that of the Buddha, sitting in the position of meditation, his weight supported by the coils of a multi-headed nāga that also uses its flared hood to shield him from above. This motif recalls the story of the Buddha and the serpent king Mucalinda: as the Buddha sat beneath a tree engrossed in meditation, Mucalinda came up from the roots of the tree to shield the Buddha from a tempest that was just beginning to arise.
The Gadsden flag of the American Revolution depicts a rattlesnake coiled up and poised to strike. Below the image of the snake is the legend, "Don't tread on me." The snake symbolized the dangerousness of colonists willing to fight for their rights and homeland, and was also symbolic of their separation from Europe, as it was an animal unique to America. The motif is repeated in the First Navy Jack of the US Navy.
Venom and medicine
Serpents are connected with venom and medicine. The snake's venom is associated with the chemicals of plants and fungi that have the power to either heal or provide expanded consciousness through divine intoxication. Because of its herbal knowledge and entheogenic association, the snake was often considered one of the wisest animals, being divine. Its divine aspect combined with its habitat in the earth between the roots of plants made it an animal with chthonic properties connected to the afterlife and immortality. The deified Greek physician Asclepius, as god of medicine and healing, carried a staff with one serpent wrapped around it, which has become the symbol of modern medicine. Moses also had a replica of a serpent on a pole, the Nehushtan, mentioned in Numbers 21:8.Associated animals
Chthonic serpents and sacred trees
In many myths, the chthonic serpent lives in or is coiled around a Tree of Life situated in a divine garden. In the Genesis story of the Torah and biblical Old Testament, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is situated in the Garden of Eden together with the tree of life and the serpent. In Greek mythology, Ladon coiled around the tree in the garden of the Hesperides protecting the golden apples.Similarly Níðhöggr, the dragon of Norse mythology, eats from the roots of the Yggdrasil, the World Tree.
Under yet another tree, the Buddha sat in ecstatic meditation. When a storm arose, the mighty serpent king Mucalinda rose up from his place beneath the earth and enveloped the Buddha in seven coils for seven days, so as not to break his ecstatic state.
The Vision Serpent was a symbol of rebirth in Maya mythology, with origins going back to earlier Maya conceptions, lying at the center of the world as the Mayans conceived it. "It is in the center axis atop the World Tree. Essentially the World Tree and the Vision Serpent, representing the king, created the center axis which communicates between the spiritual and the earthly worlds or planes. It is through ritual that the king could bring the center axis into existence in the temples and create a doorway to the spiritual world, and with it power."
Sometimes the Tree of Life is represented by a staff such as those used by shamans. Examples of such staffs featuring coiled snakes in mythology are the caduceus of Hermes, the Rod of Asclepius, the Staff of Moses, and the papyrus reeds and deity poles entwined by a single serpent Wadjet, dating to earlier than. The oldest known representation of two snakes entwined around a rod is that of the Sumerian fertility god Ningizzida, who was sometimes depicted as a serpent with a human head, eventually becoming a god of healing and magic. It is the companion of Dumuzi, with whom it stood at the gate of heaven. In the Louvre, there is a famous green steatite vase carved for King Gudea of Lagash with an inscription dedicated to Ningizzida. Ningizzida was the ancestor of Gilgamesh, who, according to the epic, dived to the bottom of the waters to retrieve the plant of life. But while he rested from his labor, a serpent came and ate the plant. The snake became immortal, and Gilgamesh was destined to die.
File:Ningizzida.jpg|thumb|left|The Sumerian deity, Ningizzida, is accompanied by two gryphons Mushussu; it is the oldest known image of two snakes coiling around an axial rod, dating from before.
Ningizzida has been popularized in the 20th century by Raku Kei, where "Nin Giz Zida" is believed to be a fire serpent of Tibetan rather than Sumerian origin. "Nin Giz Zida" is another name for the ancient Hindu concept Kundalini, a Sanskrit word meaning either "coiled up" or "coiling like a snake". "Kundalini" refers to the mothering intelligence behind yogic awakening and spiritual maturation leading to altered states of consciousness. There are a number of other translations of the term, usually emphasizing a more serpentine nature to the word—e.g. "serpent power". It has been suggested by Joseph Campbell that the symbol of snakes coiled around a staff is an ancient representation of Kundalini physiology. The staff represents the spinal column, with the snake being energy channels. In the case of two coiled snakes, they usually cross each other seven times, a possible reference to the seven energy centers called chakras.
In Ancient Egypt, where the earliest written cultural records exist, the serpent appears from the beginning to the end of their mythology. Ra and Atum became the same god, Atum, the "counter-Ra", associated with earth animals, including the serpent: Nehebkau was the two-headed serpent deity who guarded the entrance to the underworld. He is often seen as the son of the snake goddess Renenutet. She often was confused with their primal snake goddess Wadjet, the Egyptian cobra, who from the earliest of records was the patron and protector of the country, all other deities, and the pharaohs. Hers is the first known oracle. She was depicted as the crown of Egypt, entwined around the staff of papyrus and the pole that indicated the status of all other deities, as well as having the all-seeing eye of wisdom and vengeance. She never lost her position in the Egyptian pantheon.
The image of the serpent as the embodiment of the wisdom transmitted by Sophia was an emblem used by gnosticism, especially those sects that the more orthodox characterized as "Ophites". The chthonic serpent was one of the earth-animals associated with the cult of Mithras. The basilisk, the venomous "king of serpents" with the glance that kills, was hatched by a serpent, Pliny the Elder and others thought, from the egg of a cock.
Outside Eurasia, in Yoruba mythology, Oshunmare was another mythic regenerating serpent.
The Rainbow Serpent is a major mythological being for Aboriginal people across Australia, although the creation myths associated with it are best known from northern Australia. In Fiji, Ratumaibulu was a serpent god who ruled the underworld and made fruit trees bloom. In the Northern Flinders Ranges reigns the Arkaroo, a serpent who drank Lake Frome empty, refuges into the mountains, carving valleys and waterholes, earthquakes through snoring.