{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_39015/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_39015","id":"gutenberg_39015","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/39015","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Archaeology & Anthropology","Category: History - Religious","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Phallicism","Serpent worship"],"text":"Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at\nhttps://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images\ngenerously made available by The Internet Archive.)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nOPHIOLATREIA, OR SERPENT WORSHIP.\n\n\n\n\n  OPHIOLATREIA:\n\n  AN ACCOUNT OF\n\n  THE RITES AND MYSTERIES CONNECTED WITH\n  THE ORIGIN, RISE, AND DEVELOPMENT\n\n  OF\n\n  Serpent Worship\n\n  IN VARIOUS PARTS OF THE WORLD,\n\n  ENRICHED WITH INTERESTING TRADITIONS,\n\n  AND A FULL DESCRIPTION OF THE CELEBRATED\n\n  Serpent Mounds & Temples,\n\n  THE WHOLE FORMING AN EXPOSITION OF ONE\n  OF THE PHASES OF\n\n  PHALLIC, OR SEX WORSHIP.\n\n\n  PRIVATELY PRINTED.\n  1889.\n\n\n\n\n_PREFACE._\n\n\n_Our words by way of preface and introduction need be but few. The\nfollowing volume forms a companion to one already issued bearing the title\n\"Phallism.\" That work, though complete in itself, meets in this a further\nelucidation of its subject, since, in the opinion of many, Ophiolatreia,\nthe worship of the Serpent, is of Phallic origin. Such a view, and others\nof a contrary nature, have been honestly set forth, and the best and most\ntrustworthy authorities have been consulted for history, arguments, and\nillustrations by which they may be understood. No attempt has been made to\ninsist upon any one method of interpretation as undoubtedly correct, but\nsimple facts have been stated, and the reader has been left to form his\nown independent judgment._\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS.\n\n\n                                                                     PAGE.\n\n  CHAPTER I.                                                             1\n\n  Ophiolatreia an extraordinary subject--Of mysterious origin--\n  Of universal prevalence--The Serpent, a common symbol in\n  mythology--Serpent Worship, natural but irrational--Bacchic\n  orgies--Olympias, mother of Alexander, and the Serpent Emblem--\n  Thermuthis, the sacred Serpent--Asps--Saturn and his children--\n  Sacrifices at altar of Saturn--Abaddon--Ritual of Zoroaster--\n  Vulcan--Theology of Ophion--The Cuthites--The Ophiogeneis--The\n  Ophionians--Greek Traditions--Cecrops--Various Serpent\n  worshippers.\n\n  CHAPTER II.                                                           10\n\n  Supposed Phallic Origin of Serpent Worship--The idea of life--\n  Adoration of the principle of generation--The Serpent as a\n  symbol of the Phallus--Phallic Worship at Benares--The Serpent\n  and Mahadeo--Festival of the \"Nag panchami\"--Snakes and Women--\n  Traces of Phallic Worship in the Kumaon Rock Markings--The\n  Northern Bulb-stones--Professor Stephens on the Snake as a\n  Symbol of the Phallus--The \"Dionysiak Myth\"--Brown on the\n  Serpent as a Phallic Emblem--Mythology of the Aryan Nations--\n  Sir G. W. Cox and the Phallic theory--Athenian Mythology.\n\n  CHAPTER III.                                                          17\n\n  Mythology of the Ancients--Characteristics of the Pagan Deities--\n  Doctrine of the Reciprocal Principles of Nature--Creation and the\n  Egg--Creation and the Phallus--The Lotus--Osiris as the active,\n  dispensing, and originating energy--Hesiod and the generative\n  powers--Growth of Phallic Worship.\n\n  CHAPTER IV.                                                           21\n\n  Ancient Monuments of the West--The valley of the Mississippi--\n  Numerous earth-works of the Western States--Theories as to the\n  origin of the mounds--\"The Defence\" Theory--The Religious\n  Theory--Earth-work of the \"Great Serpent\" on Bush Creek--The\n  \"Alligator,\" Ohio--The \"Cross,\" Pickaway County--Structures of\n  Wisconsin--Mr. Pigeon's drawings--Significance of earth-mounds--\n  The Egg and Man's primitive ideas--The Egg as a symbol--Birth of\n  Brahma--Aristophanes and his \"Comedy of the Birds\"--The hymn to\n  Protogones--The Chinese and Creation--The Mundane or Orphic\n  Egg--Kneph--Mr. Gliddon's replies to certain inquiries--The\n  Orphic Theogony and the Egg--The Great Unity.\n\n  CHAPTER V.                                                            38\n\n  The Sun and Fire as emblems--The Serpent and the Sun--Taut and the\n  Serpent--Horapollo and the Serpent Symbol--Sanchoniathon and the\n  Serpent--Ancient Mysteries of Osiris, &c.--Rationale of the\n  connection of Solar, Phallic, and Serpent Worship--The Aztec\n  Pantheon--Mexican Gods--The Snake in Mexican Theology--The Great\n  Father and Mother--Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Serpent--Researches\n  of Stephens and Catherwood--Discoveries of Mr. Stephens.\n\n  CHAPTER VI.                                                           60\n\n  Mexican Temple of Montezuma--The Serpent emblem in Mexico--Pyramid\n  of Cholula--Tradition of the giants of Auahuac--The temple of\n  Quetzalcoatl--North American Indians and the Rattlesnake--Indian\n  Tradition of a Great Serpent--Serpents in the Mounds of the West--\n  Bigotry and folly of the Spanish Conquerors of the West--Wide\n  prevalence of Mexican Ophiolatreia.\n\n  CHAPTER VII.                                                          77\n\n  Egypt as the home of Serpent Worship--Thoth said to be the\n  founder of Ophiolatreia--Cneph the architect of the universe--\n  Mysteries of Isis--The Isiac table--Frequency of the Serpent\n  symbol--Serapis--In the temples at Luxore, etc.--Discovery at\n  Malta--The Egyptian Basilisk--Mummies--Bracelets--The Caduceus--\n  Temple of Cneph at Elephantina--Thebes--Story of a priest--\n  Painting in a tomb at Biban at Malook--Pococke at Raigny.\n\n  CHAPTER VIII.                                                         84\n\n  Derivation of the name \"Europe\"--Greece colonized by Ophites--\n  Numerous traces of the Serpent in Greece--Worship of Bacchus--\n  Story of Ericthonias--Banquet of the Bacchantes--Minerva--Armour\n  of Agamemnon--Serpents at Epidaurus--Story of the pestilence in\n  Rome--Delphi--Mahomet at Atmeidan.\n\n  CHAPTER IX.                                                           89\n\n  Ophiolatreia in Britain--The Druids--Adders--Poem of Taliessin--\n  The goddess Ceridwen--A Bardic poem--Snake stones--The anguinum--\n  Execution of a Roman Knight--Remains of the serpent temple at\n  Abury--Serpent vestiges in Ireland of great rarity--St. Patrick.\n\n  CHAPTER X.                                                            94\n\n  India conspicuous in the history of Serpent Worship--Nagpur--\n  Confessions of a snake worshipper--The gardeners of Guzerat--\n  Cottages for snakes at Calicut--The Feast of the Serpents--The\n  deity Hari--Garuda--The snake as an emblem of immortality.\n\n  CHAPTER XI.                                                           99\n\n  Mr. Bullock's exhibition of objects illustrating Serpent Worship.\n\n\n\n\nOPHIOLATREIA.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I.\n\n    _Ophiolatreia an extraordinary subject--Of mysterious origin--Of\n    universal prevalence--The Serpent a common symbol in\n    mythology--Serpent-worship natural but irrational--Bacchic\n    orgies--Olympias, mother of Alexander, and the Serpent\n    emblem--Thermuthis, the Sacred Serpent--Asps--Saturn and his\n    children--Sacrifices at altar of Saturn--Abaddon--Ritual of\n    Zoroaster--Theologo of Ophion--The Cuthites--The Ophiogeneis--The\n    Ophionians--Greek Traditions--Cecrops--Various Serpent worshippers._\n\n\nOphiolatreia, the worship of the serpent, next to the adoration of the\nphallus, is one of the most remarkable, and, at first sight, unaccountable\nforms of religion the world has ever known. Until the true source from\nwhence it sprang can be reached and understood, its nature will remain as\nmysterious as its universality, for what man could see in an object so\nrepulsive and forbidding in its habits as this reptile, to render worship\nto, is one of the most difficult of problems to find a solution to. There\nis hardly a country of the ancient world, however, where it cannot be\ntraced, pervading every known system of mythology, and leaving proofs of\nits existence and extent in the shape of monuments, temples, and\nearthworks of the most elaborate and curious character. Babylon, Persia,\nHindostan, Ceylon, China, Japan, Burmah, Java, Arabia, Syria, Asia Minor,\nEgypt, Ethiopia, Greece, Italy, Northern and Western Europe, Mexico, Peru,\nAmerica--all yield abundant testimony to the same effect, and point to the\ncommon origin of Pagan systems wherever found. Whether the worship was the\nresult of fear or respect is a question that naturally enough presents\nitself, and in seeking to answer it we shall be confronted with the fact\nthat in some places, as Egypt, the symbol was that of a good demon, while\nin India, Scandinavia, and Mexico, it was that of an evil one. It has been\nremarked that in the warmer regions of the globe, where this creature is\nthe most formidable enemy which man can encounter, the serpent should be\nconsidered the mythological attendant of an evil being is not surprising,\nbut that in the frozen or temperate regions of the earth, where he\ndwindles into the insignificance of a reptile without power to create\nalarm, he should be regarded in the same appalling character, is a fact\nwhich cannot be accounted for by natural causes. Uniformity of tradition\ncan alone satisfactorily explain uniformity of superstition, where local\ncircumstances are so discordant.\n\n\"The serpent is the symbol which most generally enters into the mythology\nof the world. It may in different countries admit among its\nfellow-satellites of Satan the most venomous or the most terrible of the\nanimals in each country, but it preserves its own constancy, as the only\ninvariable object of superstitious terror throughout the habitable world.\n'Wherever the Devil reigned,' remarks Stillingfleet, 'the serpent was held\nin some peculiar veneration.' The universality of this singular and\nirrational, yet natural, superstition it is now proposed to show.\n_Irrational_, for there is nothing in common between deity and a reptile,\nto suggest the notion of Serpent-worship; and _natural_, because, allowing\nthe truth of the events in Paradise, every probability is in favour of\nsuch a superstition springing up.\"[1]\n\nIt may seem extraordinary that the worship of the serpent should ever have\nbeen introduced into the world, and it must appear still more remarkable\nthat it should almost universally have prevailed. As mankind are said to\nhave been ruined through the influence of this being, we could little\nexpect that it would, of all other objects, have been adopted as the most\nsacred and salutary symbol, and rendered the chief object of adoration.\nYet so we find it to have been, for in most of the ancient rites there is\nsome allusion to it. In the orgies of Bacchus, the persons who took part\nin the ceremonies used to carry serpents in their hands, and with horrid\nscreams call upon \"Eva, Eva.\" They were often crowned with serpents while\nstill making the same frantic exclamation. One part of the mysterious\nrites of Jupiter Sabazius was to let a snake slip down the bosom of the\nperson to be initiated, which was taken out below. These ceremonies, and\nthis symbolic worship, are said to have begun among the Magi, who were the\nsons of Chus, and by them they were propagated in various parts.\nEpiphanius thinks that the invocation \"Eva, Eva,\" related to the great\nmother of mankind, who was deceived by the serpent, and Clemens of\nAlexandria is of the same opinion. Others, however, think that Eva was\nthe same as Eph, Epha, Opha, which the Greeks rendered Ophis, and by it\ndenoted a serpent. Clemens acknowledges that the term Eva, properly\naspirated, had such a signification.\n\nOlympias, the mother of Alexander, was very fond of these orgies, in which\nthe serpent was introduced. Plutarch mentions that rites of this sort were\npractised by the Edonian women near Mount Haemus in Thrace, and carried on\nto a degree of madness. Olympias copied them closely in all their frantic\nmanoeuvres. She used to be followed with many attendants, who had each a\nthyrsus with serpents twined round it. They had also snakes in their hair,\nand in the chaplets which they wore, so that they made a most fearful\nappearance. Their cries also were very shocking, and the whole was\nattended with a continual repetition of the words, Evoe, Saboe, Hues\nAttes, Attes Hues, which were titles of the god Dionusus. He was\npeculiarly named Hues, and his priests were the Hyades and Hyautes. He was\nlikewise styled Evas.\n\nIn Egypt was a serpent named Thermuthis, which was looked upon as very\nsacred; and the natives are said to have made use of it as a royal tiara,\nwith which they ornamented the statues of Isis. We learn from Diodorus\nSiculus that the kings of Egypt wore high bonnets, which terminated in a\nround ball, and the whole was surrounded with figures of asps. The\npriests, likewise, upon their bonnets had the representation of serpents.\nThe ancients had a notion that when Saturn devoured his own children, his\nwife Ops deceived him by substituting a large stone in lieu of one of his\nsons, which stone was called Abadir. But Ops and Opis, represented here as\na feminine, was the serpent deity, and Abadir is the same personage under\na different denomination. Abadir seems to be a variation of Ob-Adur, and\nsignifies the serpent god Orus. One of these stones, which Saturn was\nsupposed to have swallowed instead of a child, stood, according to\nPausanias, at Delphi. It was esteemed very sacred, and used to have\nlibations of wine poured upon it daily; and upon festivals was otherwise\nhonoured. The purport of the above was probably this: it was for a long\ntime a custom to offer children at the altar of Saturn; but in process of\ntime they removed it, and in its room erected a stone pillar, before which\nthey made their vows, and offered sacrifices of another nature. This stone\nwhich they thus substituted was called Ab-Adar, from the deity represented\nby it. The term Ab generally signifies a father, but in this instance it\ncertainly relates to a serpent, which was indifferently styled Ab, Aub,\nand Ob. Some regard Abadon, or, as it is mentioned in the Book of the\nRevelation, Abaddon, to have been the name of the same Ophite god, with\nwhose worship the world had been so long infected. He is termed Abaddon,\nthe angel of the bottomless pit--the prince of darkness. In another place\nhe is described as the dragon, that old serpent, which is the devil, and\nSatan. Hence the learned Heinsius is supposed to be right in the opinion\nwhich he has given upon this passage, when he makes Abaddon the same as\nthe serpent Pytho.\n\nIt is said that in the ritual of Zoroaster the great expanse of the\nheavens, and even nature itself, was described under the symbol of a\nserpent.[2] The like was mentioned in the Octateuch of Ostanes; and\nmoreover, in Persia and in other parts of the East they erected temples to\nthe serpent tribe, and held festivals to their honour, esteeming them _the\nsupreme of all Gods, and the superintendents of the whole world_. The\nworship began among the people of Chaldea. They built the city Opis upon\nthe Tigris, and were greatly addicted to divination and to the worship of\nthe serpent. From Chaldea the worship passed into Egypt, where the serpent\ndeity was called Canoph, Caneph, and C'neph. It had also the name of Ob,\nor Oub, and was the same as the Basilicus, or Royal Serpent; the same also\nas the Thermuthis, and in like manner was made use of by way of ornament\nto the statues of their Gods. The chief Deity of Egypt is said to have\nbeen Vulcan, who was also styled Opas, as we learn from Cicero. He was the\nsame as Osiris, the Sun; and hence was often called Ob-El, or Pytho Sol;\nand there were pillars sacred to him, with curious hieroglyphical\ninscriptions, which had the same name. They were very lofty, and narrow in\ncomparison of their length; hence among the Greeks, who copied from the\nEgyptians, everything gradually tapering to a point was styled Obelos, and\nObeliscus. Ophel (Oph-El) was a name of the same purport, and many sacred\nmounds, or Tapha, were thus denominated from the serpent Deity, to whom\nthey were sacred.\n\nSanchoniathon makes mention of a history which he once wrote upon the\nworship of the serpent. The title of this work, according to Eusebius, was\nEthothion, or Ethothia. Another treatise upon the same subject was written\nby Pherecydes Tyrus, which was probably a copy of the former; for he is\nsaid to have composed it from some previous accounts of the Phoenicians.\nThe title of his book was the Theology of Ophion, styled Ophioneus, and\nhis worshippers were called Ophionidae. Thoth and Athoth were certainly\ntitles of the Deity in the Gentile world; and the book of Sanchoniathon\nmight very possibly have been from hence named Ethothion, or more truly,\nAthothion. But, from the subject upon which it was written, as well as\nfrom the treatise of Pherecydes, we have reason to think that Athothion,\nor Ethothion, was a mistake for Ath-Ophion, a title which more immediately\nrelated to that worship of which the writer treated. Ath was a sacred\ntitle, as we have shewn, and we imagine that this dissertation did not\nbarely relate to the serpentine Deity, but contained accounts of his\nvotaries, the Ophitae, the principal of which were the sons of Chus. The\nworship of the serpent began among them, and they were from thence\ndenominated Ethiopians, and Aithopians, which the Greeks rendered\nAithiopes. They did not receive this name from their complexion, as has\nsometimes been surmised, for the branch of Phut and the Luhim, were\nprobably of a deeper dye; but they were most likely so called from\nAth-Ope, and Ath-Opis, the God which they worshipped. This may be shewn\nfrom Pliny. He says that the country Ethiopia (and consequently the\npeople), had the name of AEthiop, from a personage who was a Deity--_ab\nAEthiope Vulcani filio_. The AEthiopes brought these rites into Greece, and\ncalled the island where they first established them Ellopia, _Solis\nSerpentis insula_. It was the same as Euboea, a name of the like\npurport, in which island was a region named Ethiopium. Euboea is\nproperly Oub-Aia, and signifies, the Serpent Island. The same worship\nprevailed among the Hyperboreans, as we may judge from the names of the\nsacred women who used to come annually to Delos; they were priestesses of\nthe Tauric Goddess. Hercules was esteemed the chief God, the same as\nChronus, and was said to have produced the Mundane egg. He was represented\nin the Orphic theology under the mixed symbol of a lion and a serpent, and\nsometimes of a serpent only.\n\nThe Cuthites, under the title of Heliadae, having settled at Rhodes, as\nthey were Hivites, or Ophites, the island was in consequence named\nOphiusa. There was likewise a tradition that it had once swarmed with\nserpents. (Bochart says the island is said to have been named Rhodus from\n_Rhad_, a Syriac word for a serpent.) The like notion prevailed almost in\nevery place where they settled. They came under the more general titles\nof Leleges and Pelasgi; but more particularly of Elopians, Europians,\nOropians, Asopians, Inopians, Ophionians, and AEthiopes, as appears from\nthe names which they bequeathed; and in most places where they resided\nthere were handed down traditions which alluded to their original title of\nOphites. In Phrygia, and upon the Hellespont, whither they sent out\ncolonies very early, was a people styled the Ophiogeneis, or the serpent\nbreed, who were said to retain an affinity and correspondence with\nserpents; and a notion prevailed that some hero, who had conducted them,\nwas changed from a serpent to a man. In Colchis was a river Ophis, and\nthere was another of the same name in Arcadia. It was so named from a body\nof people who settled upon its banks, and were said to have been conducted\nby a serpent.\n\nIt is said these reptiles are seldom found in islands, but that Tenos, one\nof the Cyclades, was supposed to have once swarmed with them.[3]\n\nThucydides mentions a people of AEtotia, called Ophionians; and the temple\nof Apollo at Petara, in Lycia, seems to have had its first institution\nfrom a priestess of the same name. The island of Cyprus was called\nOphiusa, and Ophiodes, from the serpents with which it was supposed to\nhave abounded. Of what species they were is nowhere mentioned, excepting\nonly that about Paphos there was said to have been a kind of serpent with\ntwo legs. By this is meant the Ophite race, who came from Egypt, and from\nSyria, and got footing in this island. They settled also in Crete, where\nthey increased greatly in numbers; so that Minos was said by an unseemly\nallegory, _opheis ouresai, serpentes, minxisse_. The island Seriphus was\none vast rock, by the Romans called _saxum seriphium_, and made use of as\na large kind of prison for banished persons. It is represented as having\nonce abounded with serpents, and it is styled by Virgil, _serpentifera_,\nas the passage is corrected by Scaliger.\n\nIt is said by the Greeks that Medusa's head was brought by Perseus; by\nthis is meant the serpent Deity, whose worship was here introduced by\npeople called Peresians. Medusa's head denoted divine wisdom, and the\nisland was sacred to the serpent, as is apparent from its name. The\nAthenians were esteemed _Serpentiginae_, and they had a tradition that the\nchief guardian of their Acropolis was a serpent.\n\nIt is reported of the goddess Ceres that she placed a dragon for a\nguardian to her temple at Eleusis, and appointed another to attend upon\nErectheus. AEgeus of Athens, according to Androtion, was of the serpent\nbreed, and the first king of the country is said to have been a dragon.\nOthers make Cecrops the first who reigned. He is said to have been of a\ntwo-fold nature, being formed with the body of a man blended with that of\na serpent. Diodorus says that this was a circumstance deemed by the\nAthenians inexplicable; yet he labours to explain it by representing\nCecrops as half a man and half a brute, because he had been of two\ndifferent communities. Eustathius likewise tries to solve it nearly upon\nthe same principles, and with the like success. Some have said of Cecrops\nthat he underwent a metamorphosis, being changed from a serpent to a man.\nBy this was meant, according to Eustathius, that Cecrops by coming into\nHellas divested himself of all the rudeness and barbarity of his country,\nand became more civilised and human. This is declared by some to be too\nhigh a compliment to be paid to Greece in its infant state, and detracts\ngreatly from the character of the Egyptians. The learned Marsham therefore\nanimadverts with great justice, \"it is more probable that he introduced\ninto Greece the urbanity of his own country, than that he was beholden to\nGreece for anything from thence.\" In respect to the mixed character of\nthis personage, we may easily account for it. Cecrops was certainly a\ntitle of the Deity, who was worshipped under this emblem. Something of the\nlike nature was mentioned of Triptolemus and Ericthonius, and the like has\nbeen said of Hercules. The natives of Thebes in Boeotia, like the\nAthenians, esteemed themselves of the serpent race. The Lacedaemonians\nlikewise referred themselves to the same original. Their city is said of\nold to have swarmed with serpents. The same is said of the city Amyelae in\nItaly, which was of Spartan origin. They came hither in such abundance\nthat it was abandoned by the inhabitants. Argos was infested in the same\nmanner till Apis came from Egypt and settled in that city. He was a\nprophet, the reputed son of Apollo, and a person of great skill and\nsagacity, and to him they attributed the blessing of having their country\nfreed from this evil. Thus the Argives gave the credit to this imaginary\npersonage of clearing their land of this grievance, but the brood came\nfrom the very quarter from whence Apis was supposed to have arrived. They\nwere certainly Hivites from Egypt, and the same story is told of that\ncountry. It is represented as having been of old over-run with serpents,\nand almost depopulated through their numbers. Diodorus Siculus seems to\nunderstand this literally, but a region that was annually overflowed, and\nthat too for so long a season, could not well be liable to such a\ncalamity. They were serpents of another nature with which it was thus\ninfested, and the history relates to the Cuthites, the original Ophitae,\nwho for a long time possessed that country. They passed from Egypt to\nSyria, and to the Euphrates, and mention is made of a particular breed of\nserpents upon that river, which were harmless to the natives but fatal to\nanybody else. This can hardly be taken literally; for whatever may be the\nwisdom of the serpent it cannot be sufficient to make these distinctions.