The Good and Evil Serpent (43 page)

In the fifth century
BCE
, Europe was torn by massive invasions. In that century, the Celts settled in Gaul, near the Rhine, and eventually reached Britain. This period provides us with one final example of the serpent (or dragon) as the source of misfortune and danger. When Julius Caesar invaded Britain, the ruling person was Cassibellawn. He had succeeded Lud (Lludd) who founded “London.” This Lud lived when Britain was plagued by a shriek that occurred each evening in May. It caused men to lose their courage and strength, women their children, and young persons their minds. It is said that animals, trees, and earth were rendered barren. Lud’s brother, Llevelys (the king of France), explained to him that the shriek was caused by the Red Dragon of Britain because it was being attacked by the White Dragon of the Saxons. Lud succeeds in subduing both dragons.
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Two bronze serpent-shaped clothing clasps, dating from circa 550
BCE
, have been discovered. They belonged to the Celts, who left no written records, and were found in a grave unearthed southwest of Hohenasperb by Ludwigsburg. It was excavated in the 1970s.
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The serpent-shaped clasps are, in fact, brooches that were found on the chest of a prince, or some distinguished person, who received a wagon-burial.
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The gold serpent brooches were deliberately broken at the time of burial, which was a typical ritualistic custom in wagon-burials. The golden serpent brooches indicate the high status and social rank of the forty-year-old male who was buried. Serpents signified and symbolized the exceptional social rank of the deceased. Perhaps he was a “Great Man,” in sociological terms, and one who through hero worship was deemed a demigod. Thus, serpents sometimes did not signify a religious meaning; they denoted the aristocratic status of a person.

What Other Ways Were Snakes Used Symbolically?

From the vicinity of, or perhaps in, Württemberg was unearthed the bronze attachment to a horse’s bit; it dates from the preor early-Roman Period. The bit is shaped in the form of an Omega with two serpent heads.
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It is interesting to compare this bit with the Etruscan and Scythian pieces already examined. Two bronze belts with three gold serpents, two still attached, have been recovered; they date from the first or second century
CE
.
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Clothing clasps are made, sometimes ornately,
³⁹⁵
in the form of a serpent.

Sometimes two serpents, at each end of a coiled clasp, look in different directions, in a Janus-like pose; other times they face in the same direction.
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On the right side of the majestic Roman grave monument of L. Poblicius, as one faces it, is a magnificent portrait of Pan. Behind him is a tree around which is wrapped a large serpent, in an iconographic motif virtually identical to that which symbolizes the tree and serpent in the Garden of Eden. The whole monument is impressively displayed to the public in the Römisch-Germanisches Museum in Cologne.
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As the toga signaled that the wearer was a Roman citizen, so costly and well-crafted jewelry signified that the bearer, usually a woman, was one of the elite and was to be accorded the requisite honor and respect. Our historical imaginations of what the Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans looked like, especially in public and in official dress, are guided by frescoes, sculptures, mummies, and written descriptions.
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Earlier we focused on the gold bracelets found in Pompeii and elsewhere; now we can explore how serpent iconography and symbology revealed one’s high status. Elegant gold bracelets were discovered beside the skeleton of a woman who was felled by the volcanic eruption of Vesuvius in 79
CE
. She was found with something cherished beside her: two intricately crafted gold bracelets; perhaps she had chosen these as prized possessions to take with her into the frightful and fateful night.
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Each bracelet or armband ends with a serpent’s mouth; it is uniquely open and the teeth are exposed. Each serpent’s eye is also highlighted.

Most likely she customarily wore one of the gold serpents on each arm. They would have accorded her status. Perhaps the serpent jewelry would have been her only proof of status later, if she had succeeded in escaping the inferno. Serpent-shaped jewelry, especially a ring or a bracelet, was often worn by the upper classes in Greek and Roman times.

Silver serpent rings were also found in Pompeii dating from the early or middle decades of the first century
CE
.
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A less elaborate serpent ring was found, for example, in Backworth in Northumberland, and refined serpent jewelry was found at Llandovery. All are from the Roman Period, and not far in date from the composition of the Gospel of John.
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The third-century
CE
Roman bath in Kreuznach contains a mosaic of the ocean. In it there is a large dragon-serpent. Serpents often appear in mosaics depicting the world of the gods.

Did Some Deities Lack Serpent Iconography?

