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of the Hesperides (ib. VI., xix. 8). Thetis transformed herself into a snake to escape from Peleus (ib. V., xviii. 5), and the existence of the winged snake is a belief of Greece as well as of Egypt and Arabia. The serpent Pytho guarded the oracle at Delphi and was killed by Apollo, who assumed the oracle (Hyginus, Fabula, cxl.; here original snakeworship is indicated). Hercules strangled two serpents sent against him by Hera, fought the Lernaean Hydra, and was the progenitor by the serpent Echidna of the snake-worshiping Scythians (Herodotus, iv. 9). Cadmus fought and killed a dragon and sowed its teeth, and he and his wife were transformed into serpents. Cecrops, first king of Attica, and Erechtheus of Athens (Iliad, ii. 547) were half serpents, and it is worth noting that Homer (Iliad, xi. 38) gives to Agamemnon the insignium of a three-headed snake.

Several cycles of myths in Babylonia contain allusions to this animal, always hostile to gods and men. In the Gilgamesh epic the hero loses through a hostile serpent the herb which was to renew the youth of the aged; the Etana myth

Ionia and which plucked the wings of the eagle Egypt. that was to carry Etana to heaven; in

' the fragment of the Labbu myth a water serpent is one of the plotters against man; and the animal is brought into relation with the creation myth and chaos, the monster Tiamat appearing in some of the representations to be not the griffin-like beast but a serpent (W. H. Ward, in Bibliotheca Sacra, xxxviii., 1891, 209-253), while Tiamat gave birth to serpents and dragons, terrible and irresistible until Marduk arose as the champion of the gods. Babylonians had the conception of a huge snake which engirdled the world, as well as of another which lay in the depths of the sea and is reflected in Hebrew cosmogony. The origin of the Orontes in Syria has already received mention. In Egypt mere reference is needed to Apophis, the great serpent of the underworld, enemy of Horus, Ra, and Osiris, as well as of the dead, and the personification of evil. Set was the snake which endured forever and punished wicked souls in hell (Budge, ut sup., i. 23-24, ii. 376-377). The text of Unas (fifth dynasty) gives sets of magical formulas by which to overcome the brood of serpents of the underworld (Budge, ut sup., i. 23). A huge snake thirty cubits long was believed to live in the " mountain of the sunrise." The myth of the winged serpent was widely current in Egypt and Arabia (cf. the conception of the feathered serpent of Mexico and Peru). So through the myths of other peoples runs the trail of the serpent. In India the sky snake Vritra or Ahi keeps away the rain that would break the drought, and is slain by the arrows of Indra; Rudra is the destroyer of serpents; Devi assumed this form to carry Vishnu through the deluge. The Scandinavian myth of the Midgard serpent which girdled the earth with its tail in its mouth comes readily to the memory (Prose Edda, 410 sqq.). For the Druid myth of the egg secreted by a writhing mass of snakes see DRUIDS. Among Mexicans the first woman's husband was a great male snake (see above under " Worship").

IV. In Symbolism: In religious art this animal has an important place throughout the world. With its tail in its mouth, sometimes combining the disc, probably uniting two ways of repre-

I. General. senting eternity or endless time, it appears among the most unrelated nations-in Egypt, Persia, India, China, and Mexico, This disc is sometimes interpreted as the solar disc, sometimes as the world-egg, and is often figured, either winged or plain, with the serpent (or two serpents) issuing from it, passing through it or around it, or facing it. The employment of an effigy or representation of the animal to designate a deity or sovereign as sacred is common in both Egypt and India, and Persius (Satire, i. 113) notes that the sign of two serpents indicates a sanctuary. This symbolism is carried out even in the New World, as illustrated by the altars of the Guiana Indians, of the Moquis (among whom the snake signifies lightning, and they incise or paint it on the wands and kilts worn in the snake-dance), of the Natchez, and even of the Indians who inhabited Mexico and Peru at the time of the conquest (Prescott, Works, passim).

No country employed the emblem more consistently and abundantly than Egypt, where it appears in the head-dress or crown or about the person elsewhere of gods and monarchs, ape. Egyptian, parently only to emphasize deity and