\nThese serpents were of the same nature as the birds of Diomedes, and the\ndogs in the temple of Vulcan; and the histories relate to Ophite priests,\nwho used to spare their own people and sacrifice strangers, a custom which\nprevailed at one time in most parts of the world. The Cuthite priests are\nsaid to have been very learned; and, as they were Ophites, whoever had the\nadvantage of their information was said to have been instructed by\nserpents.\n\nAs the worship of the serpent was of old so prevalent, many places, as\nwell as people, from thence received their names. Those who settled in\nCampania were called Opici, which some would have changed to Ophici,\nbecause they were denominated from serpents. They are in reality both\nnames of the same purport, and denote the origin of the people.\n\nWe meet with places called Opis, Ophis, Ophitaea, Ophionia, Ophioessa,\nOphiodes, and Ophiusa. This last was an ancient name by which, according\nto Stephanus, the islands Rhodes, Cynthus, Besbicus, Tenos, and the whole\ncontinent of Africa, were distinguished. There were also cities so called.\nAdd to these places denominated Oboth, Obona, and reversed, Onoba, from\nOb, which was of the same purport.\n\nClemens Alexandrinus says that the term Eva signified a serpent if\npronounced with a proper aspirate, and Epiphanius says the same thing. We\nfind that there were places of this name. There was a city Eva in Arcadia,\nand another in Macedonia. There was also a mountain Eva, or Evan, taken\nnotice of by Pausanias, between which and Ithome lay the city Messene. He\nmentions also an Eva in Argolis, and speaks of it as a large town. Another\nname for a serpent, which we have not yet noticed, was Patan, or Pitan.\nMany places in different parts were denominated from this term. Among\nothers was a city in Laconia, and another in Mysia, which Stephanus styles\na city of AEolia. They were undoubtedly so named from the worship of the\nserpent, Pitan, and had probably Dracontia, which were figures and devices\nrelative to the religion which prevailed. Ovid mentions the latter city,\nand has some allusions to its ancient history when he describes Medea as\nflying through the air from Athea to Colchis. The city was situate upon\nthe ruin Eva, or Evan, which the Greeks rendered Evenus. According to\nStrabo it is compounded of Eva-Ain, the fountain or river of Eva the\nserpent.\n\nIt is remarkable that the Opici, who are said to have been named from\nserpents, had also the name of Pitanatae; at least, one part of that family\nwas so called. Pitanatae is a term of the same purport as Opici, and\nrelates to the votaries of Pitan, the serpent Deity, which was adored by\nthat people. Menelaus was of old called Pitanates, as we learn from\nHesychius, and the reason of it may be known from his being a Spartan, by\nwhich he was intimated one of the Serpentigenae, or Ophites. Hence he was\nrepresented with a serpent for a device upon his shield. It is said that a\nbrigade, or portion of infantry, was among some of the Greeks named\nPitanates, and the soldiers in consequence of it must have been termed\nPitanatae, undoubtedly, because they had the Pitan, or serpent, for their\nstandard. Analogous to this, among other nations there were soldiers\ncalled Draconarii. In most countries the military standard was an emblem\nof the Deity there worshipped.\n\nWhat has already been said has thrown some light upon the history of this\nprimitive idolatry, and we have shewn that wherever any of these Ophite\ncolonies settled, they left behind from their rites and institutions, as\nwell as from the names which they bequeathed to places, ample memorials,\nby which they may be clearly traced out.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II.\n\n    _Supposed Phallic origin of Serpent-worship--The Idea of\n    Life--Adoration of the Principle of Generation--The Serpent as a\n    Symbol of the Phallus--Phallic Worship at Benares--The Serpent and\n    Mahadeo--Festival of the \"Nag panchami\"--Snakes and Women--Traces of\n    Phallic Worship in the Kumaon Rock-markings--The Northern Bulb\n    Stones--Professor Stephens on the Snake as a Symbol of the\n    Phallus--The \"Dionysiak Myth\"--Brown on the Serpent as a Phallic\n    emblem--Mythology of the Aryan Nation--Sir G. W. Cox and the Phallic\n    Theory--Athenian Mythology._\n\n\nSome persons are disposed to attribute to the Serpent, as a religious\nemblem, an origin decidedly phallic. Mr. C. S. Wake takes a contrary view,\nand says:--\"So far as I can make out the serpent symbol has not a direct\nPhallic reference, nor is its attribute of wisdom the most essential. The\nidea most intimately associated with this animal was that of life, not\npresent merely, but continued, and probably everlasting. Thus the snake\n_Bai_ was figured as Guardian of the doorways of the Egyptian Tombs which\nrepresented the mansions of heaven. A sacred serpent would seem to have\nbeen kept in all the Egyptian temples, and we are told that many of the\nsubjects, in the tombs of the kings at Thebes in particular, show the\nimportance it was thought to enjoy in a future state. Crowns, formed of\nthe Asp or sacred _Thermuthis_, were given to sovereigns and divinities,\nparticularly to Isis, and these no doubt were intended to symbolise\neternal life. Isis was a goddess of life and healing and the serpent\nevidently belonged to her in that character, seeing that it was the symbol\nalso of other deities with the like attributes. Thus, on papyri it\nencircles the figure of Harpocrates, who was identified with AEsculapius;\nwhile not only was a great serpent kept alive in the great temple of\nSerapis, but on later monuments this god is represented by a great serpent\nwith or without a human head. Mr. Fergusson, in accordance with his\npeculiar theory as to the origin of serpent worship, thinks this\nsuperstition characterised the old Turanaian (or rather let us say\nAkkadian) empire of Chaldea, while tree-worship was more a characteristic\nof the later Assyrian Empire. This opinion is no doubt correct, and it\nmeans really that the older race had that form of faith with which the\nserpent was always indirectly connected--adoration of the male principle\nof generation, the principal phase of which was probably ancestor worship,\nwhile the latter race adored the female principle, symbolised by the\nsacred tree, the Assyrian 'grove.' The 'tree of life,' however,\nundoubtedly had reference to the male element, and we may well imagine\nthat originally the fruit alone was treated as symbolical of the opposite\nelement.\"\n\nMr. J. H. Rivett-Carnac, in his paper printed in the journal of the\nAsiatic Society of Bengal, entitled \"The Snake Symbol in India,\" suggests\nthat the serpent is a symbol of the phallus. He says:--\"The serpent\nappears on the prehistoric cromlechs and menhirs of Europe, on which I\nbelieve the remains of phallic worship may be traced. What little\nattention I have been able to give to the serpent-symbol has been chiefly\nin its connection with the worship of Mahadeo or Siva, with a view to\nascertain whether the worship of the snake and that of Mahadeo or the\nphallus may be considered identical, and whether the presence of the\nserpent on the prehistoric remains of Europe can be shown to support my\ntheory, that the markings on the cromlechs and menhirs are indeed the\ntraces of this form of worship, carried to Europe from the East by the\ntribes whose remains are buried beneath the tumuli.\n\nDuring my visits to Benares, the chief centre of Siva worship in India, I\nhave always carefully searched for the snake-symbol. On the most ordinary\nclass of \"Mahadeo,\" a rough stone placed on end supposed to represent the\nphallus, the serpent is not generally seen. But in the temples and in the\nbetter class of shrines which abound in the city and neighbourhood the\nsnake is generally found encircling the phallus. The tail of the snake is\nsometimes carried down the _Yoni_, and in one case I found two snakes on a\nshrine thus depicted.\n\nIn the Benares bazaar I once came across a splendid metal cobra, the head\nerect and hood expanded, so made as to be placed around or above a stone\nor metal \"Mahadeo.\" It is now in England. The attitude of the cobra when\nexcited and the expansion of the head will suggest the reason for this\nsnake representing Mahadeo and the phallus.\n\nAlthough the presence of the snake in these models cannot be said to prove\nmuch, and although from the easy adaptability of its form the snake must\nalways have been a favourite subject in ornament, still it will be seen\nthat the serpent is prominent in connection with the conventional shape\nunder which Mahadeo is worshipped at Benares and elsewhere, that it\nsometimes takes the place of the Linga, and that it is to be found\nentwined with almost every article connected with this worship.\"\n\nFurther on the same writer says:--\"The Nag panchami or fifth day of the\nmoon in Sawan is a great fete in the city of Nagpur, and more than usual\nlicense is indulged in on that day. Rough pictures of snakes in all sorts\nof shapes and positions are sold and distributed, something after the\nmanner of valentines. I cannot find any copies of these queer sketches,\nand if I could they would hardly be fit to be reproduced. Mr. J. W. Neill,\nthe present Commissioner of Nagpur, was good enough to send me some\nsuperior valentines of this class, and I submit them now for the\ninspection of the Society. It will be seen that in these paintings, some\nof which are not without merit either as to design or execution, no human\nfigures are introduced. In the ones I have seen in days gone by the\npositions of the women with the snakes were of the most indecent\ndescription and left no doubt that, so far as the idea represented in\nthese sketches was concerned, the cobra was regarded as the phallus. In\nthe pictures now sent the snakes will be seen represented in congress in\nthe well-known form of the Caduceus Esculapian rod. Then the many-headed\nsnake, drinking from the jewelled cup, takes me back to some of the\nsymbols of the mysteries of bygone days. The snake twisted round the tree\nand the second snake approaching it are suggestive of the temptation and\nfall. But I am not unmindful of the pitfalls from which Wilford suffered,\nand I quite see that it is not impossible that this picture may be held to\nbe not strictly Hindu in its treatment. Still the tree and the serpent are\non the brass models which accompany this paper, and which I have already\nshewn are to be purchased in the Benares Brass Bazaar of to-day--many\nhundreds of miles away from Nagpur where these Valentines were drawn.\n\nIn my paper on the Kumaon Rock Markings, besides noting the resemblance\nbetween the cup markings of India and Europe, I hazarded the theory that\nthe concentric circles and certain curious markings of what some have\ncalled the \"jew's harp\" type, so common in Europe, are traces of Phallic\nworship carried there by tribes whose hosts decended into India, pushed\nforward into the remotest corners of Europe, and, as their traces seem to\nsuggest, found their way on to the American Continent too. Whether the\nmarkings really ever were intended to represent the Phallus and the Yoni\nmust always remain a matter of opinion. But I have no reason to be\ndissatisfied with the reception with which this, to many somewhat pleasant\ntheory, has met in some of the Antiquarian Societies of Europe.\n\nNo one who compares the stone Yonis of Benares, sent herewith, with the\nengravings on the first page of the work on the Rock Markings of\nNorthumberland and Argyleshire, published privately by the Duke of\nNorthumberland, will deny that there is an extraordinary resemblance\nbetween the conventional symbol of Siva worship of to-day and the ancient\nmarkings on the rocks, menhirs and cromlechs of Northumberland, of\nScotland, of Brittany, of Scandinavia and other parts of Europe.\n\nAnd a further examination of the forms of the cromlechs and tumuli and\nmenhirs will suggest that the tumuli themselves were intended to indicate\nthe symbols of the Mahadeo and Yoni, conceived in no obscene sense, but as\nrepresenting regeneration, the new life, \"life out of death, life\neverlasting,\" which those buried in the tumuli, facing towards the sun in\nits meridian, were expected to enjoy in the hereafter. Professor Stephens,\nthe well-known Scandinavian Antiquary, writing to me recently, speaks of\nthe symbols as follows:--\"The pieces (papers) you were so good as to send\nme were very valuable and welcome. There can be no doubt that it is to\nIndia we have to look for the solution of many of our difficult\narchaeological questions.\"\n\n\"But especially interesting is your paper on the Ancient\nRock-Sculpturings. I believe that you are quite right in your views. Nay,\nI go further. I think that the northern Bulb-stones are explained by the\nsame combination. I therefore send you the Swedish Archaeological Journal\nfor 1876, containing Baron Herculius' excellent dissertation on these\nobject.... You can examine the many excellent woodcuts. I look upon these\nthings as late conventionalized abridgments of the Linga and Yoni, life\nout of death, life everlasting--thus a fitting ornament for the graves of\nthe departed.\"\n\nThe author further says:--\"Many who indignantly repudiate the idea of the\nprevalence of Phallic Worship among our remote ancestors hold that these\nsymbols represent the snake or the sun. But admitting this, may not the\nsnake, after all, have been but a symbol of the phallus? And the sun, the\ninvigorating power of nature, has ever, I believe, been considered to\nrepresent the same idea, not necessarily obscene, but the great mystery of\nnature, the life transmitted from generation to generation, or, as\nProfessor Stephen puts it, 'life out of death, life everlasting.'\" The\nsame idea, in fact, which, apart from any obscene conception, causes the\nrude Mahadeo and Yoni to be worshipped daily by hundreds of thousands of\nHindus.\n\nBrown, in his \"Great Dionysiak Myth,\" says:--\"The Serpent has six\nprincipal points of connection with Dionysos: 1.--As a symbol of, and\nconnected with, wisdom. 2.--As a solar emblem. 3.--As a symbol of time and\neternity. 4.--As an emblem of the earth, life. 5.--As connected with\nfertilizing moisture. 6.--As a phallic emblem.\"\n\nReferring to the last of these, he proceeds--\"The serpent being connected\nwith the sun, the earth life and fertility must needs be also a phallic\nemblem, and so appropriate to the cult of Dionysos Priapos. Mr. Cox after\na review of the subject, observes, 'Finally, the symbol of the Phallus\nsuggested the form of the serpent, which thus became the emblem of life\nand healing. There then we have the key to that tree and serpent worship\nwhich has given rise to much ingenious speculation.' The myth of the\nserpent and the tree is not, I apprehend, exhausted by any merely phallic\nexplanation, but the phallic element is certainly one of the most\nprominent features in it, as it might be thought any inspection of the\ncarvings connected with the Topes of Sanchi and Amravati would show. It is\nhard to believe, with Mr. Fergusson, that the usefulness and beauty of\ntrees gained them the payment of divine honours. Again, the Asherah or\nGrove-cult (Exod. 34, 13; 1 Kings 17, 16; Jer. 17, 2; Micah 5, 14) was\nessentially Phallic, Asherah being the Upright. It seems also to have been\nin some degree connected with that famous relic, the brazen serpent of\nNehushtan (2 Kings 18, 4). Donaldson considers that the Serpent is the\nemblem of desire. It has also been suggested that the creature symbolised\nsensation generally.\"\n\nThe Sir G. W. Cox referred to above, in his \"Mythology of Argai Nations,\"\nsays:--\"If there is one point more certain than another it is that\nwherever tree and serpent worship has been found, the cultus of the\nPhallos and the Ship, of the Linga and Yoni, in connection with the\nworship of the sun, has been found also. It is impossible to dispute the\nfact, and no explanation can be accepted for one part of the cultus which\nfails to explain the other. It is unnecessary, therefore, to analyze\ntheories which profess to see in it the worship of the creeping brute or\nthe wide-spreading tree. A religion based on the worship of the venomous\nreptile must have been a religion of terror; in the earliest glimpses\nwhich we have of it, the serpent is a symbol of life and of love. Nor is\nthe Phallic cultus in any respect a cultus of the full-grown and branching\ntree. In its earliest form the symbol is everywhere a mere stauros, or\npole; and although this stock or rod budded in the shape of the thyrsus\nand the shepherd's staff, yet, even in its latest developements, the\nworship is confined to small bushes and shrubs and diminutive plants of a\nparticular kind. Nor is it possible again to dispute the fact that every\nnation, at some stage or other of its history, has attached to this cultus\nprecisely that meaning which the Brahman now attaches to the Linga and the\nYoni. That the Jews clung to it in this special sense with vehement\ntenacity is the bitter complaint of the prophets; and the crucified\nserpent adored for its healing powers stood untouched in the Temple until\nit was removed and destroyed by Hezekiah. This worship of serpents, \"void\nof reason,\" condemned in the Wisdom of Solomon, probably survived even the\nBabylonish captivity. Certainly it was adopted by the Christians who were\nknown as Ophites, Gnostics, and Nicolaitans. In Athenian mythology the\nserpent and the tree are singularly prominent. Kekrops, Erechtheus, and\nErichthonios, are each and all serpentine in the lower portion of their\nbodies. The sacred snake of Athene had its abode in the Akropolis, and her\nolive trees secured for her the victory in her rivalry with Poseidon. The\nhealth-giving serpent lay at the feet of Asklepios and snakes were fed in\nhis temple at Epidauros and elsewhere. That the ideas of mere terror and\ndeath suggested by the venomous or the crushing reptile could never have\ngiven way thus completely before those of life, healing, and safety, is\nobvious enough; and the latter ideas alone are associated with the serpent\nas the object of adoration. The deadly beast always was, and has always\nremained, the object of the horror and loathing which is expressed for\nAhi, the choking and throttling snake, the Vritra whom Indra smites with\nhis unerring lance, the dreadful Azidahaka of the Avesta, the Zohak or\nBiter of modern Persian mythology, the serpents whom Heraktes strangles in\nhis cradle, the Python, or Fafnir, or Grendel, or Sphinx whom Phoibos, or\nSigurd, or Beowulf, or Oidipous smite and slay. That the worship of the\nSerpent has nothing to do with these evil beasts is abundantly clear from\nall the Phallic monuments of the East or West. In the topes of Sanchi and\nAmravati the disks which represent the Yoni predominate in every part of\nthe design; the emblem is worn with unmistakeable distinctness by every\nfemale figure, carved within these disks, while above the multitude are\nseen, on many of the disks, a group of women with their hands resting on\nthe linga, which they uphold. It may, indeed, be possible to trace out the\nassociation which connects the Linga with the bull in Sivaison, as\ndenoting more particularly the male power, while the serpent in Jainaison\nand Vishnavism is found with the female emblem, the Yoni. So again in\nEgypt, some may discern in the bull Apis or Mnevis the predominance of the\nmale idea in that country, while in Assyria or Palestine the Serpent or\nAgathos Daimon is connected with the altar of Baal.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III.\n\n    _Mythology of the Ancients--Characteristics of the Pagan\n    Deities--Doctrine of the Reciprocal Principles of Nature--Creation of\n    the Egg--Creation and the Phallus--The Lotus--Osiris as the active,\n    dispensing, and originating energy--Hesiod and the generative\n    powers--Growth of Phallic Worship._\n\n\n\"By comparing all the varied legends of the East and West in conjunction,\"\nsays a learned author, \"we obtain the following outline of the mythology\nof the Ancients: It recognises, as the primary elements of things, two\nindependent principles of the nature of Male and Female; and these, in\nmystic union, as the soul and body, constitute the Great Hermaphrodite\nDeity, THE ONE, the universe itself, consisting still of the two separate\nelements of its composition, modified though combined in one individual,\nof which all things are regarded but as parts.... If we investigate the\nPantheons of the ancient nations, we shall find that each, notwithstanding\nthe variety of names, acknowledged the same deities and the same system of\ntheology; and, however humble any of the deities may appear, each who has\nany claim to antiquity will be found ultimately, if not immediately,\nresolvable into one or other of the Primeval Principles, the Great God and\nGoddess of the Gentiles.\"[4]\n\n\"We must not be surprised,\" says Sir William Jones, \"at finding, on a\nclose examination, that the characters of all the Pagan deities, male and\nfemale, melt into each other, and at last into one or two, for it seems a\nwell-founded opinion that the whole crowd of gods and goddesses in ancient\nRome and modern Varanes mean only the Powers of Nature, and principally\nthose of the Sun, expressed in a variety of ways and by a multitude of\nfanciful names.\"\n\nThe doctrine of the Reciprocal Principles of Nature, designated as active\nand passive, male and female, and often symbolized as the Sun and Moon, or\nthe Sun and the Earth, was distinctly recognised in the mythological\nsystems of America. It will be well to notice the _rationale_ of this\ndoctrine, and some of the more striking forms which, in the developement\nof human ideas, it has assumed; for it may safely be claimed that under\nsome of its aspects or modifications it has entered into every religious\nsystem, if, indeed, it has not been the nucleus of every mythology.\n\nThe idea of a creation, suggested by the existence of things, was, no\ndoubt, the first result of human reasoning. The mode of the event, the\nmanner in which it was brought about, was, it is equally unquestionable,\nthe inquiry which next occupied the mind, and man deduced from the\noperations of nature around him his first theory of creation. From the\negg, after incubation, he saw emerging the living bird, a phenomenon\nwhich, to his simple apprehension, was nothing less than an actual\ncreation. How naturally then, how almost of necessity, did that\nphenomenon, one of the most obvious in nature, associate itself with his\nideas of creation--a creation which he could not help recognising, but\nwhich he could not explain. The extent to which the egg, received as a\nsymbol, entered into the early cosmogonies will appear in another and more\nappropriate connection.\n\nBy a similar process did the creative power come to be symbolized under\nthe form of the Phallus, in it was recognised the cause of reproduction,\nor, as it appeared to the primitive man, of creation. So the Egyptians, in\ntheir refinement upon this idea, adopted the scarabaeus as a symbol of the\nFirst Cause, the great hermaphrodite Unity, for the reason that they\nbelieved that insect to be both male and female, capable of self-inception\nand singular production, and possessed of the power of vitalizing its own\nwork.\n\nIt is well known that the Nymphoe, Lotus, or Water-Lily is held sacred\nthroughout the East, and the various sects of that quarter of the globe\nrepresent their deities, either decorated with its flowers, holding it as\na sceptre, or seated on a lotus throne or pedestal. \"It is,\" says Maurice,\n\"the sublime and hallowed symbol that perpetually occurs in oriental\nmythology, and not without substantial reason; for it is itself a lovely\nprodigy, and contains a treasure of physical instruction.