Not all Greek, Roman, Etruscan, and Celtic gods are associated with the serpent or shown anatomically with serpent features. For example, I have failed to find a depiction of Venus with a serpent. Beginning with the end of the second century
BCE
, there were twelve gods in Rome.
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According to a distich attributed to Ennius (second cent.
BCE
), they are the following: Juno, Vesta, Minerva, Ceres, Diana, Venus, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Neptune, Vulcan, and Apollo.
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Many of these, but not all of them, as we have seen, were associated with serpents or were creatively portrayed in anguine form. For example, allegedly from the Diana Temple in Ephesus comes a bronze figure. Diana’s deer is shown with a lamb about to suckle from her. Coiled around the neck of the sheep is a serpent with a triangular head (see
Fig. 81
).
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Again, while there is abundant evidence that the serpent symbolized something good in ancient culture, one needs to examine all the evidence and seek to be balanced. The serpent also represented a negative symbol. Aelian, for example, records the folklore that assumes a serpent originates from the spine of a wicked man when dead (
Nat. an.
I.51).
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Were Venomous Snakes Milked in Antiquity?

The information assembled draws attention to the suggestion by Farnell that the data frequently reveal “the bias of mystic symbolism towards theriomorphism”
⁴⁰⁶
—that is, becoming like a god. Since the god or goddess was conceived to be in the form of an animal, often a serpent, the votary, seeking to be one with the deity, either emotionally or entirely, sought to be one with the god imagined or experienced. As the god or goddess became a serpent, so the devotee became the god, or sought to become one with the god. As one became one with Bacchus by becoming intoxicated, so one became one with Asclepius by descending into the subterranean chambers in which live snakes would be “bosom companions.”

Yet the search for the meaning and symbolism of the serpent in the first century is not yet complete. Were snakes milked in antiquity for their venom? And, if so, how was the venom used? Venomous snakes were indeed milked in antiquity, as they are today. The ancients obtained the serum necessary to heal various diseases and to provide an antidote to a venomous snake bite.

In
De natura animalium
, Aelian reports the legends about the so-called purple snake of India. It has no fangs, but can be deadly when it “vomits,” even causing entire limbs to putrify (4.36). When the extract from such a snake is properly selected and prepared, it prolongs the lives of many for up to two years (4.36).
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Flavius Philostratus (c. 170#x2013;c. 248
CE
) in his
Life of Apollonius
, which was composed about 220
CE
, describes how physicians learned from Asclepius. This son of Apollo taught them to extract venom from serpents in order to cure many diseases. Note the following section:

And who [he said] can deprive the art of divination of the credit for discovering serums which heal the bites of venomous creatures and in particular of using the venom itself as a cure for many diseases? For I do not think that humans without the assistance of prophetic wisdom would ever have ventured to mix with medicines that save life these most deadly venoms.
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This insightful account surely represents what many people, from the highly educated to the rustic peasant, believed and experienced during the first century
CE
. There is no reason to doubt that the members of the Johannine community knew about the use of venom to heal diseases. This insight adds another significant dimension to the mythology and ideology that surrounded the symbol of the serpent in antiquity. It is imperative that the exegesis of the New Testament be informed by such discoveries and insights.

SANCHUNIATHON: THE HOLIEST BEING IS THE SERPENT

Philo of Byblos, who wrote at the end of the first century or the beginning of the second century
CE
, claims to translate from a work by a certain Sanchuniathon. This author may have been a historical person or he may be only a creation of Philo of Byblos.
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For us the issue is not relevant. What is important is his symbolism and his ideology. Philo of Byblos wrote a long work devoted to snakes or serpents.
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It is a major source to study as we seek to comprehend the culture in which the symbolism of the Fourth Gospel was fashioned.
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Reference is made to the “divine nature of the serpent and snakes; this animal is ‘fiery and the most filled with breath of all crawling things.’ The creature has matchless swiftness by means of its breath [
sic
].”
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Note how important for an understanding of serpent symbolism the following excerpt from Philo of Byblos is (814.23#x2013; 815.13):

The nature there of the snake
and of serpents
, Taautos himself regarded as divine, and after him, again, the Phoenicians and Egyptians [did so]. For he presented the animal as that of all the reptiles which contained most spirit and as being [of the nature] of fire. Besides which he also attributes to it unsurpassable swiftness on account of the spirit, since it lacks feet and arms or any other limbs by means of which the other animals move…. And it is most long lived, for it not only sheds its old skin and becomes young but also it is increased [by the process] and becomes bigger. And when it has filled out the established measure [of age] it consumes itself, just as Taautos himself described in the sacred writings. Therefore, too, this animal is taken into the temples and mysteries. It has been discussed by us more fully in the treatise entitled Ethothion, in which it is established that the snake is immortal
and that it is resolved into itself as was said above. For the nature of this animal is such that it does not die unless it is struck by some violent force. The Phoenicians call it Agathos Daimon.
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