\" The reason of\nits adoption as a symbol is explained by Mr. Payne Knight, and affords a\nbeautiful illustration of the _rationale_ of symbolism, and of the\nprofound significance often hidden beneath apparently insignificant\nemblems. \"This plant,\" observes Mr. Knight, \"grows in the water, and\namongst its broad leaves puts forth a flower, in the centre of which is\nformed its seed vessel, shaped like a bell or inverted cone, and punctured\non the top with little cavities or cells, in which the seeds grow. The\norifice of these cells being too small to let the seeds drop out when\nripe, they shoot forth into new plants in the places where they are\nformed; the bulb of the vessel serving as a matrix to nourish them until\nlarge enough to burst it open and release themselves, after which, like\nother aquatic plants, they take root wherever the current deposits them.\nThe plant, therefore, being thus productive of itself, and vegetating from\nits own matrix, without being fostered in the earth, was naturally adopted\nas a symbol of the productive power of waters upon which the active Spirit\nof the Creator acted in giving life and vegetation to matter. We\naccordingly find it employed in every part of the northern hemisphere\nwhere the symbolical religion, improperly called idolatry, existed.\"\n\nExamples quoted illustrate the inductive powers by which unaided reason\narrives at its results, as well as the means by which it indicates them in\nthe absence of a written language or of one capable of conveying abstract\nideas. The mythological symbols of all early nations furnish ample\nevidence that it was thus they embodied or shadowed forth their\nconceptions,--the germ of a symbolic system, which was afterwards extended\nto every manifestation of nature and every attribute of Divinity.\n\nWe may in this manner rationally and satisfactorily account for the origin\nof the doctrine of the reciprocal principles. Its universal acceptance\nestablishes that it was deduced from the operations of that law so\nobviously governing all animated nature--that of reproduction or\nprocreation.\n\nIn the Egyptian mythology, the Divine Osiris was venerated as the active,\ndispensing, or originating energy, and was symbolized as the Sun; Isis as\nterrene nature, the passive recipient, the producer; their annual\noffspring was Horus, the vernal season or infant year. The poet Hesiod, in\nthe beginning of his Theogony, distinguishes the male and female, or\ngenerative and productive powers of Nature, as Ouranus and Gaia, Heaven\nand Earth. The celestial emblems of these powers were usually, as we have\nsaid, the Sun and Moon; the terrestrial, Fire and Earth. They were\ndesigned as Father and Mother; and their more obvious symbols, as has\nalready been intimated, were the Phallus and Kteis, or the Lingham and\nYoni of Hindustan.\n\nThat the worship of the phallus passed from India or from Ethiopia into\nEgypt, from Egypt into Asia Minor, and into Greece, is not so much a\nmatter of astonishment,--these nations communicated with each other; but\nthat this worship existed in countries a long time unknown to the rest of\nthe world--in many parts of America, with which the people of the Eastern\nContinent had formerly no communication--is an astonishing but well\nattested fact. When Mexico was discovered, there was found in the city of\nPanuco, the particular worship of the Phallus well established, its image\nwas adorned in the temples; there were in the public places bas reliefs,\nwhich like those of India, represented in various manners the union of the\ntwo sexes. At Tlascalla, another city of Mexico, they revered the act of\ngeneration under the united symbols of the characteristic organs of the\ntwo sexes. Garcilasso de la Vega says--\"that according to Blas Valera, the\nGod of Luxury was called Tiazolteuli,\" but some writers say, \"this is a\nmistake.\" One of the goddesses of the Mexican Pantheon was named\nTiazolteotl, which Boturini describes as Venus unchaste, low, and\nabominable, the hieroglyphic of these men and women who are wholly\nabandoned, mingling promiscuously one with another, gratifying their\nbestial appetites like animals. Boturini is said to be not entirely\ncorrect in his apprehensions of the character of this goddess. She is\nCinteotl, the goddess of Maize, under another aspect. Certain of the\ntemples of India abound with sculptured representations of the symbols of\nPhallic Worship, and if we turn to the temples of Central America, which\nin many respects exhibit a strict correspondence with those of India, we\nfind precisely the same symbols, separate and in combination.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV.\n\n    _Ancient Monuments of the West--The Valley of the Mississippi--Numerous\n    Earthworks of the Western States--Theory as to origin of the\n    mounds--The \"Defence\" Theory--The Religious Theory--Earthwork of the\n    \"Great Serpent\" on Bush Creek--The \"Alligator,\" Ohio--The \"Cross,\"\n    Pickaway County--Structures of Wisconsin--Mr. Pigeons Drawings--\n    Significance of the Earth-mounds--The Egg and Man's Primitive\n    Ideas--The Egg as a Symbol--Birth of Brahma--Aristophanes and his\n    \"Comedy of the Birds\"--The Hymn to Protogones--The Chinese and\n    Creation--The Mundane or Orphic Egg--Kneph--Mr. Gliddon's replies to\n    certain enquiries--The Orphic Theogony and the Egg--The Great Unity._\n\n\nThe ancient monuments of the Western United States consist for the most\npart of elevations and embankments of earth and stone, erected with great\nlabour and manifest design. In connection with these, more or less\nintimate, are found various minor relics of art, consisting of ornaments\nand implements of many kinds, some of them composed of metal but most of\nstone.\n\nThese remains are spread over a vast amount of country. They are found on\nthe sources of the Alleghany, in the western part of the state of New York\non the east; and extend thence westwardly along the southern shore of Lake\nErie, and through Michigan and Wisconsin, to Iowa and the Nebraska\nterritory on the west. Some ancient works, probably belonging to the same\nsystem with those of the Mississippi valley and erected by the same\npeople, occur upon the Susquehanna river as far down as the Valley of\nWyoming in Pennsylvania. The mound builders seem to have skirted the\nsouthern border of Lake Erie, and spread themselves in diminished numbers\nover the western part of the State of New York, along the shores of Lake\nOntario to the St. Lawrence river. They penetrated into the interior,\neastward, as far as the county of Onondaga, where some slight vestiges of\ntheir work still exist. These seem to have been their limits at the\nnorth-east. We have no record of their occurrence above the great lakes.\nCarner mentions some on the shores of Lake Pepin, and some are said to\noccur near Lake Travers, under the 46th parallel of latitude. Lewis and\nClarke saw them on the Missouri river, one thousand miles above its\njunction with the Mississippi; and they have been observed on the Kanzas\nand Platte and on other remote western rivers. They are found all over the\nintermediate country, and spread over the valley of the Mississippi to the\nGulf of Mexico. They line the shores of the Gulf from Texas to Florida,\nand extend in diminished numbers into South Carolina. They occur in great\nnumbers in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Missouri, Arkansas,\nKentucky, Tennessee, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida and\nTexas. They are found in less numbers in the Western portions of New York,\nPennsylvania, Virginia, and North and South Carolina; as also in Michigan,\nIowa, and in the Mexican territory beyond the Rio Grande del Norte. In\nshort, they occupy the entire basin of the Mississippi and its\ntributaries, as also the fertile plains along the Gulf.\n\nAlthough possessing throughout certain general points of resemblance going\nto establish a kindred origin, these works, nevertheless, resolve\nthemselves into three grand geographical divisions, which present in many\nrespects striking contrasts, yet so gradually merge into each other that\nit is impossible to determine where one series terminates and the other\nbegins. In the region bordering upon the upper lakes, to a certain extent\nin Michigan, Iowa and Missouri, but particularly in Wisconsin, we find a\nsuccession of remains, entirely singular in their form and presenting but\nslight analogy to any others of which we have in any portion of the globe.\nThe larger proportion of these are structures of earth bearing the forms\nof beasts, birds, reptiles, and even of men; they are frequently of\ngigantic dimensions, constituting huge _basso-relievos_ upon the face of\nthe country. They are very numerous and in most cases occur in long and\napparently dependent ranges. In connection with them are found many\nconical mounds and occasional short lines of embankment, in rare instances\nforming enclosures. These animal effigies are mainly confined to\nWisconsin, and extend across that territory from Ford du Lac in a\nsouth-western direction, ascending the Fox river and following the general\ncourse of Rock and Wisconsin rivers to the Mississippi. They may be much\nmore extensively disseminated; but it is here only that they have been\nobserved in considerable numbers. In Michigan, as also in Iowa and\nMissouri, similar elevations of more or less outline are said to occur.\nThey are represented as dispersed in ranges like the buildings of a modern\ncity, and covering sometimes an arc of many acres.\n\nThe number of these ancient remains is well calculated to excite surprise,\nand has been adduced in support of the hypothesis that they are most if\nnot all of them natural formations, \"the result of diluvial action,\"\nmodified perhaps in some instances, but never erected by man. Of course no\nsuch suggestion was ever made by individuals who had enjoyed the\nopportunity of seeing and investigating them. Single structures of earth\ncould not possibly bear more palpable evidences of an artificial origin\nthan do most of the western monuments. The evidences in support of this\nassertion, derived from the form, structure, position and contents of\nthese remains, sufficiently appear in the pages of this work.\n\nThe structure, not less than the form and position of a large number of\nthe Earthworks of the West, and especially of the Scioto valley, render it\nclear that they were erected for other than defensive purposes. The small\ndimensions of most of the circles, the occurrence of the ditch interior to\nthe embankments, and the fact that many of them are completely commanded\nby adjacent heights, are some of the circumstances which may be mentioned\nas sustaining this conclusion. We must seek, therefore, in the connection\nin which these works are found and in the character of the mounds, if such\nthere be within their walls, for the secret of their origin. And it may be\nobserved that it is here we discover evidences still more satisfactory and\nconclusive than are furnished by their small dimensions and other\ncircumstances above mentioned, that they were not intended for defence.\nThus, when we find an enclosure containing a number of mounds, all of\nwhich it is capable of demonstration were religious in their purposes or\nin some way connected with the superstitions of the people who built them,\nthe conclusion is irresistible that the enclosure itself was also deemed\nsacred and thus set apart as \"tabooed\" or consecrated ground--especially\nwhere it is obvious at the first glance that it possesses none of the\nrequisites of a military work. But it is not to be concluded that those\nenclosures alone, which contain mounds of the description here named, were\ndesigned for sacred purposes. We have reason to believe that the religious\nsystem of the mound builders, like that of the Aztecs, exercised among\nthem a great if not controlling influence. Their government may have been,\nfor aught we know, a government of priesthood; one in which the priestly\nand civil functions were jointly exercised, and one sufficiently powerful\nto have secured in the Mississippi valley, as it did in Mexico, the\nerection of many of those vast monuments which for ages will continue to\nchallenge the wonder of men. There may have been certain superstitious\nceremonies, having no connection with the purposes of the mounds, carried\non in the enclosures specially dedicated to them. It is a conclusion which\nevery day's investigation and observation has tended to confirm, that\nmost, perhaps all, of the earthworks not manifestly defensive in their\ncharacter were in some way connected with the superstitious rights of the\nbuilders, though in what manner, it is, and perhaps ever will be,\nimpossible satisfactorily to determine.\n\nBy far the most extraordinary and interesting earthwork discovered in the\nWest is the Great Serpent, situate on Brush Creek at a point known as the\n\"Three Forks,\" near the north line of Adams county, Ohio. It occupies the\nsummit of a high crescent-form hill or spur of land, rising a hundred and\nfifty feet above the level of Brush Creek, which washes its base. The side\nof the hill next the stream presents a perpendicular wall of rock, while\nthe other slopes rapidly, though it is not so steep as to preclude\ncultivation. The top of the hill is not level but slightly convex, and\npresents a very even surface one hundred and fifty feet wide by one\nthousand long, measuring from its extremity to the point where it connects\nwith the table land. Conforming to the curve of the hill and occupying its\nvery summit is the serpent, its head resting near the point and its body\nwinding back for seven hundred feet in graceful undulations, terminating\nin a triple coil at the tail. The entire length, if extended, would be not\nless than one thousand feet. The neck of the serpent is stretched out and\nslightly curved, and its mouth is opened wide as if in the act of\nswallowing or ejecting an oval figure which rests partially within the\ndistended jaws. This oval is formed by an embankment of earth, without any\nperceptible opening, four feet in height, and is perfectly regular in\noutline, its transverse and conjugate diameters being one hundred and\nsixty and eighty feet respectively. The ground within the oval is slightly\nelevated: a small circular elevation of large stones much burned once\nexisted in its centre, but they have been thrown down and scattered by\nsome ignorant visitor, under the prevailing impression probably that gold\nwas hidden beneath them. The point of the hill within which this\negg-shaped figure rests seems to have been artificially cut to conform to\nits outline, leaving a smooth platform, ten feet wide and somewhat\ninclining inwards, all around it.\n\nUpon either side of the serpent's head extend two small triangular\nelevations ten or twelve feet over. They are not high, and although too\ndistinct to be overlooked, are yet much too much obliterated to be\nsatisfactorily traced.\n\nAn effigy in the form of an alligator occurs near Granville, Licking\ncounty, Ohio, upon a high hill or headland; in connection with which there\nare unmistakable evidences of an altar, similar to that in conjunction\nwith the work just named. It is known in the vicinity as \"the Alligator,\"\nwhich designation has been adopted for want of a better, although the\nfigure bears as close a resemblance to the lizard as any other reptile. It\nis placed transversly to the point of land on which it occurs, the head\npointing to the south-west. The total length from the point of the nose\nfollowing the curve of the tail to the tip is about two hundred and fifty\nfeet, the breadth of the body forty feet, and the length of the feet or\npaws each thirty-six feet. The ends of the paws are a little broader than\nthe remaining portions of the same, as if the spread of the toes had been\noriginally indicated. Some parts of the body are more elevated than\nothers, an attempt having evidently been made to preserve the proportions\nof the object copied. The outline of the figure is clearly defined; its\naverage height is not less than four feet; at the shoulders it is six feet\nin altitude. Upon the inner side of the effigy is an elevated circular\nspace covered with stones which have been much burned. This has been\ndenominated an altar.\n\nIt seems more than probable that this singular effigy, like that last\ndescribed, had its origin in the superstition of its makers. It was\nperhaps the high place where sacrifices were made on stated or\nextraordinary occasions, and where the ancient people gathered to\ncelebrate the rites of their unknown worship. Its position and all the\ncircumstances attending it certainly favour such a conclusion.\n\nThe same is true of a work in the form of a cross, occupying a like\nsituation near the village of Tarlton, Pickaway County, Ohio. From these\npremises, we are certainly justified in concluding that these several\neffigies had probably a cognate design, possessed a symbolical\nsignificance, and were conspicuous objects of religious regard, and that\non certain occasions sacrifices were made on the altars within or near\nthem.\n\nThe only structures sustaining any analogy to these are found in Wisconsin\nand the extreme North-west. There we find great numbers of mounds bearing\nthe forms of animals of various kinds, and entering into a great variety\nof combinations with each other, and with conical mounds and lines of\nembankments, which are also abundant. They are usually found on the low,\nlevel, or undulating prairies, and seldom in such conspicuous positions as\nthose discovered in Ohio. Whether they were built by the same people with\nthe latter, and had a common design and purpose, it is not undertaken to\nsay, nor is it a question into which we propose to enter.\n\nIt is an interesting fact that amongst the animal effigies of Wisconsin,\nstructures in the form of serpents are of frequent occurrence.\n\nSome years ago, Mr. Pigeon, of Virginia, made drawings of a number of\nthese, and he stated that near the junction of the St. Peter's with the\nMississippi River were a large number of mounds and monuments,\nconsisting--1st, of a circle and square in combination, as at Circleville,\nin Ohio, the sole difference being a large truncated mound in the centre\nof the square, as well as in the centre of the circle, with a platform\nround its base; 2nd, near by, the effigy of a gigantic animal resembling\nthe elk, in length one hundred and ninety-five feet; 3rd, in the same\nvicinity, a large conical mound, three hundred feet in diameter at the\nbase, and thirty feet in height, its summit covered with charcoal. This\nmound was surrounded by one hundred and twenty smaller mounds, disposed in\nthe form of a circle. Twelve miles to the westward of these, and within\nsight of them, was a large conical truncated mound, sixty feet in diameter\nat the bottom, and eighteen feet high, built upon a raised platform or\nbottom. It was surrounded by a circle three hundred and sixty-five feet in\ncircumference. Entwined around this circle, in a triple coil, was an\nembankment, in the form of a serpent, two thousand three hundred and ten\nfeet in length. This embankment, at the centre of the body, was eighteen\nfeet in diameter, but diminished towards the head and tail in just\nproportion. The elevation of the head was four feet, of the body six feet,\nof the tail two feet. The central mound was capped with blue clay, beneath\nwhich was sand mixed with charcoal and ashes.\n\nMounds arranged in serpentine form have also been found in Iowa, at a\nplace formerly known as Prairie La Porte, afterwards called Gottenburgh.\nAlso at a place seven miles north of these on Turkey River, where the\nrange was two and a half miles long, the mounds occurring at regular\nintervals. Twenty miles to the westward of this locality was the effigy of\na great serpent with that of a tortoise in front of its mouth. This\nstructure was found to be one thousand and four feet long, eighteen feet\nbroad at its widest part, and six feet high; the tortoise was eighteen by\ntwelve feet.\n\nMr. Pigeon gave accounts of many other structures, tending to illustrate\nand confirm the opinions advanced respecting the religious and symbolical\ncharacter and design of many, if not all, the more regular earth-works of\nthe Western States. Thirty miles west of Prairie Du Chien, he found a\ncircle enclosing a pentagon, which in its turn enclosed another circle,\nwithin which was a conical truncated mound. The outer circle was twelve\nhundred feet in circumference, the embankment twelve feet broad and from\nthree to five feet high. The entrance was on the east. The mound was\nthirty-six feet in diameter by twelve feet high. Its summit was composed\nof white pipe-clay, beneath which was found a large quantity of mica in\nsheets. It exhibited abundant traces of fire.\n\nFour miles distant from this, on the lowlands of the Kickapoo River, Mr.\nPigeon discovered a mound with eight radiating points, undoubtedly\ndesigned to represent the Sun. It was sixty feet in diameter at the base,\nand three feet high. The points extended outwards about nine feet.\nSurrounding this mound were five crescent-shaped mounds so arranged as to\nconstitute a circle. Many analagous structures were discovered at other\nplaces, both in Wisconsin and Iowa. At Cappile Bluffs, on the Mississippi\nRiver, was found a conical, truncated mound, surrounded by nine radiating\neffigies of men, the heads pointing inwards.\n\nProbably no one will hesitate in ascribing to work just described, some\nextraordinary significance. It cannot be supposed to be the offspring of\nan idle fancy or a savage whim. It bears, in its position and the harmony\nof its structure, the evidences of design, and it seems to have been begun\nand finished in accordance with a matured plan, and not to have been the\nresult of successive and unmeaning combinations. It is probably not a work\nfor defence, for there is nothing to defend; on the contrary, it is\nclearly and unmistakably, in form and attitude, the representation of a\nserpent, with jaws distended, in the act of swallowing or ejecting an oval\nfigure, which may be distinguished, from the suggestions of analogy, as an\negg. Assuming for the entire structure a religious origin, it can be\nregarded only as the recognised symbol of some grand mythological idea.\nWhat abstract conception was thus embodied; or what vast event thus\ntypically commemorated, we have no certain means of knowing! Analogy,\nhowever, although too often consulted on trivial grounds, furnishes us\nwith gleams of light, of greater or less steadiness, as our appeals to its\nassistance happen to be conducted, on every subject connected with man's\nbeliefs. We proceed now to discover what light reason and analogy shed\nupon the singular structure before us.\n\nNaturally, and almost of necessity, the egg became associated with man's\nprimitive idea of a creation. It aptly symbolised that primordial,\nquiescent state of things which preceded their vitalization and\nactivity--the inanimate chaos, before life began, when \"the earth was\nwithout form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep.\" It was\nthus received in the early cosmogonies, in all of which the vivification\nof the Mundane Egg constituted the act of creation; from it sprang the\nworld resplendent in glory and teeming with life.\n\nFaber says--\"The ancient pagans, in almost every part of the globe, were\nwont to symbolize the world by an Egg. Hence this symbol is introduced\ninto the cosmogonies of nearly all nations, and there are few persons even\namong those who have not made mythology their study, to whom the Mundane\nEgg is not perfectly familiar. It was employed, not only to represent the\nearth, but also the Universe in its largest extent.\"[5]\n\n\"The world,\" says Menu, \"was all darkness, undiscernible,\nundistinguishable, altogether in a profound sleep, till the Self-Existent,\nInvisible God (Brahm), making it manifest with five elements and other\nglorious forms, perfectly dispelled the gloom. Desiring to raise up\ncreatures by an emanation from his own essence, he first created the\nwaters, and inspired them with power of motion; by that power was produced\na golden egg, blazing like a thousand stars, in which was born Brahma, the\ngreat parent of national beings, that which is the invisible cause,\nself-existent, but unperceived. This divinity having dwelt in the Egg\nthrough revolving years, himself meditating upon himself, divided into two\nequal parts, and from these halves he framed the heavens and the earth,\nplacing in the midst the subtil ether, the eight points of the world, and\nthe permanent receptacle of the waters.\"\n\nThe above is Maurice's translation. Sir William Jones renders it:--\"The\nsole, self-existent power, having willed to produce various beings from\nhis own divine substance, first, with a thought created the waters, and\nplaced in them a productive seed. That seed became an egg, bright as\ngold, blazing like the luminary with a thousand beams, and in that egg was\nborn himself, in the form of Brahma, the great forefather of all spirits.\"\n\nAristophanes, in his Comedy of the Birds, is thought to have given the\nnotions of cosmogony, ancient even in his days. \"Chaos, Night, black\nErebus, and wide Tartarus first existed: there was neither earth, nor air,\nnor heaven; but in the bosom of Erebus black-winged Night produced an\nAerial Egg, from which was born golden-pinioned Love (Phanes), and he, the\nGreat Universal Father, begot our race out of dark Chaos, in the midst of\nwide-spreading Tartarus, and called us into light.\"\n\nWe find this conception clearly embodied in one of the Orphic fragments,\nthe Hymn to Protogones, who is equivalent to Phanes, the Life-giver,\nPriapus, or Generator.\n\n  \"I invoke thee, oh Protogones, two-fold, great, wandering through the\n        ether;\n  Egg-Born rejoicing in thy golden wings;\n  Bull-faced, the Generator of the blessed and of mortal men;\n  The much-renowned Light, the far celebrated Ericapaeus;\n  Ineffable, occult, impetuous all-glittering strength;\n  Who scatterest the twilight cloud of darkness from the eyes,\n  And roam'st through the world upon the flight of thy wings,\n  Bringing forth the brilliant and all-pure light; wherefore I invoke\n        thee, as Phanes,\n  As Priapus the King, and as the dark-faced splendour,--\n  Come, thou blessed being, full of Metis (wisdom) and generation, come in\n        joy\n  To thy sacred, ever-varying mysteries.\"\n\nWe have, according to these early notions, the egg representing Being\nsimply; Chaos, the great void from which, by the will of the superlative\nUnity, proceeds the generative or creative influence, designated among the\nGreeks as \"Phanes,\" \"Golden-pinioned Love,\" \"The Universal Father,\"\n\"Egg-born Protogones\" (the latter Zeus or Jupiter); in India as \"Brahma,\"\nthe \"Great Parent of Rational Creatures,\" the \"Father of the Universe;\"\nand in Egypt as \"Ptha,\" the \"Universal Creator.\"\n\nThe Chinese, whose religious conceptions correspond generally with those\nof India, entertained similar notions of the origin of things. They set\nforth that Chaos, before the creation, existed in the form of a vast egg,\nin which was contained the principles of all things. Its vivification,\namong them also, constituted the act of creation.\n\nAccording to this and other authorities, the vivification of the Mundane\nEgg is allegorically represented in the temple of Daibod, in Japan, by a\nnest egg, which is shown floating in an expanse of waters against which a\nbull (everywhere an emblem of generative energy, and prolific heat, the\nSun) is striking with his horns.\n\n\"Near Lemisso, in the Island of Cyprus, is still to be seen a gigantic\negg-shaped vase, which is supposed to represent the Mundane or Orphic Egg.\nIt is of stone, and measures thirty feet in circumference. Upon one side,\nin a semi-circular niche, is sculptured a bull, the emblem of productive\nenergy. This figure is understood to signify the Tauric constellation,\n\"The Stars of Abundance,\" with the heliacal or cosmical rising of which\nwas connected the return of the mystic reinvigorating principle of animal\nfecundity.\"[6]\n\nIn the opinions above mentioned, many other nations of the ancient world,\nthe Egyptians, the Assyrians, the Phoenicians, and the Indo-Scythiac\nnations of Europe participated. They not only supported the propriety of\nthe allegory, says Maurice, from the perfection of its external form, but\nfancifully extended the allusion to its interior composition, comparing\nthe pure white shell to the fair expanse of heaven; the fluid, transparent\nwhite, to the circumambient air, and the more solid yolk to the central\nearth.\n\nEven the Polynesians entertained the same general notions. The tradition\nof the Sandwich Islanders is that a bird (with them it is an emblem of\nDeity) laid an egg upon the waters which burst of itself and produced the\nIslands.\n\nThe great hemaphrodite first principle in its character of Unity, the\nSupreme Monad, the highest conception of Divinity was denominated Kneph or\nCnuphis among the Egyptians. According to Plutarch this god was without\nbeginning and without end, the One, uncreated and eternal, above all, and\ncomprehending all. And as Brahm, \"the Self-existent Incorruptible\" Unity\nof the Hindus, by direction of His energetic will upon the expanse of\nchaos, \"with a thought\" (say Menu) produced a \"golden egg blazing like a\nthousand stars\" from which sprung Brahma, the Creator; so according to the\nmystagogues, Kneph, the Unity of Egypt, was represented as a serpent\nthrusting from his mouth an egg, from which proceeds the divinity _Phtha_,\nthe active creative power, equivalent in all his attributes to the Indian\nBrahma.\n\nThat Kneph was symbolized by the ancient Egyptians under the form of a\nserpent is well known. It is not, however, so well established that the\nact of creation was allegorically represented in Egypt by the symbolic\nserpent thrusting from its mouth an egg, although no doubt of the fact\nseems to have been entertained by the various authors who have hitherto\nwritten on the Cosmogony and Mythology of the primitive nations of the\nEast. With the view of ascertaining what new light has been thrown upon\nthe subject by the investigations of the indefatigable Champollion and his\nfollowers--whose researches among the monuments and records of Ancient\nEgypt have been attended with most remarkable results--the following\ninquiries were addressed to Mr. G. R. Gliddon (U.S. Consul at Cairo), a\ngentleman distinguished for his acquaintance with Egyptian science, and\nhis zeal in disseminating information on a subject too little\nunderstood:--\n\n\"Do the serpent and the egg, separate or in combination, occur among the\nEgyptian symbols and if they occur what significance seem to have been\nassigned them? Was the serpent in any way associated with the worship of\nthe sun or the kindred worship of the Phallus?\"\n\nTo these inquiries Mr. Gliddon replied as follows:--\"In respect to your\nfirst inquiry; I concede at once that the general view of the Greco-Roman\nantiquity, the oriental traditions collected, often indiscriminately, by\nthe Fathers and the concurring suffrages of all occidental Mythologists,\nattribute the compound symbol of the Serpent combined with the Mundane Egg\nto the Egyptians. Modern criticism however, coupled with the application\nof the tests furnished by Champollion le-Jeune and his followers since\n1827 to the hieroglyphics of Egypt, has recognised so many exotic fables\nand so much real ignorance of Egyptology in the accounts concerning that\nmystified country, handed down to us from the schools of Alexandria and\nByzantium, that at the present hour science treads doubtingly, where but a\nfew years ago it was fashionable to make the most sweeping assertions; and\nwe now hesitate before qualifying, as Egyptian in origin, ideas that\nbelong to the Mythologies of other eastern nations. Classical authority,\ncorrect enough when treating on the philosophy and speculative theories of\nPtolemaic and Roman Alexandria, is generally at fault when in respect to\nquestions belonging to anterior or Pharaonic times. Whatever we derive\nthrough the medium of the Alexandrines, and especially through their\nsuccessors, the Gnostics, must by the Archaeologist be received with\nsuspicion.\n\nAfter this, you will not be surprised if I express doubts as to existence\nof the myth of the Serpent and Egg in the Cosmogony of the early\nEgyptians. It is lamentably true that, owing to twenty centuries of\ndestruction, so fearfully wrought out by Mohammed Ali, we do not up to\nthis day possess one tithe of the monuments or papyri bequeathed to\nposterity by the recording genius of the Khime. It is possible that this\nmyth may have been contained in the vast amount of hieroglyphical\nliterature now lost to us. But the fact that in no instance whatever, amid\nthe myriads of inscribed or sculptured documents extant, does the symbol\nof the Serpent and the Egg occur, militates against the assumption of\nthis, perhaps Phoenician myth, as originally Egyptian. \"The worship of\nthe Serpent,\" observes Ampere, \"by the Ophites may certainly have a real\nconnection with the choice of the Egyptian symbol by which Divinity is\ndesignated in the paintings and hieroglyphics, and which is the Serpent\nUraeus (Basilisk royal, of the Greeks, the seraph set up by Moses. Se Ra\nPh is the singular of seraphim, meaning Semitice, splendour, fire, light;\nemblematic of the fiery disk of the sun and which, under the name of\nNehushtan--\"Serpent Dragon\"--was broken up by the reforming Hezekiah. 2\nKings, 18, 4); or with the serpent with wings and feet, which we see\nrepresented in the Funeral Rituals; but the serpent is everywhere in the\nMythologies and Cosmogonies of the East, and we cannot be assured that the\nserpent of the Ophites (any more than that emitting or encircling the\nMundane Egg) was Egyptian rather than Jewish, Persian, or Hindustanee.\"\n\n\"No serpents found in the hieroglyphics bear, so far as I can perceive,\nany direct relation to the Ouine Myth, nor have Egyptian Eggs any direct\nconnection with the Cosmogonical Serpent. The egg, under certain\nconditions, seems to denote the idea of a human body. It is also used as a\nphonetic sign =S=, and when combined with =T=, is the determinative of the\nfeminine gender; in which sense exclusively it is sometimes placed close\nto a serpent in hieroglyphical legends.\"\n\n\"My doubts apply in attempting to give a specific answer to your specific\nquestion; _i.e._, the direct connection, in Egyptian Mythology, of the\nSerpent and the Cosmogonical Egg. In the \"Book of the Dead,\" according to\na MS. translation favoured me by the erudite Egyptologist, Mr. Birch, of\nthe British Museum, allusion is made to the \"great mundane egg\" addressed\nby the deceased, which seems to refer to the winds or the\natmosphere--again the deceased exclaims 'I have raised myself up in the\nform of the great Hawk which comes out of the Egg (_i.e._, the Sun).'\n\n\"I do not here perceive any immediate allusion to the duplex emblem of the\negg combined with the serpent, the subject of your query.\n\n\"Yet a reservation must be made in behalf of your very consistent\nhypothesis--supported, as I allow, by all oriental and classical\nauthority, if not possibly by the Egyptian documents yet\nundeciphered--which hypothesis is Euclidean. 'Things which are equal to\nthe same are equal to one another.' Now if the 'Mundane Egg' be in the\npapyric rituals the equivalent to Sun and that by other hieroglyphical\ntexts we prove the Sun to be, in Egypt as elsewhere, symbolized by the\nfigure of a Serpent, does not the 'ultima ratio' resolve both emblems into\none? Your grasp of this Old and New World Question renders it superfluous\nthat I should now posit the syllogism. I content myself by referring you\nto the best of authorities. One point alone is what I would venture to\nsuggest to your philosophical acumen, in respect to ancient 'parallelisms'\nbetween the metaphysical conceptions of radically distinct nations (if you\nplease 'species' of mankind, at geographically different centres of\n_origins_, compelled of necessity in ages anterior to alphabetical record\nto express their ideas by pictures, figurative or symbolical). It is that\nman's mind has always conceived, everywhere in the same method, everything\nthat relates to him; because the inability, in which his intelligence is\ncircumscribed, to figure to his mind's eye existence distinct from his\nown, constrains him to devolve, in the pictorial or sculptural delineation\nof his thoughts, within the same circle of ideas; and, ergo, the\nfigurative representative of his ideas must ever be, in all ages and\ncountries, the reflex of the same hypotheses, material or physical. May\nnot the emblem of the Serpent and Egg, as well in the New as in the Old\nWorld, have originated from a similar organic law without thereby\nestablishing intercourse? Is not your serpent a \"rattlesnake\" and, ergo,\npurely American? Are not Egyptian Serpents all purely Nilotic? The\nmetaphysical idea of the Cosmogonical Serpent may be one and the same; but\ndoes not the zoological diversity of representation prove that America,\nthree thousand years ago, could have no possible intercourse with Egypt,\nPhoenicia, or _vice versa_?\n\n\"Such being the only values attached to Serpents and eggs in Egyptian\nhieroglyphics it is arduous to speculate whether an esoteric significance\ndid or did not exist between those emblems in the, to us, unknown\nCosmogony of the Theban and Memphite Colleges. I, too, could derive\ninferences and deduce analogies between the attributes of the God Knuphis,\nor the God Ptha, and the 'Mundane Egg' recorded by Eusebius, Jamblichus,\nand a wilderness of classical authorities, but I fear with no very\nsatisfactory result. It is, however, due to Mr. Bonomi, to cite his\nlanguage on this subject. Speaking of the colossal statue of Rameses\nSesostris at Metraheni, in a paper read before the Royal Society of\nLiterature, London, June, 1845, he observes, 'There is one more\nconsideration connected with the hieroglyphics of the great oval of the\nbelt, though not affecting the preceding argument; it is the oval or egg\nwhich occurs between the figure of Ptha and the staff of which the usual\nsignification is Son or Child, but which by a kind of two-fold meaning,\ncommon in the details of sculpture of this period (the 18th or 19th\nDynasty, say B.C. 1500 or 1200), I am inclined to believe refers also to\nthe myth or doctrine preserved in the writings of the Greek authors, as\nbelonging to Vulcan and said to be derived from Egypt, viz., the doctrine\nof the Mundane Egg. Now, although in no Egyptian sculpture of the remote\nperiod of this statue has there been found any allusion to this doctrine,\nit is most distinctly hinted at in one of the age of the Ptolomies; and I\nam inclined to think it was imported from the East by Sesostris, where, in\nconfirmation of its existence at a very remote period. I would quote the\nexistence of those egg-shaped basaltic stones, embossed with various\ndevices and covered with cuneatic inscriptions, which are brought from\nsome of the ancient cities of Mesopotamia.\n\n\"In respect to your final inquiry, I may observe that I can produce\nnothing from the hieroglyphics to connect, directly, Phallic Worship with\nthe solar emblem of the Serpent. In Semitic tongues, the same root\nsignifies Serpent and Phallus; both in different senses are solar\nemblems.\"\n\nIn the Orphic Theogony a similar origin is ascribed to the egg, from which\nsprings \"the Egg-born Protogones,\" the Greek counterpart of the Egyptian\nPhtha. The egg in this instance also proceeds from the pre-eminent Unity,\nthe Serpent God, the \"Incomparable Cronus,\" or Hercules. (Bryant, quoting\nAthenagoras, observes--\"Hercules was esteemed the chief god, the same as\nCronus, and was said to have produced the Mundane Egg. He is represented\nin the Orphic Theology, under the mixed symbol of a lion and a serpent,\nand sometimes of a serpent only.\")\n\nCronus was originally esteemed the Supreme, as is manifest from his being\ncalled Il or Ilus, which is the same with the Hebrew El and, according to\nSt. Jerome, one of the ten names of God. Damascius, in the life of\nIsidorus, mentions distinctly that Cronus was worshipped under the name of\nEl, who, according to Sanchoniathon, had no one superior or antecedent to\nhimself.\n\nBrahm, Cronus, and Kneph each represented the mystical union of the\nreciprocal or active and passive principles. Most, if not all, the\nprimitive nations recognised this Supreme Unity, although they did not all\nassign him a name. He was the Creator of Gods, who were the Demiurgs of\nthe Universe, the creators of all rational beings, angels and men, and the\narchitects of the world.\n\nThe early writers exhaust language in endeavours to express the lofty\ncharacter and attributes, and the superlative power and dignity of this\ngreat Unity, the highest conception of which man is capable. He is spoken\nof in the sacred book of the Hindus as the \"Almighty, infinite, eternal,\nincomprehensible, self-existent Being; he who see everything, though never\nseen; he who is not to be compassed by description; he from whom the\nuniverse proceeds; who reigns supreme, the light of all lights; whose\npower is too infinite to be imagined; is Brahm, the One Being, True and\nUnknown.\"[7]\n\nThe supreme God of Gods of the Hindus was less frequently expressed by the\nname Brahm than by the mystical syllable =O'M=, which corresponded to the\nHebrew Jehovah. Strange as the remark may seem to most minds, it is\nnevertheless true, that the fundamental principles of the Hindu religion\nwere those of pure Monotheism, the worship of one supreme and only God.\nBrahm was regarded as too mighty to be named; and, while his symbolized or\npersonified attributes were adored in gorgeous temples, not one was\nerected to him. The holiest verse of the Vedas is paraphrased as follows:\n\n\"Perfect truth; perfect happiness; without equal; immortal; absolute\nunity; whom neither speech can describe nor mind comprehend;\nall-pervading; all-transcending; delighted by his own boundless\nintelligence, not limited by space or time; without feet, moving swiftly;\nwithout hands, grasping all worlds; without ears, all-hearing,\nunderstanding all; without cause, the first of all causes; all-ruling;\nall-powerful; the Creator, Preserver, and Transformer of all things; such\nis the Great One, Brahm.\"\n\nThe character and power of Kneph are indicated in terms no less lofty and\ncomprehensive than those applied to the omnipotent Brahm. He is described\nin the ancient Hermetic books as the \"first God, immovable in the solitude\nof his Unity, the fountain of all things, the root of all primary,\nintelligible, existing forms, the God of Gods, before the etherial and\nempyrean Gods and the celestial.\"\n\nIn America this great Unity, this God of Gods, was equally recognised. In\nMexico as Teotl, \"he who is all in himself\" (Tloque Nahuaque); in Peru as\nVaricocha, the \"Soul of the Universe\"; in Central America and Yucatan as\nStunah Ku or Hunab Ku, \"God of Gods, the incorporeal origin of all\nthings.\" And as the Supreme Brahm of the Hindus, \"whose name was\nunutterable,\" was worshipped under no external form and had neither\ntemples nor altars erected to him, so the Supreme Teotl and the\ncorresponding Varicocha and Hunab Ku, \"whose names,\" says the Spanish\nconquerors, \"were spoken only with extreme dread,\" were without an image\nor an outward form of worship for the reason, according to the same\nauthorities, that each was regarded as the Invisible and Unknown God.\n\nThe Mundane Egg, received as a symbol of original, passive, unorganized,\nformless nature, became associated, in conformity with primitive notions,\nwith other symbols referring to the creative force or vitalizing\ninfluence. Thus in the Hindu cosmogany Brahma is represented, after long\ninertia, as arranging the passive elements, \"creating the world and all\nvisible things.\" Under the form of the emblematic bull the generative\nenergy was represented breaking the quiescent egg. Encircled by the folds\nof the agatho-demon, a type of the active principle, it was suspended\naloft at the temples of Tyre. For the serpent, like the bull, was an\nemblem of the sun or of the attributes of that luminary--itself the\ncelestial emblem of the \"Universal Father,\" the procreative power of\nnature. \"Everywhere,\" says Faber, \"we find the great father exhibiting\nhimself in the form of a serpent, and everywhere we find the serpent\ninvested with the attributes of the Great Father and partaking of the\nhonours which were paid him.\"[8]\n\nUnder this view, therefore, we may regard the compound symbol of the\nserpent and the egg, though specifically allusive to the general creation,\nas an illustration of the doctrine of the reciprocal principles which, as\nwe have already seen, enters largely into the entire fabric of primitive\nphilosophy and mythology.\n\nThus have we shewn that the grand conception of a Supreme Unity and the\ndoctrine of the reciprocal principles existed in America in a well defined\nand easily recognised form.\n\nOur present inquiry relates to the symbols by which they were represented\nin both continents. That these were not usually arbitrary, but resulted\nfrom associations, generally of an obvious kind, will be readily\nadmitted.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V.\n\n    _The Sun and Fire as emblems--The Serpent and the Sun--Taut and the\n    Serpent--Horapollo and the Serpent symbol--Sanchoniathon and the\n    Serpent--Ancient Mysteries of Osiris, &c.--Rationale of the connection\n    of Solar, Phallic, and Serpent Worship--The Aztec Pantheon--Mexican\n    Gods--The Snake in Mexican Mythology--The Great Father and\n    Mother--Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Serpent--Researches of Stephens\n    and Catherwood--Discoveries of Mr. Stephens._\n\n\nThat fire should be taken to be the physical, of what the sun is the\ncelestial emblem, is sufficiently apparent; we can readily understand also\nhow the bull, the goat, or ram, the phallus, and other symbols should have\nthe same import; also how naturally and almost inevitably and universally\nthe sun came to symbolize the active principle, the vivifying power, and\nhow obviously the egg symbolized the passive elements of nature, but how\nthe serpent came to possess, as a symbol, a like significance with these\nis not so obvious. That it did so, however, cannot be doubted, and the\nproofs will appear as we proceed; likewise that it sometimes symbolized\nthe great hermaphrodite first principle, the Supreme Unity of the Greeks\nand Egyptians.\n\nAlthough generally, it did not always symbolize the sun, or the power of\nwhich the sun is an emblem; but, invested with various meanings, it\nentered widely into the primitive mythologies. It typified wisdom, power,\nduration, the good and evil principles, life, reproduction--in short, in\nEgypt, Syria, Greece, India, China, Scandinavia, America, everywhere in\nthe globe it has been a prominent emblem. In the somewhat poetical\nlanguage of a learned author, \"It entered into the mythology of every\nnation, consecrated almost every temple, symbolized almost every deity,\nwas imagined in the heavens, stamped on the earth, and ruled in the realms\nof everlasting sorrow.\" Its general acceptance seems to have been remarked\nat a very early period. It arrested the attention of the ancient sages,\nwho assigned a variety of reasons for its adoption, founded upon the\nnatural history of the reptile. Among these speculations, none are more\ncurious than those preserved by Sanchoniathon, who says:--\"Taut first\nattributed something of the Divine nature to the Serpent, in which he was\nfollowed by the Phoenicians and Egyptians. For this animal was esteemed\nby him to be the most inspirited of all reptiles, and of a fiery nature,\ninasmuch as it exhibits an incredible celerity, moving by its spirit,\nwithout hands or feet, or any of the external members by which the other\nanimals effect their motion; and, in its progress, it assumes a variety of\nforms, moving in a spiral course, and darting forward with whatever degree\nof swiftness it pleases.\"\n\nIt is, moreover, long lived, and has the quality not only of putting off\nits old age, and assuming a second youth, but of receiving at the same\ntime an augmentation of its size and strength; and when it has filled the\nappointed measure of its existence, it consumes itself, as Taut has laid\ndown in the Sacred Books, upon which account this animal is received into\nthe sacred rites and mysteries.\n\nHorapollo, referring to the serpent symbol, says of it:--\"When the\nEgyptians would represent the Universe they delineate a serpent bespeckled\nwith variegated scales, devouring its own tail, the scales intimating the\nstars in the Universe. The animal is extremely heavy, as is the earth, and\nextremely slippery like the water, moreover, it every year puts off its\nold age with its skin, as in the Universe the annual period effects a\ncorresponding change and becomes renovated, and the making use of its own\nbody for food implies that all things whatever, which are generated by\ndivine providence in the world, undergo a corruption into them again.\"\n\nNothing is more certain than that the serpent at a very remote period was\nregarded with high veneration as the most mysterious of living creatures.\nIts habits were imperfectly understood, and it was invested, as we\nperceive from the above quotations, with the most extraordinary qualities.\nAlike the object of fear, admiration, and wonder, it is not surprising\nthat it became early connected with man's superstitions, but how it\nobtained so general a predominance it is difficult to understand.\n\nPerhaps there is no circumstance in the natural history of the serpent\nmore striking than that alluded to by Sanchoniathon, viz.: the annual\nsloughing of its skin, or supposed rejuvenation.\n\n  \"As an old serpent casts his sealy vest,\n  Wreaths in the sun, in youthful glory dressed,\n  So when Alcides' mortal mould resign'd,\n  His better part enlarged, and grew refin'd.\"--OVID.\n\nIt was probably this which connected it with the idea of an eternal\nsuccession of forms, constant reproduction and dissolution, a process\nwhich was supposed by the ancients to have been for ever going on in\nnature. This doctrine is illustrated in the notion of a succession of Ages\nwhich prevailed among the Greeks, corresponding to the Yugs of the Hindus,\nand Suns of the aboriginal Mexicans. It is further illustrated by the\nannual dissolution and renovation exhibited, in the succession of the\nseasons, and which was supposed to result from the augmentation and\ndecline of the active principle, the Sun.\n\nThe mysteries of Osiris, Isis, and Horus, in Egypt; Atys and Cybele, in\nPhrygia; Ceres and Proserpine, at Eleusis; of Venus and Adonis in\nPhoenicia; of Bona Dea, and Priapus, in Rome, are all susceptible of one\nexplanation. They all set forth and illustrated, by solemn and impressive\nrites and mystical symbols, the grand phenomena of nature, especially as\nconnected with the creation of things and the perpetuation of life. In\nall, it is worthy of remark, the serpent was more or less conspicuously\nintroduced, always as symbolical of the invigorating or active energy of\nnature. In the mysteries of Ceres and Proserpine, the grand secret\ncommunicated to the initiated was thus enigmatically expressed: _Taurus\nDraconem genuit, et Taurum Draco_; \"The bull has begotten a serpent, and\nthe serpent a bull.\" The bull, as already seen, was a prominent emblem of\ngenerative force, the Bacchus Zagreus, or Tauriformis.\n\nThe doctrine of an unending succession of forms was not remotely connected\nwith that of regeneration, or new birth, which was part of the phallic\nsystem, and which was recognised in a form more or less distinct in nearly\nall the primitive religions. In Hindustan, this doctrine is still enforced\nin the most unequivocal manner, through the medium of rites of portentous\nsolemnity and significance to the devotees of the Hindu religion. \"For the\npurpose of regeneration,\" says Wilford, \"it is directed to make an image\nof pure gold of the female powers of nature in the shape of either a woman\nor a cow. In this statue the person to be regenerated is enclosed, and\nafterwards dragged out through the usual channel. As a statue of pure\ngold, and of proper dimensions would be too expensive, it is sufficient to\nmake an image of the sacred Yoni, through which the person to be\nregenerated is to pass.\"\n\nWe have seen the serpent as a symbol of productive energy associated with\nthe egg as a symbol of the passive elements of nature. The egg does not,\nhowever, appear except in the earlier cosmogonies. \"As the male serpent,\"\nsays Faber, \"was employed to symbolize the Great Father, so the female\nserpent was equally used to typify the Great Mother. Such a mode of\nrepresentation may be proved by express testimony, and is wholly agreeable\nto the analogy of the entire system of Gentile mythology. In the same\nmanner that the two great parents were worshipped under the hieroglyphics\nof a bull and cow, a lion and lioness, &c., so they were adored under the\ncognate figures of a male and female serpent.\"\n\nNearly every inquirer into the primitive superstitions of men has observed\na close relationship, if not an absolute identity, in what are usually\ndistinguished as Solar, Phallic, and Serpent Worship, yet the _rationale_\nof the connection has been rarely detected. They really are all forms of a\nsingle worship. \"If (as it seems certain) they all three be identical,\"\nobserves Mr. O'Brien, \"where is the occasion for surprise at our meeting\nthe sun, phallus, and serpent, the constituent symbols of each, occurring\nin combination, embossed upon the same table, and grouped upon the same\narchitrave.\"\n\nWe turn again to America. The principal God of the Aztecs, subordinate to\nthe great Unity, was the impersonation of the active, creative energy,\nTezcatlipoca or Tonacatlecoatl. He was also called Tonacatenctli.\n\nLike the Hindu Brahma, the Greek Phanes, and the Egyptian Phtha, he was\nthe \"Creator of heaven and earth,\" \"the Great Father,\" \"the God of\nProvidence,\" who dwells in heaven, earth, and hades, and attends to the\ngovernment of the world. To denote this unfailing power and eternal youth,\nhis figure was that of a young man. His celestial emblem was Tonatiuh, the\nSun. His companion or wife was Cihuacohuatl or Tonaeacihua, \"the Great\nMother\" both of gods and men.\n\nThe remaining gods and goddesses of the Aztec Pantheon resolve themselves\ninto modified impersonations of these two powers. Thus, we have Ometuctli\nand Omecihuatl, the adorable god and goddess who preside over the\ncelestial paradise, and which, though generally supposed to be distinct\ndivinities, are, nevertheless, according to the Codex Vaticanus, but other\nnames for the deities already designated. We have also Xiuhteuctli,\n\"Master of the Year,\" \"the God of Fire,\" the terrestrial symbol of the\nactive principle, and Xochitli, \"the Goddess of Earth and Corn;\" Tlaloc\nand Cinteotl, or Chalchiuhcueije, \"the god and goddess of the waters;\"\nMictlanteuctli and Mictlancihuatl, \"the god and goddess of the dead;\" the\nterrible Mexitli or Huitzlipochtli, corresponding to the Hindu Siva, in\nhis character of destroyer, and his wife Teoyamiqui, whose image, like\nthat of Kali, the consort of Siva, was decorated with the combined emblems\nof life and death.\n\nIn the simple mythology and pure Sabianism of Peru, we have already shown\nthe existence of the primeval principles symbolized, the first by the Sun\nand the second by his wife and sister the Moon. That the sun was here\nregarded as symbolizing the intermediate father, or demiurgic creator,\ncannot be doubted. The great and solemn feast of Raimi was instituted in\nacknowledgment of the Sun as the great father of all visible things, by\nwhom all living things are generated and sustained. The ceremonies of this\nfeast were emblematical, and principally referred to the sun as the\nreproductive and preserving power of nature. In Mexico, where the\nprimitive religion partook of the fiercer nature of the people, we find\nthe Raimaic ceremonies assuming a sanguinary character, and the\nacknowledgment of the reproductive associated with the propitiation of its\nantagonist principle, as we see in the orgies of Huitzlipochtli in his\ncharacter of the Destroyer. The same remarks hold true of Central America,\nthe religion and mythology of which country correspond essentially with\nthose of the nations of Anahuac.\n\nWe have said that the principal god of the Aztec pantheon, subordinate\nonly to the Unity and corresponding to the Hindu Brahma, was Tezcatlipoca,\nTonacatlecoalt, or Tonacateuctli. If we consult the etymology of these\nnames we shall find ample confirmation of the correctness of the\ndeductions already drawn from the mythologies of the East. Thus\nTonacateuctli embodied Lord Sun from Tonatiuh, Sun, _nacayo_ or catl, body\nor person, and teuctli, master or lord. Again, Tonacatlcoatl, the Serpent\nSun, from Tonctiah and catl, as above, and coatl, serpent. If we adopt\nanother etymology for the names (and that which seems to have been most\ngenerally accepted by the early writers) we shall have Tonacateuctli, Lord\nof our Flesh, from to, the possessive pronoun plural, nacatl, flesh or\nbody, and teuctli, master or lord. We shall also have Tonacatlecoatl,\nSerpent of our Flesh, from to and nacatl, and coatl, serpent.\n\nAccording to Sahagim, Tezcatlipoca, in his character of the God of Hosts,\nwas addressed as follows by the Mexican High Priest:--\"We entreat that\nthose who die in war may be received by thee, our Father the Sun, and our\nMother the Earth, for thou alone reignest.\" The same authority informs us\nthat in the prayer of thanks, returned to Tezcatlipoca by the Mexican\nkings on the occasion of their coronation, God was recognised as the God\nof Fire, to whom Xiuthteuctli, Lord of Vegetation, and specifically Lord\nof Fire, bears the same relation that Suyra does to the first person of\nthe Hindu Triad. The king petitions that he may act \"in conformity with\nthe will of the ancient God, the Father of all Gods, who is the God of\nFire; whose habitation is in the midst of the waters, encompassed by\nbattlements, surrounded by rocks as it were with roses, whose name is\nXiuteuctli,\" etc.\n\nTonacateuctli, or Tezcatlipoca, is often, not to say generally, both on\nthe monuments and in the paintings, represented as surrounded by a disc of\nthe sun.\n\nThe name of the primitive goddess, the wife of Tezcatlipoca, was\nCihuacohuatl or Tonacacihua. She was well known by other names, all\nreferring to her attributes. The etymology of Cihuacohuatl is clearly\nCihua, woman or female, and coatl, serpent--Female Serpent. And\nTonacacihua is Female Sun, from Tonatiuh nacatl (as before) and cihua,\nwoman or female. Adopting the other etymology, it is Woman of our Flesh.\n\nGama, who is said to be by far the most intelligent author who has treated\nwith any detail of the Mexican Gods, referring to the serpent symbols\nbelonging to the statue of Teoyaomiqui, says--\"These refer to another\nGoddess named Cihuacohuatl, or Female Serpent, which the Mexicans believe\ngave to the light, at a single birth, two children, one male and the other\nfemale, to whom they refer the origin of mankind: and hence twins, among\nthe Mexicans, are called cohuatl or coatl, which is corrupted in the\npronunciation by the vulgar into coate.\"\n\nWhichever etymology we assign to Tonaca in these combinations, the leading\nfact that the Great Father was designated as the male serpent, and the\nGreat Mother as the female servant, remains unaffected. Not only were they\nthus designated, but Cinacoatl or Cihuacohuatl was generally if not always\nrepresented, in the paintings, accompanied by a great snake or\nfeather-headed serpent (Tonacatlecoatl \"serpent sun\") in which the monkish\ninterpreters did not fail to discover a palpable allusion to Eve and the\ntempter of the garden.\n\nPursuing the subject of the connection of the Serpent Symbol with American\nMythology, we remark, the fact that it was a conspicuous symbol and could\nnot escape the attention of the most superficial of observers of the\nMexican and Central American monuments, and mythological paintings. The\nearly Spaniards were particularly struck with its prominence.\n\n\"The snake,\" says Dupaix, \"was a conspicuous object in the Mexican\nmythology, and we find it carved in various shapes and sizes, coiled,\nextended, spiral or entwined with great beauty, and sometimes represented\nwith feathers and other ornaments. These different representatives,\" he\ncontinues, \"no doubt denoted its different attributes.\"\n\nThe editor of Kingsborough's great work observes:--\"Like the Egyptian\nSphynx, the mystical snake of the Mexicans had its enigmas, and both are\nbeyond our power to unravel;\" this, however, is a matter of opinion, and\nthe conclusion is one from which many will strongly dissent.\n\nIn almost every primitive mythology we find, not only a Great Father and\nMother, the representatives of the reciprocal principles, and a Great\nHemaphrodite Unity from whom the first proceed and in whom they are both\ncombined, but we find also a beneficial character, partaking of a divine\nand human nature, who is the Great Teacher of Men, who instructs them in\nreligion, civil organization and the arts, and who, after a life of\nexemplary usefulness, disappears mysteriously, leaving his people\nimpressed with the highest respect for his institutions and the\nprofoundest regard for his memory. This demi-god, to whom divine honours\nare often paid after his withdrawal from the earth, is usually the Son of\nthe Sun, or of the Demiurgic Creator, the Great Father, who stands at the\nhead of the primitive pantheons and subordinate only to the Supreme Unity;\nhe is born of an earthly mother, a virgin, and often a vestal of the Sun,\nwho conceives in a mysterious manner, and who, after giving birth to her\nhalf-divine son, is herself sometimes elevated to the rank of a goddess.\nIn the more refined and systematized mythologies he appears clearly as an\nincarnation of the Great Father and partaking of his attributes, his\nterrestial representative, and the mediator between him and man. He\nappears as Buddha in India; Fohi in China; Schaka in Thibet; Zoroasta in\nPersia; Osiris in Egypt; Taut in Phoenicia; Hermes or Cadmus in Greece;\nRomulus in Rome; Odin in Scandinavia; and in each case is regarded as the\nGreat Teacher of Men, and the founder of religion.\n\nIn the mythological systems of America, this intermediate demi-god was not\nless clearly recognised than in those of the Old World; indeed, as these\nsystems were less complicated because less modified from the original or\nprimitive forms, the Great Teacher appears here with more distinctness.\nAmong the savage tribes his origin and character were, for obvious\nreasons, much confused; but among the more advanced nations he occupied a\nwell-defined position.\n\nAmong the nations of Anahuac, he bore the name of Quetzalcoatl (Feathered\nSerpent) and was regarded with the highest veneration. His festivals were\nthe most gorgeous of the year. To him it is said the great temple of\nCholula was dedicated. His history, drawn from various sources, is as\nfollows:--The god of the \"Milky Way\"--in other words, of Heaven--the\nprincipal deity of the Aztec Pantheon, and the Great Father of gods and\nmen, sent a message to a virgin of Tulan, telling her that it was the will\nof the gods that she should conceive a son, which she did without knowing\nany man. This son was Quetzalcoatl, who was figured as tall, of fair\ncomplexion, open forehead, large eyes and a thick beard. He became high\npriest of Tulan, introducted the worship of the gods, established laws\ndisplaying the profoundest wisdom, regulated the calendar, and maintained\nthe most rigid and exemplary manners in his life. He was averse to\ncruelty, abhorred war, and taught men to cultivate the soil, to reduce\nmetal from their ores, and many other things necessary to their welfare.\nUnder his benign administration the widest happiness prevailed amongst\nmen. The corn grew to such a size that a single ear was a load for a man;\ngourds were as long as a man's body; it was unnecessary to dye cotton for\nit grew of all colours; all fruits were in the greatest profusion and of\nextraordinary size; there were also vast numbers of beautiful and sweet\nsinging birds. His reign was the golden age of Anahuac. He however\ndisappeared suddenly and mysteriously, in what manner is unknown. Some say\nhe died on the sea-shore, and others say that he wandered away in search\nof the imaginary kingdom of Tlallapa. He was deified; temples were erected\nto him, and he was adored throughout Anahuac.\n\nQuetzalcoatl is, therefore, but an incarnation of the \"Serpent Sun\"\nTonacatlecoalt, and, as is indicated by his name, the feathered serpent\nwas his recognised symbol. He was thus symbolized in accordance with a\npractice which (says Gama) prevailed in Mexico, of associating or\nconnecting with the representatives of a god or goddess, the symbols of\nthe other deities from whom they are derived, or to whom they sustain\nsome relation. His temples were distinguished as being circular, and the\none dedicated to his worship in Mexico, was, according to Gomera, entered\nby a door \"like unto the mouth of a serpent, which was a thing to fear by\nthose who went in thereat, especially by the Christians, to whom it\nrepresented very hell.\"\n\nThe Mayas of Yucatan had a demi-god corresponding entirely with\nQuetzalcoatl, if he was not the same under a different name--a conjecture\nvery well sustained by the evident relationship between the Mexican and\nMayan mythologies. He was named Itzamna or Zamna, and was the only son of\nthe principal God, Kinchanan. He arrived from the East, and instructed the\npeople in all that was essential to their welfare. \"He,\" says Cogolludo,\n\"invented the characters which they use as letters, and which are called\nafter him, Itzamna, and they adore him as a god.\"\n\nThere was another similar character in Yucatan, called Ku Kulcan or\nCuculcan, another in Nicaragua named Theotbilake, son of their principal\ngod Thomathoyo, and another in Colombia bearing the name of Bochia. Peru\nand Guatemala furnish similar traditions, as do also Brazil, the nations\nof the Tamanac race, Florida, and various savage tribes of the West.\n\nThe serpent, as we show elsewhere, was an emblem both of Quetzalcoatl and\nof Ku Kulcan--a fact which gives some importance to the statement of\nCabrera that Votan of Guatemala as above was represented to be a serpent,\nor of serpent origin.\n\nTorquemada states, that the images of Huitzlipochtli of Mexico,\nQuetzalcoatl, and Tlaloc were each represented with a golden serpent,\nbearing different symbolical sacrificial allusions. He also assures us\nthat serpents often entered into the symbolical sacrificial ceremonies of\nthe Mexicans, and presents the following example:--\n\n\"Among the many sacrifices which these Indians made, there was one which\nthey performed in honour of the mountains, by forming serpents out of wood\nor of the roots of the trees, to which they affixed serpents' heads, and\nalso dolls of the same, which they called Ecatotowin, which figures of\nserpents and fictitious children they covered with dough, named by them\nTzoalli, composed of the seeds of Bledos, and placed them on supports of\nwood, carved in the representation of hills or mountains, on the tops of\nwhich they fixed them. This was the kind of offering which they made to\nthe mountains and high hills.\"\n\nThe mother of Huitzlipochtli was a priestess of Tezcatlipoca (a cleanser\nof the temple, says Gama) named Coatlantona, Coatlcue, or Coatlcyue\n(serpent of the temple or serpent woman). She was extremely devoted to the\ngods, and one day when walking in the temple, she beheld, descending in\nthe air, a ball made of variously coloured feathers. She placed it in her\ngirdle, became at once pregnant, and afterwards was delivered of Mexith or\nHuitzlipochtli, full armed, with a spear in one hand, a shield in the\nother, and a crest of green feathers on his head. He became, according to\nsome, their leader into Anahuac, guiding them to the place where Mexico is\nbuilt. His statue was of gigantic size, and covered with ornaments each\none of which had its significance. He was depicted placed upon a seat,\nfrom the four corners of which issued four large serpents. \"His body,\"\nsays Gomeza, \"was beset with pearls, precious stones and gold, and for\ncollars and chains around his neck ten hearts of men made of gold. It had\nalso a counterfeit vizard, with eyes of glass, and in its neck death\npainted, all of which things had their considerations and meanings.\" It\nwas to him in his divine character of the destroyer that the bloodiest\nsacrifices of Mexico were performed. His wife, Teoyaomiqui (from Teo,\nsacred or divine; Yaoyotl, war; and Miqui, to kill) was represented as a\nfigure bearing the full breasts of a woman, literally enveloped in\nserpents, and ornamented with feathers, shells, and the teeth and claws of\na tiger. She had a necklace composed of six hands. Around her waist is a\nbelt to which death's heads are attached. One of her statues, a horrible\nfigure, still exists in the city of Mexico. It is carved from a solid\nblock of vasalt, and is nine feet in height and five and a half in\nbreadth.\n\nIt is not improbable that the serpent-mother of Huitzlipochtli was an\nimpersonation of the great female serpent Cinacohuatl, the wife of\nTonacatlecoatl, the serpent-father of Quetzalcoatl. However this may be,\nit is clear that a more intimate connection exists between the several\nprincipal divinities of Mexico, than appears from the confused and meagre\naccounts which have been left us of their mythology. Indeed, we have seen\nthat the Hindu Triad, Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva, has very nearly its\ncounterpart in Tezcatlipoca, Tlaloc, and the celestial Huitzlipochtli, the\nCreator, Preserver, and Destroyer and Reproducer. In the delineations of\nSiva or Mahadeo, in his character of the destroyer, he is represented as\nwrapped in tiger skins. A hooded snake is twisted around him and lifts its\nhead above his shoulder, and twisted snakes form his head-dress. In other\ncases he holds a spear, a sword, a serpent, and a skull, and has a girdle\nof skulls around his waist. The bull Nandi (emblem of generative force),\nas also the lingham, are among his emblems. To him were dedicated the\nbloodiest sacrifices of India. Durga, or Kali (an impersonation of Bhavin,\ngoddess of nature and fecundity) corresponds with the Mexican Tesyaomiqui,\nand is represented in a similar manner. She is a war goddess and her\nmartial deeds give her a high position in the Hindu pantheon. As Kali, her\nrepresentatives are most terrible. The emblems of destruction are common\nto all: she is entwined with serpents; a circlet of flowers surrounds her\nhead; a necklace of skulls; a girdle of dissevered human hands; tigers\ncrouching at her feet--indeed every combination of the horrible and the\nloathsome is invoked to portray the dark character which she represents.\nShe delights in human sacrifices and the ritual prescribes that, previous\nto the death of the victim, she should be invoked as follows: \"Let the\nsacrificer first repeat the name of Kali thrice, Hail, Kali! Kali! Hail,\nDevi! Hail, Goddess of Thunder! iron-sceptered, hail, fierce Kali! Cut,\nslay, destroy! bind, secure! Cut with the axe, drink blood, slay,\ndestroy!\" \"She has four hands,\" says Patterson, \"two of which are employed\nin the work of death; one points downwards, allusive to the destruction\nwhich surrounds her, and the other upwards, which seems to promise the\nregeneration of nature by a new creation.\" \"On her festivals,\" says\nColeman, \"her temples literally stream with blood.\" As Durga, however, she\nis often represented as the patroness of Virtue and her battles with evil\ndemons form the subject of many Hindu poems. She is under this aspect the\narmed Phallas.\n\nWe have seen that the Creator of the World, the Great Father of the\nAztecs, Tonacatlecoatl or Tezcatlipoca, and his wife Cihuacohuatl, were\nnot only symbolized as the Sun and Moon, but also that they were\ndesignated as the male and female serpent, and that in the mythological\npictures the former was represented as a feather-headed snake. We have\nalso seen that the incarnate or human representative of this deity\nQuetzalcoatl, was also symbolized as a feathered serpent. This was in\naccordance with the system of the Aztecs, who represented cognate symbols,\nand invested the impersonations or descendants of the greater gods with\ntheir emblems.\n\nThese facts being well established, many monuments of American antiquity,\notherwise inexplicable, become invested with significance. In Mexico,\nunfortunately, the monumental records of the ancient inhabitants have\nbeen so ruthlessly destroyed or obliterated that now they afford us but\nlittle aid in our researches. Her ancient paintings, although there are\nsome which have escaped the general devastation, are principally beyond\nour reach and cannot be consulted particularly upon these points. In\nCentral America, however, we find many remains which, although in a ruined\nstate, are much more complete and much more interesting than any others\nconcerning which we possess any certain information.\n\nThe researches and explorations of Messrs. Stephens and Catherwood have\nplaced many of these before us in a form which enables us to detect their\nleading features. Ranking first among the many interesting groups of ruins\ndiscovered by these gentlemen, both in respect to their extent and\ncharacter, are those of Chichen-itza. One of the structures comprising\nthis group is described as follows:--\"The building called the Castillo is\nthe first which we saw, and is, from every point of view, the grandest and\nmost conspicuous object that towers above the plain. The mound upon which\nit stands measures one hundred and ninety-seven feet at the base, and is\nbuilt up, apparently solid, to the height of seventy-five feet. On the\nwest side is a stairway thirty-seven feet wide; on the north another,\nforty-four feet wide, and containing ninety steps. On the ground at the\nfoot of the stairway, forming a bold, striking, and well-conceived\ncommencement, are two collossal serpents' heads (feathered) ten feet in\nlength, with mouths wide open and tongues protruding.\"\n\n\"No doubt they were emblematic of some religious belief, and, in the minds\nof the imaginative people passing between them, must have excited feelings\nof solemn awe. The platform on the mound is about sixty feet square and is\ncrowned by a building measuring forty-three by forty-nine feet. Single\ndoorways face the east, south and west, having massive lentils of zapote\nwood, covered with elaborate carvings, and the jambs are ornamented with\nsculptured figures. The sculpture is much worn, but the head-dress of\nfeathers and portions of the rich attire still remain. The face is well\npreserved and has a dignified aspect. All the other jambs are decorated\nwith sculptures of the same general character, and all open into a\ncorridor six feet wide, extending around three sides of the building. The\ninterior of this building was ornamented with very elaborate but much\nobliterated carvings.\n\n\"The sacred character of this remarkable structure is apparent at the\nfirst glance, and it is equally obvious that the various sculptures must\nhave some significance. The entrance between the two colossal serpents'\nheads remind us at once of Gomera's description of the entrance to the\ntemple of Quetzalcoatl in Mexico, which 'was like unto the mouth of a\nserpent and which was a thing to fear by those who entered in thereat.'\"\n\nThe circumstance that these heads are feathered seems further to connect\nthis temple with the worship of that divinity. But in the figures\nsculptured upon the jambs of the entrances, and which, Mr. Stephens\nobserves, were of the same general character throughout, we have further\nproof that this structure was dedicated to a serpent divinity. Let it be\nremembered that the dignified personage there represented is accompanied\nby a feathered serpent, the folds of which are gracefully arrayed behind\nthe figure and the tail of which is marked by the rattles of the\nrattle-snake--the distinguishing mark of the monumental serpent of the\ncontinent, whether represented in the carvings of the mounds or in the\nsculptures of Central America. This temple, we may therefore reasonably\ninfer, was sacred to the benign Quetzalcoatl, or a character corresponding\nto him, whose symbolical serpent guarded the ascent to the summit, and\nwhose imposing representation was sculptured on its portals. This\ninference is supported by the fact that in Mexican paintings the temples\nof Quetzalcoatl are indicated by a serpent entwined around or rising above\nthem, as may be seen in an example from the Codex Borgianus in\nKingsborough.\n\nBut this is not all. We have already said that amongst the Itzaes--\"holy\nmen\"--the founders of Chichen-itza and afterwards of Mayapan, there was a\ncharacter, corresponding in many respects with Quetzalcoatl, named Ku\nKulcan or Cuculcan. Torquemada, quoted by Cogolludo, asserts that this was\nbut another name for Quetzalcoatl. Cogolludo himself speaks of Ku Kulcan\nas \"one who had been a great captain among them,\" and was afterwards\nworshipped as a god. Herrara states that he ruled at Chichen-itza; that\nall agreed that he came from the westward, but that a difference exists as\nto whether he came before or afterwards or with the Itzaes. \"But\" he adds,\n\"the name of the structure at Chichen-itza and the events of that country\nafter the death of the lords, shows that Cuculcan governed with them. He\nwas a man of good disposition, not known to have had wife or children, a\ngreat statesman, and therefore looked upon as a god, he having contrived\nto build another city in which business might be managed. To this purpose\nthey pitched upon a spot eight leagues from Merida, where they made an\nenclosure of about an eighth of a league in circuit, being a wall of dry\nstone with only two gates. They built temples, calling the greatest of\nthem Cuculcan. Near the enclosures were the houses of the prime men, among\nwhom Cuculcan divided the land, appointing towns to each of them.\n\n\"This city was called Mayapan (the standard of Maya), the Mayan being the\nlanguage of the country. Cuculcan governed in peace and quietness and with\ngreat justice for some years, when, having provided for his departure and\nrecommended to them the good form of government which had been\nestablished, he returned to Mexico the same way he came, making some stay\nat Chanpotan, where, as a memorial of his journey, he erected a structure\nin the sea, which is to be seen to this day.\"[9]\n\nWe have here the direct statement that the principal structure at Mayapan\nwas called Cuculcan; and from the language of Herrara the conclusion is\nirresistible that the principal structure of Chichen-itza was also called\nby the same name. These are extremely interesting facts, going far to show\nthat the figure represented in the \"Castillo,\" and which we have\nidentified upon other evidence as being that of a personage corresponding\nto Quetzalcoatl, is none other than the figure of the demi-god Ku Kulcan,\nor Cuculcan, to whose worship the temple was dedicated and after whom it\nwas named.\n\nIf we consult the etymology of the name Ku Kulcan we shall have further\nand striking evidence in support of this conclusion. _Ku_ in the Mayan\nlanguage means God, and _can_ serpent. We have, then, Ku _Kul_can,\nGod--_Kul_, Serpent, or Serpent-God. What _Kul_ signifies it is not\npretended to say, but we may reasonably conjecture that it is a qualifying\nword to _can_ serpent. _Kukum_ is feather, and it is possible that by\nbeing converted into an adjective form it may change its termination into\nKukul. The etymology may therefore be Kukumcan Feather-Serpent, or\nKukulcan Feathered Serpent. We, however, repose on the first explanation,\nand unhesitatingly hazard the opinion that, when opportunity is afforded\nof ascertaining the value of _Kul_, the correctness of our conclusions\nwill be fully justified.\n\nAnd here we may also add that the etymology of Kinchahan, the name of the\nprincipal god of the Mayas and corresponding to Tonacatlcoatl of Mexico,\nis precisely the same as that of the latter. _Kin_ is Sun in the Mayan\nlanguage, and _Chahan_, as every one acquainted with the Spanish\npronunciation well knows, is nothing more than a variation in orthography\nfor _Caeaen_ or _Can_, serpent. Kin Chahan, Kincaan, or Kincan is,\ntherefore, Sun-serpent.\n\nThe observation that Quetzalcoatl might be regarded as the incarnation of\nTezcatlipoca, or Tonacatlcoatl, corresponding to the Buddha of the Hindus,\nwas based upon the coincidences in their origin, character, and teachings,\nbut there are some remarkable coincidences between the temples dedicated\nto the worship of these two great teachers--or perhaps we should say,\nbetween the religious structures of Central America and Mexico and\nHindustan and the islands of the Indian Archipelago, which deserve\nattention.\n\nFrom the top of the lofty temple at Chichen-itza, just described, Mr.\nStephens saw, for the first time, groups of columns or upright stones\nwhich, he observes, proved upon examination to be among the most\nremarkable and unintelligible remains he had yet encountered. \"They stood\nin rows of three, four and five abreast, many rows continuing in the same\ndirection, when they collectively changed and pursued another. They were\nlow, the tallest not more than six feet high. Many had fallen, in some\nplaces lying prostrate in rows, all in the same direction, as if thrown\nintentionally. In some cases they extended to the bases of large mounds,\non which were ruins of buildings and large fragments of sculptures, while\nin others they branched off and terminated abruptly. I counted three\nhundred and eighty, and there were many more; but so many were broken and\nlay so irregularly that I gave up counting them.\"\n\nThose represented by Mr. Stephens, in his plate, occur in immediate\nconnection with the temple above described, and enclose an area nearly\nfour hundred feet square.\n\nIn the third volume of the \"Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society\" is\nan account of the mixed temples of the ancient city of Anarajapura\n(situated in the centre of the island of Ceylon) by Captain Chapman, of\nthe British Army. The remarkable character of these ancient structures and\nthe decided resemblances which they sustain to those of Central America,\nand particularly to the group of Chichen-itza, justify a somewhat detailed\nnotice of them.\n\nAccording to native records, Anarajapura was, for a period of thirteen\nhundred years, both the principal seat of the religion of the country and\nthe residence of its kings. It abounded in magnificent buildings,\nsculptures and other works of art, and was, as it still is, held in the\ngreatest veneration by the followers of Buddha as the most sacred spot in\nthe island.\n\n\"At this time,\" says Captain Chapman, \"the only remaining traces of the\ncity consist of nine temples; of two very extensive banks; of several\nsmaller ones in ruins; of groups of pillars, and of portions of walls,\nwhich are scattered over an extent of several miles. The nine temples are\nstill held in great reverence, and are visited periodically by the\nBuddhists. They consist first of an enclosure, in which are the sacred\ntrees called the Bogaha; the Thousand Pillars called Lowa Maha Paya; and\nthe seven mounds or Dagobas, each one of which has a distinct name given\nit by its founder.\"\n\nThe temple of Bo Malloa, especially sacred to Buddha, is of granite and\nconsists of a series of four rectangular terraces, faced with granite,\nrising out of each other and diminishing both in height and extent, upon\nwhich are situated the altars and the sacred Bogaha trees, or trees of\nBuddha. The total height of the terraces is about twenty feet and the\nextent of the largest thirty paces by fifteen. These terraces are ascended\nby flights of steps. At the foot of the principal flight are slabs of\ngranite, placed perpendicularly, upon which figures are boldly sculptured;\nand between is a semi-circular stone with simple mouldings let in the\nground. Upon the east of the building projects a colossal figure of\nBuddha. Another similar, but smaller, structure is placed a little to the\neastward of that first described. Both are surrounded by a wall, enclosing\na space one hundred and twenty five paces long by seventy-five wide,\nwithin which are planted a variety of odoriferous trees.\n\nA few paces to the eastward of this enclosure are the ruins of the\n\"Thousand Pillars.\" These consisted originally of 1600 pillars, disposed\nin a square. The greater part are still standing; they consist, with a few\nexceptions, of a single piece of gneiss in the rough state in which they\nwere quarried. They are ten or twelve feet above the ground; twelve inches\nby eight square, and about four feet from each other; but the two in the\ncentre of the outer line differ from the rest in being of hard blue\ngranite, and in being more carefully finished. These pillars were said to\nhave been covered with _chunam_ (plaster) and thus converted into columns\nhaving definite forms and proportions. There is a tradition that there\nwas formerly in the centre of this square a brazen chamber, in which was\ncontained a relic held in much veneration. A few paces from this was a\nsingle pillar of gneiss in a rough state, which was from fourteen to\nsixteen feet high.\n\nCaptain Chapman observes that structures, accompanied by similar groups of\ncolumns, exist on the opposite or continental coast. The temples of\nRamiseram, Madura, and the celebrated one of Seringham, have each their\n\"Thousand Pillars.\" In Ramiseram the pillars are arranged in colonnades of\nseveral parallel rows, and these colonnades are separated by tanks or\nspaces occupied by buildings in the manner indicated by Mr. Stephens at\nChichen-itza. Some of these pillars are carved; others are in their rough\nstate or covered with plaster. In Madura the pillars are disposed in a\nsquare of lines radiating in such a manner that a person placed in the\ncentre can see through in every direction. This square is on a raised\nterrace, the pillars rude and only about eight feet high. At Seringham the\npillars also form a square.\n\nThe dagobas, occurring in connection with the temple of Buddha and the\n\"Thousand Pillars\" at Anarajapura, deserve a notice, as they correspond in\nmany respects with some of the structures at Chichen. They are of various\ndimensions and consist generally of raised terraces or platforms of great\nextent, surrounded by mounds of earth faced with brick or stone, and often\ncrowned with circular, dome-shaped structures. The base is usually\nsurrounded by rows of columns. They vary from fifty to one hundred and\nfifty feet in height. The dagobas, of intermediate size, have occasionally\na form approaching that of a bubble, but in general they have the form of\na bell. They constitute part of the Buddhist Temples, almost without\nexception. We have, in the character of these singular columns and their\narrangement in respect to each other and the pyramidal structures in\nconnection with which they are found, a most striking resemblance between\nthe ruins of Chichen-itza in Central America, and Anarajapura in\nCeylon--between the temples of Buddha and those of Quetzalcoatl, or some\ncorresponding character. The further coincidences which exist between the\nsacred architecture of India and Central America will be reserved for\nanother place. We cannot, however, omit to notice here the structure at\nChichen-itza designated as the \"Caracol,\" both from its resemblance to the\ndagobas of Ceylon and its connection with the worship of the Serpent\nDeity. Mr. Stephens describes it as follows:--\n\n\"It is circular in form and is known by the name of the Caracol, or\nWinding Staircase, on account of its interior arrangements. It stands on\nthe upper of two terraces. The lower one measuring in front, from north to\nsouth, two hundred and twenty-three feet, and is still in good\npreservation. A grand staircase, forty-five feet wide, and containing\ntwenty steps, rises to the platform of this terrace. On each side of the\nstaircase, forming a sort of balustrade, rest the entwined bodies of two\ngigantic serpents, three feet wide, portions of which are still in place;\nand amongst the ruins of the staircase a gigantic head, which had\nterminated, at one side the foot of the steps. The platform of the second\nterrace measured eighty feet in front and fifty-five in depth, and is\nreached by another staircase forty-two feet wide and having forty-two\nsteps. In the centre of the steps and against the wall of the terrace are\nthe remains of a pedestal six feet high, on which probably once stood an\nidol. On the platform, fifteen feet from the last step, stands the\nbuilding. It is twenty-two feet in diameter and has four small doorways\nfacing the cardinal points. Above the cornice the roof sloped off so as to\nform an apex. The height, including the terraces, is little short of sixty\nfeet. The doorways give entrance to a circular corridor five feet wide.\nThe inner wall has four doorways, smaller than the others, and standing\nintermediately with respect to them. These doors give entrance to a second\ncircular corridor, four feet wide, and in the centre is a circular mass,\napparently of solid stone, seven feet six inches in diameter; but in one\nplace, at the height of eleven feet from the floor, was a small square\nopening, which I endeavoured to clear out but without success. The roof\nwas so tottering that I could not discover to what this opening led. The\nwalls of both corridors were plastered and covered with paintings, and\nboth were covered with a triangular arch.\"\n\nMr. Stephens also found at Mayapan, which city, as we have seen, was built\nby Ku Kulcan, the great ruler and demi-god of Chichen-itza, a dome-shaped\nedifice of much the same character with that here described. It is the\nprincipal structure here, and stands on a mound thirty feet high. The\nwalls are ten feet high to the top of the lower cornice, and fourteen more\nto the upper one. It has a single entrance towards the west. The outer\nwall is five feet thick, within which is a corridor three feet wide,\nsurrounding a solid cylindrical mass of stone, nine feet in thickness. The\nwalls have four or five coats of stucco and were covered with remains of\npaintings, in which red, yellow, blue and white were distinctly visible.\nOn the south-west of the building was a double row of columns, eight feet\napart, though probably from the remains around, there had been more, and\nby clearing away the trees others might be found. They were two feet and a\nhalf in diameter. We are not informed upon the point but presumably the\ncolumns were arranged, in respect to the structure, in the same manner as\nthose accompanying the dagobas of Ceylon, or the mounds of Chichen-itza.\n\nAmong the ruins of Chichen are none more remarkable than that called by\nthe natives \"Egclesia\" or the Church. It is described by Mr. Stephens as\nconsisting of \"two immense parallel walls each two hundred and\nseventy-five feet long, thirty feet thick, and placed one hundred and\ntwenty feet apart. One hundred feet from the northern extremity, facing\nthe space between the walls, stands, on a terrace, a building thirty-five\nfeet long, containing a single chamber, with the front fallen, and rising\namong the rubbish the remains of two columns elaborately ornamented, the\nwhole interior wall being exposed to view, covered from top to bottom with\nsculptured figures in bas-relief much worn and faded. At the southern end\nalso, placed back a hundred feet and corresponding in position, is another\nbuilding eighty-one feet long, in ruins, but also exhibiting the remains\nof this column richly sculptured. In the centre of the great stone walls,\nexactly opposite each other, and at the height of thirty feet from the\nground, are two massive stone rings, four feet in diameter and one foot\none inch thick, the diameter of the hole is one foot seven inches. On the\nrim and border are sculptured two entwined serpents; one of them is\nfeather-headed, the other is not.\" May we regard them as allusive to the\nSerpent God and the Serpent Goddess of the Aztec mythology? Mr. Stephens\nis disposed to regard the singular structure here described as a Gymnasium\nor Tennis Court, and supports his opinion by a quotation from Herrara. It\nseems to others much more probable that, with the other buildings of the\ngroup, this had an exclusively sacred origin. However that may be, the\nentwined serpents are clearly symbolical, inasmuch as we find them\nelsewhere, in a much more conspicuous position, and occupying the first\nplace among the emblematic figures sculptured on the aboriginal temples.\n\nImmediately in connection with this singular structure and constituting\npart of the eastern wall, is a building, in many respects the most\ninteresting visited by Mr. Stephens, and respecting which it is to be\nregretted he has not given us a more complete account. It requires no\nextraordinary effort of fancy to discover in the sculptures and paintings\nwith which it is decorated the pictured records of the teachings of the\ndeified Ku Kulcan, who instructed men in the arts, taught them in\nreligion, and instituted government. There are represented processions of\nfigures, covered with ornaments, and carrying arms. \"One of the inner\nchambers is covered,\" says Mr. Stephens, \"from the floor to the arched\nroof, with designs in painting, representing, in bright and vivid colours,\nhuman figures, battles, horses, boats, trees, and various scenes in\ndomestic life.\" These correspond very nearly with the representations on\nthe walls of the ancient Buddhist temples of Java, which are described by\nMr. Crawfurd as being covered with designs of \"a great variety of\nsubjects, such as processions, audiences, religious worship, battles,\nhunting, maritime and other scenes.\"\n\nAmong the ruins of Uxmal is a structure closely resembling the Egclesia of\nChichen. It consists of two massive walls of stone, one hundred and\ntwenty-eight feet long, and thirty in thickness, and placed seventy feet\napart. So far as could be made out, they are exactly alike in plan and\nornament. The sides facing each other are embellished with sculpture, and\nupon both remain the fragments of entwined colossal serpents which run the\nwhole length of the walls. In the centre of each facade, as at Chichen,\nwere the fragments of a great stone ring, which had been broken off and\nprobably destroyed. It would therefore seem that the emblem of the\nentwined serpents was significant of the purposes to which these\nstructures were dedicated. The destruction of these stones is another\nevidence of their religious character; for the conquerors always directed\ntheir destroying zeal against those monuments, or parts of monuments, most\nvenerated and valued by the Indians, and which were deemed most intimately\nconnected with their superstitions.\n\nTwo hundred feet to the south of this edifice is another large and\nimposing structure, called Casa de las Monjas, House of the Nuns. It\nstands on the highest terraces, and is reached by a flight of steps. It is\nquadrangular in form, with a courtyard in the centre. This is two hundred\nand fourteen by two hundred and fifty-eight. \"Passing through the arched\ngateway,\" says Mr. Stephens, \"we enter this noble courtyard, with four\ngreat facades looking down upon it, each ornamented from one end to the\nother with the richest and most elaborate carving known in the art of the\nbuilders. The facade on the left is most richly ornamented, but is much\nruined. It is one hundred and sixty feet long, and is distinguished by two\ncolossal serpents entwined, running through and encompassing nearly all\nthe ornaments throughout its entire length. At the north end, where the\nfacade is most entire, the tail of one serpent is held up nearly over the\nhead of the other, and has an ornament upon it like a turban with a plume\nof feathers. There are marks upon the extremity of the tail, probably\nintended to represent the rattlesnake, with which the country abounds. The\nlower serpent has its monstrous jaws wide open, and within there is a\nhuman head, the face of which is distinctly visible in the stone. The head\nand tail of the two serpents at the south end of the facade are said to\nhave corresponded with those at the north, and when the whole was entire,\nin 1836, the serpents were seen encircling every ornament of the building.\nThe bodies of the serpents are covered with feathers. Its ruins present a\nlively idea of the large and many well-constructed buildings of lime and\nstone, which Bernal Diaz saw at Campeachy, with figures of serpents and\nidols painted on their walls.\" Mr. Norman mentions that the heads of the\nserpents were adorned with plumes of feathers, and that the tails showed\nthe peculiarity of the rattlesnake.[10]\n\nThe eastern facade, opposite that just described, is less elaborately, but\nmore tastefully ornamented. Over each doorway is an ornament representing\nthe Sun. In every instance there is a face in the centre, with the tongue\nprojected, surmounted by an elaborate head-dress; between the bars there\nis also a range of many lozenge-shaped ornaments, in which the remains of\nred paint are distinctly visible, and at each end is a serpent's head with\nthe mouth open. The ornament over the principal doorway is much more\ncomplicated and elaborate, and of that marked and peculiar style which\ncharacterizes the highest efforts of the builders.\n\nThe central figure, with the projecting tongue, is probably that of the\nSun, and in general design coincides with the central figure sculptured on\nthe great calendar stone of Mexico, and with that found by Mr. Stephens on\nthe walls of Casa No. 3 at Palenque, where it is represented as an object\nof admiration. The protrusion of the tongue signified, among the Aztecs,\nability to speak, and denoted life or existence. Among the Sclavonian\nnations, the idea of vitality was conveyed by ability to eat, as it is by\nto breathe among ourselves, and to walk among the Indians of the Algonquin\nstock.\n\nAlthough Central America was occupied by nations independent of those of\nMexico proper, yet some of them (as those inhabiting the Pacific coast, as\nfar south as Nicaragua) were descended directly from them, and all had\nstriking features in common with them. Their languages were in general\ndifferent, but cognate; their architecture was essentially the same; and\ntheir religion, we have every reason for believing, was not widely\ndifferent, though doubtless that of the south was less ferocious in its\ncharacter, and not so generally disfigured by human sacrifices.\n\nWe may therefore look with entire safety for common mythological notions,\nespecially when we are assured of the fact that, whatever its\nmodifications, the religion of the continent is essentially the same; and\nespecially when we know that whatever differences may have existed amongst\nthe various nations of Mexico and Central America, the elements of their\nreligion were derived from a common Tottecan root.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI.\n\n    _Mexican Temple of Montezuma--The Serpent Emblem in Mexico--Pyramid of\n    Cholula--Tradition of the Giants of Anahuac--The Temple of\n    Quetzalcoatl--North American Indians and the Rattlesnake--Indian\n    Tradition of a Great Serpent--Serpents in the Mounds of the\n    West--Bigotry and Folly of the Spanish Conquerors of the West--Wide\n    prevalence of Mexican Ophiolatreia._\n\n\nThe monuments of Mexico representing the serpent are very numerous, and\nhave been specially remarked by nearly every traveller in that interesting\ncountry. The symbol is equally conspicuous in the ancient paintings.\n\n\"The great temple of Mexico,\" says Acosta, \"was built of great stones in\nfashion of snakes tied one to another, and the circuit was called\ncoate-pantli which is circuit of snakes.\" Duran informs us that this\ntemple was expressly built by the first Montezuma \"for all the gods,\" and\nhence called Coatlan, literally \"serpent place.\" It contained, he also\ninformed us, the temple or shrine of Tezcatlipoca, Huitzlipochtli, and\nTlaloc, called Coateocalli, \"Temple of the Serpent.\"\n\nSays Bernal Diaz, in his account of the march of Cortes to Mexico, \"We\nto-day arrived at a place called Terraguco, which we called the town of\nthe serpents, on account of the enormous figures of those reptiles which\nwe found in their temples, and which they worshipped as gods.\"\n\nIt cannot be supposed that absolute serpent worship--a simple degraded\nadoration of the reptile itself, or Fetishism, such as is said to exist in\nsome parts of Africa--prevailed in Mexico. The serpent entered into their\nreligious systems only as an emblem. It is nevertheless not impossible, on\nthe contrary it is extremely probable, that a degree of superstitious\nveneration attached to the reptile itself. According to Bernal Diaz,\nliving rattlesnakes were kept in the great temple of Mexico as sacred\nobjects. He says, \"Moreover, in that accursed house they kept vipers and\nvenomous snakes, who had something at their tails which sounded like\nmorris-bells, and these are the worst of vipers. They were kept in cradles\nand barrels, and in earthen vessels, upon feathers, and there they laid\ntheir eggs, and nursed up their snakelings, and they were fed with the\nbodies of the sacrificed, and with dogs' meat.\"\n\nCharlevaix in the History of Paraguay, relates \"that Alvarez, in one of\nhis expeditions into that country, found a town in which was a large tower\nor temple the residence of a monstrous serpent which the inhabitants had\nchosen for a divinity and which they fed with human flesh. He was as thick\nas an ox, and seven and twenty feet long.\" This account has been regarded\nas somewhat apocryphal, although it is likely enough that Serpent Worship\nmay have existed among some of the savage tribes of South America.\n\nIt has been said \"it should be remarked that Diaz was little disposed to\nlook with complacency upon the religion of the Mexicans, or whatever was\nconnected with it, and that his prejudices were not without their\ninfluence on his language. His relation, nevertheless, may be regarded as\nessentially reliable.\"\n\nMr. Mayer, in his Description of Mexico, gives an interesting account of\nthe ancient and extraordinary Indian Pyramid of Cholula, an erection\nintimately connected with the Quetzalcoatl we have been speaking of.\n\nThis is one of the most remarkable relics of the aborigines on the\ncontinent, for, although it was constructed only of the adobes or common\nsun-dried brick, it still remains in sufficient distinctness to strike\nevery observer with wonder at the enterprise of its Indian builders. What\nit was intended for, whether tomb or temple, no one has determined with\ncertainty, though the wisest antiquarians have been guessing since the\nconquest. In the midst of a plain the Indians erected a mountain. The base\nstill remains to give us its dimensions; but what was its original height?\nWas it the tomb of some mighty lord, or sovereign prince; or was it alone\na place of sacrifice?\n\nMany years ago in cutting a new road toward Puebla from Mexico it became\nnecessary to cross a portion of the base of this pyramid. The excavation\nlaid bare a square chamber, built of stone, the roof of which was\nsustained by cypress beams. In it were found some idols of basalt, a\nnumber of painted vases, and the remains of two dead bodies. No care was\ntaken of these relics by the discoverers, and they are lost to us for\never.\n\nApproaching the pyramid from the east, it appears so broken and overgrown\nwith trees that it is difficult to make out any outline distinctly. From\nthe west, however, a very fair idea may be obtained of this massive\nmonument as it rises in solitary grandeur from the midst of the\nwide-spreading plain. A well-paved road cut by the old Spaniards, ascends\nfrom the north-west corner with steps at regular intervals, obliquing\nfirst on the west side to the upper bench of the terrace, and thence\nreturning toward the same side until it is met by a steep flight rising to\nthe front of the small dome-crowned chapel, surrounded with its grave of\ncypress and dedicated to the Virgin of Remedies.\n\nThe summit is perfectly level, and protected by a parapet wall, whence a\nmagnificent view extends on every side over the level valley. Whatever\nthis edifice may have been, the idea of thus attaining permanently an\nelevation to which the people might resort for prayer--or even for parade\nor amusement--was a sublime conception and entitles the men who, centuries\nago, patiently erected the lofty pyramid, to the respect of posterity.\n\nThere remain at present but four stories of the Pyramid of Cholula, rising\nabove each other and connected by terraces. These stories are formed, as\nalready said, of sun-dried bricks, interspersed with occasional layers of\nplaster and stone work. \"And this is all,\" says Mr. Mayer, \"that is to be\ntold or described. Old as it is--interesting as it is--examined as it has\nbeen by antiquaries of all countries--the result has ever been the same.\nThe Indians tell you that it was a place of sepulture, and the Mexicans\ngive you the universal reply of ignorance in this country: _Quien\nSabe?_--who knows? who can tell?\"\n\nBaron Humboldt says:--\"The Pyramid of Cholula is exactly the same height\nas that of Tonatiuh Ylxaqual, at Teotihuacan. It is three metres higher\nthan that of Mycerinus, or the third of the great Egyptian pyramids of the\ngroup of Djizeh. Its base, however, is larger than that of any pyramid\nhitherto discovered by travellers in the old world, and is double of that\nknown as the Pyramid of Cheops. Those who wish to form an idea of the\nimmense mass of this Mexican monument by the comparison of objects best\nknown to them, may imagine a square four times greater than that of the\nPlace Vendome in Paris, covered with layers of bricks rising to twice the\nelevation of the Louvre. Some persons imagine that the whole of the\nedifice is not artificial, but as far as explorations have been made there\nis no reason to doubt that it is entirely a work of art. In its present\nstate (and we are ignorant of its perfect original height) its\nperpendicular proportion is to its base as eight to one, while in the\nthree great pyramids of Djizeh the proportion is found to be one and\nsix-tenths to one and seven-tenths to one; or nearly as eight to five.\"\n\nMay not this have been the base of some mighty temple destroyed long\nbefore the conquest, and of which even the tradition no longer lingers\namong the neighbouring Indians?\n\nIn continuation Humboldt observes that \"that the inhabitants of Anahauc\napparently designed giving the Pyramid of Cholula the same height, and\ndouble the base of the Pyramid of Teotihuacan, and that the Pyramid of\nAsychis, the largest known of the Egyptians, has a base of 800 feet, and\nis like that of Cholula built of brick. The cathedral of Strasburgh is\neight feet, and the cross of St Peter's at Rome forty-one feet lower than\nthe top of the Pyramid of Cheops. Pyramids exist throughout Mexico; in the\nforests of Papantla at a short distance above the level of the sea; on the\nplains of Cholula and of Teotihuacan, at the elevations which exceed those\nof the passes of the Alps. In the most widely distant nations, in climates\nthe most different, man seems to have adopted the same style of\nconstruction, the same ornaments, the same customs, and to have placed\nhimself under the government of the same political institutions.\"\n\nIs this an argument? it has been asked; that all men have sprung from one\nstock, or that the human mind is the same everywhere, and, affected by\nsimilar interests or necessities, invariably comes to the same result,\nwhether pointing a pyramid or an arrow, in making a law or a ladle?\n\n\"Much as I distrust,\" says Mayer, \"all the dark and groping efforts of\nantiquarians, I will nevertheless offer you some sketches and legends\nwhich may serve at least to base a conjecture upon as to the divinity to\nwhom this pyramid was erected, and to prove, perhaps, that it was intended\nas the foundation of a temple and not the covering of a tomb.\"\n\nA tradition, which has been recorded by a Dominican monk who visited\nCholula in 1566, is thus related from his work, by the traveller already\nquoted.\n\n\"Before the great inundation which took place 4,800 years after the\nerection of the world, the country of Anahuac was inhabited by giants, all\nof whom either perished in the inundation or were transformed into fishes,\nsave seven who fled into caverns.\n\n\"When the waters subsided, one of the giants, called Xelhua, surnamed the\n'Architect,' went to Cholula, where as a memorial of the Tlaloc which had\nserved for an asylum to himself and his six brethern, he built an\nartificial hill in the form of a pyramid. He ordered bricks to be made in\nthe province of Tlalmanalco, at the foot of the Sierra of Cecotl, and in\norder to convey them to Cholula he placed a file of men who passed them\nfrom hand to hand. The gods beheld, with wrath, an edifice the top of\nwhich was to reach the clouds. Irritated at the daring attempt of Xelhua,\nthey hurled fire on the pyramid. Numbers of the workmen perished. The work\nwas discontinued, and the monument was afterwards dedicated to\nQuetzalcoatl.\" Of this god we have already given a description in these\npages.\n\nThe following singular story in relation to this divinity and certain\nservices of his temple, is to be found in the \"Natural and Moral History\nof Acosta,\" book 5, chap. 30.\n\n\"There was at this temple of Quetzalcoatl, at Cholula, a court of\nreasonable greatness, in which they made great dances and pastimes with\ngames and comedies, on the festival day of this idol, for which purpose\nthere was in the midst of this court a theatre of thirty feet square, very\nfinely decked and trimmed--the which they decked with flowers that\nday--with all the art and invention that might be, being environed around\nwith arches of divers flowers and feathers, and in some places there were\ntied many small birds, conies, and other tame beasts. After dinner, all\nthe people assembled in this place, and the players presented themselves\nand played comedies. Some counterfeited the deaf and rheumatic, others the\nlame, some the blind and crippled which came to seek for cure from the\nidol. The deaf answered confusedly, the rheumatic coughed, the lame\nhalted, telling their miseries and griefs, wherewith they made the people\nto laugh. Others came forth in the form of little beasts, some attired\nlike snails, others like toads, and some like lizards; then meeting\ntogether they told their offices, and, everyone retiring to his place,\nthey sounded on small flutes which was pleasant to hear. They likewise\ncounterfeited butterflies and small birds of divers colours which were\nrepresented by the children who were sent to the temple for education.\nThen they went into a little forest, planted there for the purpose, whence\nthe priests of the temple drew them forth with instruments of music. In\nthe meantime they used many pleasant speeches, some in propounding, others\nin defending, wherewith the assistants were pleasantly entertained. This\ndone, they made a masque or mummery with all the personages, and so the\nfeast ended.\"\n\nFrom these traditions we derive several important facts. First, that\nQuetzalcoatl was \"god of the air;\" second, that he was represented as a\n\"feathered serpent;\" third, that he was the great divinity of the\nCholulans; and fourth, that a hill was raised by them upon which they\nerected a temple to his glory where they celebrated his festivals with\npomp and splendour.\n\nCombining all these, is it unreasonable to believe that the Pyramid of\nCholula was the base of this temple, and that he was there worshipped as\nthe Great Spirit of the Air--or of the seasons; the God who produced the\nfruitfulness of the earth, regulated the Sun, the wind, and the shower,\nand thus spread plenty over the land. It has been thought too, that the\nserpent might not improbably typify lightning, and the feathers swiftness,\nthus denoting one of the attributes of the air and that the most speedy\nand destructive.\n\nMr. Mayer says:--\"I constantly saw serpents, in the city of Mexico, carved\nin stone, and in the various collections of antiquities,\" and he gives\ndrawings of several of the principal, notably one carved with exquisite\nskill and found in the court-yard of the University.\n\nVasquez Coronado, Governor of New Gallicia, as the northern territories of\nSpain were then called, wrote to the Viceroy Mendoza in 1539, concerning\nthe unknown regions still beyond him to the northward. His account was\nchiefly based upon the fabulous relation of the Friar Marco Niza, and is\nnot entirely to be relied upon. In this letter he mentions that \"in the\nprovince of Topira there were people who had great towers and temples\ncovered with straw, with small round windows, filled with human skulls,\nand before the temple a great round ditch, the brim of which was compassed\nwith a serpent, made of various metals, which held its tail in its mouth,\nand before which men were sacrificed.\"\n\nDu Paix has given many examples of the carving representing the snake,\nwhich he found in his Antiquarian Explorations in Mexico. One found near\nthe ancient city of Chochimilco represents a snake artificially coiled\ncarved from a block of porphry. \"Its long body is gracefully entwined,\nleaving its head and tail free. There is something showy in the execution\nof the figure. Its head is elevated and curiously ornamented, its open\nmouth exhibits two long and pointed fangs, its tongue (which is unusually\nlong) is cloven at the extremity like an anchor, its body is fancifully\nscaled, and its tail (covered with circles) ends with three rattles. The\nsnake was a frequent emblem with the Mexican artists. The flexibility of\nits figure rendering it susceptible of an infinite diversity of position,\nregular and irregular; they availed themselves of this advantage and\nvaried their representations of it without limit and without ever giving\nit an unnatural attitude.\"\n\nNear Quauhquechula, Du Paix found another remarkable sculpture of the\nserpent carved in black basalt, and so entwined that the space within the\nfolds of its body formed a font sufficiently large to contain a\nconsiderable quantity of water. The body of the reptile was spirally\nentwined, and the head probably served as a handle to move it. It was\ndecorated with circles, and the tail was that of a rattlesnake.\n\nDu Paix also found at Tepeyaca, in a quarter of the town called St.\nMichael Tlaixegui (signifying in the Mexican language the cavity of the\nmountain) a serpent carved in red porphry. It is of large dimensions, in\nan attitude of repose, and coiled upon itself in spiral circles so as to\nleave a hollow space or transverse axis in the middle. The head, which has\na fierce expression, is armed with two long and sharp fangs, and the\ntongue is double being divided longitudinally. The entire surface of the\nbody is ornamented or covered with broad and long feathers, and the tail\nterminates in four rattles. Its length from the head to the extremity of\nthe tail is about twenty feet, and it gradually diminishes in thickness.\n\"This reptile,\" Du Paix says, \"was the monarch or giant of its species,\nand in pagan times was a deity greatly esteemed under the name\nQuetzalcoatl, or Feathered Serpent. It is extremely well sculptured, and\nthere are still marks of its having been once painted with vermillion.\"\n\nBut the symbolical feathered serpent was not peculiar to Mexico and\nYucatan. Squier, in his Explorations in Nicaragua, several times\nencountered it. Near the city of Santiago de Managua, the capital of the\nRepublic, situated upon the shores of Lake Managua or Leon, and near the\ntop of the high volcanic ridge which separates the waters flowing into the\nAtlantic from those running into the Pacific, is an extinct crater, now\npartially filled with water, forming a lake nearly two miles in\ncircumference, called Nihapa. The sides of this crater are perpendicular\nrocks ranging from five hundred to eight hundred feet in height. There is\nbut one point where descent is possible. It leads to a little space,\nformed by the fallen rocks and debris which permits a foothold for the\ntraveller. Standing here, he sees above him, on the smooth face of the\ncliff, a variety of figures, executed by the aborigines, in red paint.\nMost conspicuous amongst them, is a feathered serpent coiled and\nornamented. It is about four feet in diameter. Upon some of the other\nrocks were found paintings of the serpent, perfectly corresponding with\nthe representations in the Dresden MS. copied by Kingsborough and\nconfirming the conjectures of Humboldt and other investigators that this\nMS. had its origin to the southward of Mexico. The figure copied was\nsupposed by the natives who had visited it to represent the sun. Some\nyears ago, large figures of the sun and moon were visible upon the cliffs,\nbut the section upon which they were painted was thrown down by the great\nearthquake of 1838. Parts of the figures can yet be traced upon the fallen\nfragments.\n\nIt is a singular fact that many of the North American Indian tribes\nentertain a superstitious regard for serpents, and particularly for the\nrattlesnake. Though always avoiding, they never destroyed it, \"lest,\" says\nBartram, \"the spirit of the reptile should excite its kindred to revenge.\"\n\nAccording to Adair, this fear was not unmingled with veneration.\nCharlevoix states that the Natchez had the figure of a rattlesnake, carved\nfrom wood, placed among other objects upon the altar of their temple, to\nwhich they paid great honours. Heckwelder relates that the Linni Linape,\ncalled the rattlesnake \"grandfather\" and would on no account allow it to\nbe destroyed. Henney states that the Indians around Lake Huron had a\nsimilar superstition, and also designated the rattlesnake as their\n\"grandfather.\" He also mentions instances in which offerings of tobacco\nwere made to it, and its parental care solicited for the party performing\nthe sacrifice. Carver also mentions an instance of similar regard on the\npart of a Menominee Indian, who carried a rattlesnake constantly with him,\n\"treating it as a deity, and calling it his great father.\"\n\nA portion of the veneration with which the reptile was regarded in these\ncases may be referred to that superstition so common among the savage\ntribes, under the influence of which everything remarkable in nature was\nregarded as a medicine or mystery, and therefore entitled to respect.\nStill there appears to be, linked beneath all, the remnant of an Ophite\nsuperstition of a different character which is shown in the general use of\nthe serpent as a symbol of incorporeal powers, of \"Manitous\" or spirits.\n\nMr. James, in his MSS. in the possession of the New York Historical\nSociety, states, \"that the Menominees translate the _manitou_ of the\nChippeways by _ahwahtoke_,\" which means emphatically a snake. \"Whether,\"\nhe continues, \"the word was first formed as a name for a surprising or\ndisgusting object, and thence transferred to spiritual beings, or whether\nthe extension of its signification has been in an opposite direction, it\nis difficult to determine.\" Bossu also affirms that the Arkansas believed\nin the existence of a great spirit, which they adore under form of a\nserpent. In the North-west it was a symbol of evil power.\n\nHere we may suitably introduce the tradition of a great serpent, which is\nto this day, current amongst a large portion of the Indians of the\nAlgonquin stock. It affords some curious parallelisms with the allegorical\nrelations of the old world. The Great Teacher of the Algonquins,\nManabozho, is always placed in antagonism to a great serpent, a spirit of\nevil, who corresponds very nearly with the Egyptian Typhon, the Indian\nKaliya, and the Scandinavian Midgard. He is also connected with the\nAlgonquin notions of a deluge; and as Typhon is placed in opposition to\nOsiris or Apollo, Kaliya to Surya or the Sun, and Midgard to Wodin or\nOdin, so does he bear a corresponding relation to Manabozho. The conflicts\nbetween the two are frequent; and although the struggles are sometimes\nlong and doubtful, Manabozho is usually successful against his adversary.\nOne of these contests involved the destruction of the earth by water, and\nits reproduction by the powerful and beneficent Manabozho. The tradition\nin which this grand event is embodied was thus related by\nKah-ge-ga-gah-boowh, a chief of the Ojibway. In all of its essentials, it\nis recorded by means of the rude pictured signs of the Indians, and\nscattered all over the Algonquin territories.\n\nOne day returning to his lodge, from a long journey, Manabozho missed from\nit his young cousin, who resided with him, he called his name aloud, but\nreceived no answer. He looked around on the sand for the tracks of his\nfeet, and he there, for the first time, discovered the trail of\nMeshekenabek, the serpent. He then knew that his cousin had been seized by\nhis great enemy. He armed himself, and followed on his track, he passed\nthe great river, and crossed mountains and valleys to the shores of the\ndeep and gloomy lake now called Manitou Lake, Spirit Lake, or the Lake of\nDevils. The trail of Meshekenabek led to the edge of the water.\n\nAt the bottom of this lake was the dwelling of the serpent, and it was\nfilled with evil spirits--his attendants and companions. Their forms were\nmonstrous and terrible, but most, like their master, bore the semblance of\nserpents. In the centre of this horrible assemblage was Meshekenabek\nhimself, coiling his volumes around the hapless cousin of Manabozho. His\nhead was red as with blood, and his eyes were fierce and glowed like fire.\nHis body was all over armed with hard and glistening scales of every shade\nand colour.\n\nManabozho looked down upon the writhing spirits of evil, and he vowed deep\nrevenge. He directed the clouds to disappear from the heavens, the winds\nto be still, and the air to become stagnant over the lake of the manitous,\nand bade the sun shine upon it with all its fierceness; for thus he sought\nto drive his enemy forth to seek the cool shadows of the trees, that grew\nupon its banks, so that he might be able to take vengeance upon him.\n\nMeanwhile, Manabozho, seized his bow and arrows and placed himself near\nthe spot where he deemed the serpents would come to enjoy the shade. He\nthen transferred himself into the broken stump of a withered tree, so that\nhis enemies might not discover his presence.\n\nThe winds became still, and the sun shone hot on the lake of the evil\nmanitous. By and by the waters became troubled, and bubbles rose to the\nsurface, for the rays of the sun penetrated to the horrible brood within\nits depths. The commotion increased, and a serpent lifted its head high\nabove the centre of the lake and gazed around the shores. Directly another\ncame to the surface, and they listened for the footsteps of Manabozho but\nthey heard him nowhere on the face of the earth, and they said one to the\nother, \"Manabozho sleeps.\" And then they plunged again beneath the waters,\nwhich seemed to hiss as they closed over them.\n\nIt was not long before the lake of manitous became more troubled than\nbefore, it boiled from its very depths, and the hot waves dashed wildly\nagainst the rocks on its shores. The commotion increased, and soon\nMeshekenabek, the Great Serpent, emerged slowly to the surface, and moved\ntowards the shore. His blood-red crest glowed with a deeper hue, and the\nreflection from his glancing scales was like the blinding glitter of a\nsleet covered forest beneath the morning sun of winter. He was followed by\nthe evil spirits, so great a number that they covered the shores of the\nlake with their foul trailing carcases.\n\nThey saw the broken, blasted stump into which Manabozho had transformed\nhimself, and suspecting it might be one of his disguises, for they knew\nhis cunning, one of them approached, and wound his tail around it, and\nsought to drag it down. But Manabozho stood firm, though he could hardly\nrefrain from crying aloud, for the tail of the monster tickled his sides.\n\nThe Great Serpent wound his vast folds among the trees of the forest, and\nthe rest also sought the shade, while one was left to listen for the steps\nof Manabozho.\n\nWhen they all slept, Manabozho silently drew an arrow from his quiver, he\nplaced it in his bow, and aimed it where he saw the heart beat against\nthe sides of the Great Serpent. He launched it, and with a howl that shook\nthe mountains and startled the wild beasts in their caves, the monstre\nawoke, and, followed by its frightful companions, uttering mingled sounds\nof rage and terror, plunged again into the lake. Here they vented their\nfury on the helpless cousin of Manabozho, whose body they tore into a\nthousand fragments, his mangled lungs rose to the surface, and covered it\nwith whiteness. And this is the origin of the foam on the water.\n\nWhen the Great Serpent knew that he was mortally wounded, both he and the\nevil spirits around him were rendered tenfold more terrible by their great\nwrath and they rose to overwhelm Manabozho. The water of the lake swelled\nupwards from its dark depths, and with a sound like many thunders, it\nrolled madly on its track, bearing the rocks and trees before it with\nresistless fury. High on the crest of the foremost wave, black as the\nmidnight, rode the writhing form of the wounded Meshekenabek, and red eyes\nglazed around him, and the hot breaths of the monstrous brood hissed\nfiercely above the retreating Manabozho. Then thought Manabozho of his\nIndian children, and he ran by their villages, and in a voice of alarm\nbade them flee to the mountains, for the Great Serpent was deluging the\nearth in his expiring wrath, sparing no living thing. The Indians caught\nup their children, and wildly sought safety where he bade them. But\nManabozho continued his flight along the base of the western hills, and\nfinally took refuge on a high mountain beyond Lake Superior, far towards\nthe north. There he found many men and animals who had fled from the flood\nthat already covered the valleys and plains, and even the highest hills.\nStill the waters continued to rise, and soon all the mountains were\noverwhelmed save that on which stood Manabozho. Then he gathered together\ntimber, and made a raft, upon which the men and women, and the animals\nthat were with him, all placed themselves. No sooner had they done so,\nthan the rising floods closed over the mountain and they floated alone on\nthe surface of the waters; and thus they floated for many days, and some\ndied, and the rest became sorrowful, and reproached Manabozho that he did\nnot disperse the waters and renew the earth that they might live. But\nthough he knew that his great enemy was by this time dead, yet could not\nManabozho renew the world unless he had some earth in his hands wherewith\nto begin the work. And this he explained to those that were with him, and\nhe said that were it ever so little, even a few grains of earth, then\ncould he disperse the waters and renew the world. Then the beaver\nvolunteered to go to the bottom of the deep, and get some earth, and they\nall applauded her design. She plunged in, they waited long, and when she\nreturned she was dead; they opened her hands but there was no earth in\nthem. \"Then,\" said the otter, \"will I seek the earth:\" and the bold\nswimmer dived from the raft. The otter was gone still longer than the\nbeaver, but when he returned to the surface he too was dead, and there was\nno earth in his claws. \"Who shall find the earth?\" exclaimed all those\nleft on the raft, \"now that the beaver and the otter are dead?\" and they\ndesponded more than before, repeating, \"Who shall find the earth?\" \"That\nwill I,\" said the muskrat, and he quickly disappeared between the logs of\nthe raft. The muskrat was gone very long, much longer than the otter, and\nit was thought he would never return, when he suddenly rose near by, but\nhe was too weak to speak, and he swam slowly towards the raft. He had\nhardly got upon it when he too died from his great exertion. They opened\nhis little hands and there, clasped closely between the fingers, they\nfound a few grains of fresh earth. These Manabozho carefully collected and\ndried them in the sun, and then he rubbed them into a fine powder in his\npalms, and, rising up, he blew them abroad upon the waters. No sooner was\nthis done than the flood began to subside, and soon the trees on the\nmountains and hills emerged from the deep, and the plains and the valleys\ncame in view and the waters disappeared from the land leaving no trace but\na thick sediment, which was the dust that Manabozho had blown abroad from\nthe raft.\n\nThen it was found that Meshekenabek, the Great Serpent, was dead, and that\nthe evil manitous, his companions, had returned to the depths of the lake\nof spirits, from which, for the fear of Manabozho, they never more dared\nto come forth. And in gratitude to the beaver, the otter, and the muskrat,\nthose animals were ever after held sacred by the Indians, and they became\ntheir brethren, and they never killed nor molested them until the medicine\nof the stranger made them forget their relations and turned their hearts\nto ingratitude.\n\nIn the mounds of the West have been found various sculptures of the\nserpent, and amongst them one as follows:--It represents a coiled\nrattlesnake, and is carved in a very compact cinnamon-coloured sandstone.\nIt is six and a quarter inches long, one and three-eighths broad, and a\nquarter of an inch thick. The workmanship is delicate, and the\ncharacteristic features of the rattlesnake are perfectly represented, the\nhead, unfortunately, is not entire, but enough remains to show that it was\nsurmounted by some kind of feather-work resembling that so conspicuously\nrepresented in the sculptured monuments of the South. It was found\ncarefully enveloped in sheet copper, and under circumstances which render\nit certain that it was an object of high regard and probably of worship.\n\nNotwithstanding the striking resemblances which have been pointed out, in\nthe elementary religions of the old and new worlds, and the not less\nremarkable coincidences in their symbolical systems, we are scarcely\nprepared to find in America that specific combination which fills so\nconspicuous a place in the early cosmogonies and mythologies of the East,\nand which constitute the basis of these investigations, namely, the\ncompound symbol of the Serpent and the Egg. It must be admitted that, in\nthe few meagre and imperfect accounts which we have of the notions of\ncosmogony entertained by the American nations, we have no distinct\nallusion to it. The symbolism is far too refined and abstract to be\nadopted by wandering, savage tribes, and we can only look for it, if at\nall, among the more civilized nations of the central part of the\ncontinent, where religion and mythology ranked as an intelligible system.\nAnd here we have at once to regret and reprobate the worse than barbarous\nzeal of the Spanish conquerors, who, not content with destroying the\npictured records and overturning and defacing the primitive monuments of\nthose remarkable nations; distorted the few traditions which they\nrecorded, so as to lend a seeming support to the fictions of their own\nreligion, and invested the sacred rites of the aborigines with horrible\nand repulsive features, so as to furnish, among people like minded with\nthemselves, some apology for their savage cruelty. Not only were orders\ngiven by the first Bishop of Mexico, the infamous Zumanaga, for the\nburning of all the Mexican MSS. which could be procured, but all persons\nwere discouraged from recording the traditions of the ancient inhabitants.\n\nSo far, therefore, from having a complete and consistent account of the\nbeliefs and conceptions of those nations, to which reference may be had in\ninquiries of this kind, we have only detached and scattered fragments,\nrescued by later hands from the general destruction. Under such\ncircumstances we cannot expect to find parallel evidences of the existence\nof specific conceptions; that is to say, we may find certain\nrepresentations clearly symbolical and referring to the cosmogony,\nmythology, or religion of the primitive inhabitants and yet look in vain\namong the scanty and distorted traditions and few mutilated pictured\nrecords which are left us for collateral support of the significance which\nreason and analogy may assign to them.\n\nIt is not assumed to say that any distinct representation of the Serpent\nand the Egg exists amongst the monuments of Mexico or Central America;\nwhat future investigations may disclose remains to be seen. If, until the\npresent time, we have remained in profound ignorance of the existence of\nthe grand monument under notice, in one of the best populated states, what\ntreasures of antiquity may yet be hidden in the fastnesses of the central\npart of the continent!\n\nIt has often been said that every feature in the religion of the New\nWorld, discovered by Cortez and Pizarro, indicates an origin common to the\nsuperstitions of Egypt and Asia. The same solar worship, the same\npyramidal monuments, and the same Ophiolatreia distinguish them all.\n\nAcosta says \"the temple of Vitziliputzli was built of great stones in\nfashion of snakes tied one to another, and the circuit was called 'the\ncircuit of snakes' because the walls of the enclosure were covered with\nthe figures of snakes. Vitziliputzli held in his right hand a staff cut in\nthe form of a serpent, and the four corners of the ark in which he was\nseated terminated each with a carved representation of the head of a\nserpent. From the sides of the god projected the heads of two serpents and\nhis right hand leaned upon a staff like a serpent. The Mexican century was\nrepresented by a circle, having the sun in the centre, surrounded by the\nsymbols of the years. The circumference was a serpent twisted into four\nknots at the cardinal points.\"[11]\n\nThe Mexican month was divided into twenty days; the serpent and dragon\nsymbolized two of them. In Mexico there was also a temple dedicated to the\nGod of the Air, and the door of it was formed so as to resemble a\nserpent's mouth.[12]\n\nAmongst other things, Peter Martyr mentions a large serpent-idol at\nCampeachy, made of stones and bitumen, in the act of devouring a marble\nlion. When first seen by the Spaniards it was warm with the blood of human\nvictims.\n\n\"Ancient painting and sculptures abound with evidences of Mexican\nOphiolatreia, and prove that there was scarcely a Mexican deity who was\nnot symbolized by a serpent or a dragon. Many deities appear holding\nserpents in their hands, and small figures of priests are represented with\na snake over each head. This reminds us forcibly of the priests of the\nEgyptian Isis, who are described in sculpture with the sacred asp upon the\nhead and a cone in the left hand. And to confirm the original mutual\nconnexion of all the serpent-worshippers throughout all the world--the\nMexican paintings, as well as the Egyptian and Persian hieroglyphics,\ndescribe the Ophite Hierogram of the intertwined serpents in almost all\nits varieties. A very remarkable one occurs in M. Allard's collection of\nsculptures; in which the dragons forming it have each a man's head in his\nmouth. The gods of Mexico are frequently pictured fighting with serpents\nand dragons; and gods, and sometimes men, are represented in conversation\nwith the same loathsome creatures. There is scarcely, indeed, a feature in\nthe mystery of Ophiolatreia which may not be recognised in the Mexican\nsuperstitions.\n\n\"We perceive, therefore, that in the kingdom of Mexico the serpent was\nsacred, and emblematic of more gods than one: an observation which may be\nextended to almost every other nation which adored the symbolical serpent.\nThis is a remarkable and valuable fact, and it discovers in Ophiolatreia\nanother feature of its aboriginal character. For it proves the serpent to\nhave been a symbol of intrinsic divinity, and not a mere representative of\npeculiar properties which belong to some gods and not to others.\"[13]\n\nFrom what has been presented, it will be seen that the serpent symbol was\nof general acceptance in America, particularly among the semi-civilized\nnations; that it entered widely into their symbolic representations, and\nthis significance was essentially the same with that which attached to it\namong the early nations of the old continent. Upon the basis, therefore,\nof the identity which we have observed in the elementary religious\nconceptions of the Old and New World, and the striking uniformity in their\nsymbolical systems, we feel justified in ascribing to the emblematic\nSerpent and Egg of Ohio a significance radically the same with that which\nwas assigned to the analogous compound symbol among the primitive nations\nof the East. This conclusion is further sustained by the character of some\nof the religious structures of the old continent, in which we find the\nsymbolic serpent and the egg or circle represented on a most gigantic\nscale. Analogy could probably furnish no more decisive sanction, unless by\nexhibiting other structures, in which not only a general correspondence,\nbut an absolute identity should exist. Such an identity it would be\nunreasonable to look for, even in the works of the same people,\nconstructed in accordance with a common design.\n\nIt may seem hardly consistent with the caution which should characterize\nresearches of this kind, to hazard the suggestion that the symbolical\nSerpent and Egg of Ohio are distinctly allusive to the specific notions of\ncosmogony which prevailed among the nations of the East, for the reason\nthat it is impossible to bring positive collateral proof that such notions\nwere entertained by any of the American nations. The absence of written\nrecords and of impartially preserved traditions we have already had ample\nreason to deplore; and unless further explorations shall present us with\nunexpected results, the deficiency may always exist. But we must remember\nthat in no respect are men more tenacious than in the preservation of\ntheir rudimental religious beliefs and early conceptions. In the words of\na philosophical investigator--\"Of all researches that most effectually aid\nus to discover the origin of a nation or people whose history is involved\nin the obscurity of ancient times, none perhaps are attended with such\nimportant results as the analysis of their theological dogmas and their\nreligious practices. To such matters mankind adhere with the greatest\ntenacity, which, though modified and corrupted in the revolution of ages,\nstill retain features of their original construction, when language, arts,\nsciences and political establishments no longer preserve distinct\nlineaments of their ancient constitutions.\"[14]\n\nA striking example of the truth of these remarks is furnished in the\nreligion of India, which, to this day, notwithstanding the revolution of\ntime and empire, the destructions of foreign and of civil wars, and the\nconstant addition of allegorical fictions (more fatal to the primitive\nsystem than all the other causes combined), still retains its original\nfeatures, which are easily recognisable, and which identify it with the\nreligions which prevailed in monumental Egypt, on the plains of Assyria,\nin the valleys of Greece, among the sterner nations around the Caspian,\nand among their kindred tribes on the rugged shores of Scandinavia.\n\nThis tenacity is not less strikingly illustrated in the careful\nperpetuation of rites, festivals and scenic representations which\noriginated in notions which have long since become obsolete, and are now\nforgotten. Very few of the attendants on the annual May-day festival, as\ncelebrated a few years back in this country, and very few of those who\nhave read about the same are aware that it was only a perpetuation of the\nvernal solar festival of Baal, and that the garlanded pole was anciently a\nPhallic emblem.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII.\n\n    _Egypt as the Home of Serpent Worship--Thoth said to be the founder of\n    Ophiolatreia--Cneph, the Architect of the Universe--Mysteries of\n    Isis--The Isaic Table--Frequency of the Serpent Symbol--Serapis--In\n    the Temples at Luxore, etc.--Discovery at Malta--The Egyptian\n    Basilisk--Mummies--Bracelets--The Caduceus--Temple of Cneph at\n    Elephantina--Thebes--Story of a Priest--Painting in a Tomb at Biban at\n    Malook--Pococke at Raigny._\n\n\nEgypt, of all ancient nations the most noted for its idolatry, was in its\nearliest days the home of the peculiar worship we are contemplating. A\nlearned writer on the subject says \"the serpent entered into the Egyptian\nreligion under all his characters--of an Emblem of Divinity, a Charm or\nOracle, and a God.\" Cneph, Thoth and Isis were conspicuous and chief among\nthe gods and goddesses thus symbolized, though he is said to have entered\nmore or less into the symbolical worship of all the gods.\n\nSanchoniathon describes Thoth as the founder of Serpent Worship in Egypt,\nand he is generally regarded as the planter of the earliest colonies in\nPhoenicia and Egypt after the Deluge. He has been called the Reformer of\nthe Religions of Egypt, and Deane says: \"He taught the Egyptians (or\nrather that part of his colony which was settled in Egypt) a religion,\nwhich, partaking of Zabaism and Ophiolatreia, had some mixture also of\nprimeval truth. The Divine Spirit he denominted Cneph, and described him\nas the Original, Eternal Spirit, pervading all creation, whose symbol was\na serpent.\"\n\nCneph was called by the priests the architect of the universe, and has\nbeen represented as a serpent with an egg in his mouth; the serpent being\nhis hieroglyphical emblem, and the egg setting forth the mundane elements\nas proceeding from him.\n\nAfter his death Thoth was, in return for services rendered to the people,\nmade a god of--the god of health, or of healing, and so became the\nprototype of AEsculapius. His learning appears to have been great, and he\ninstructed the people in astronomy, morals, hieroglyphics and letters. He\nis generally represented leaning upon a knotted stick which has around it\na serpent.\n\nThe mysteries of the worship of Isis abounded in allusions to the serpent,\nand Montfaucon says that the Isaic table, a plate of brass overlaid with\nbrass enamel, intermixed with plates of silver, which described the\nmysteries, was charged with serpents in every part as emblems of the\ngoddess. The particular serpent thus employed was that small one well know\nas the instrument used in her suicide by the celebrated Cleopatra, the\nasp. This creature is pictured and carved on the priestly robes, the\ntiaras of the kings, the image of the goddess. The British Museum\npossesses a head of this divinity wearing a coronet of them. Not only so,\nthe living reptiles were kept in her temple and were supposed to sanctify\nthe offerings by crawling about amongst them.\n\nAs we have said the serpent entered largely into the symbolical worship of\nall the Egyptian deities, and Cneph, Thoth and Isis can only be regarded\nas three of the chief.\n\nDeane says there is scarcely an Egyptian deity which is not occasionally\nsymbolized by it. Several of these deities are represented with their\nproper heads terminating in serpents' bodies. In Montfaucon, vol. 2, plate\n207, there is an engraving of Serapis with a human head and serpentine\ntail. Two other minor gods are also represented, the one by a serpent with\na bull's head, the other by a serpent with the radiated head of the lion.\nThe second of these, which Montfaucon supposes to be an image of Apis, is\nbored through the middle: probably with a design to hang about the neck,\nas they did many other small figures of gods, by way of ornament or\ncharms.\n\nThe figure of Serapis encircled by serpents is found on tombs. The\nappearance of serpents on tombs was very general. On an urn of Egnatius,\nNicephoras, and of Herbasia Clymene, engraved in Montfaucon, vol. 5, a\nyoung man entwined by a serpent is described as falling headlong to the\nground. In the urn of Herbasia Clymene the corners are ornamented with\nfigures of serpents. It is a singular coincidence that the creature by\nwhom it is believed came death into the world should be consecrated by the\nearliest heathen idolaters to the receptacles of the dead. It is\nremarkable also that Serapis was supposed by the Egyptians to have\ndominion over evil demons, or in other words was the same as Pluto or\nSatan.\n\nOn some of the Egyptian temples the serpent has been conspicuously figured\nas an emblem consecrated to the Divine service. Thus it is found at\nLuxore, Komombu, Dendara, Apollinopolis and Esnay. The Pamphylian obelisk\nalso bears it many times--fifty-two it is said--and according to Pococke\neach of the pillars of the temple of Gava has it twice sculptured.\n\nAll writers on the subject have noticed the variations of form under which\nthe serpent has appeared on Egyptian monuments, and have laid stress upon\nit as indicating the great consideration in which he was held. There is\nlittle to be wondered at in this when we remember that he was regarded as\nsymbolical of divine wisdom, power, and creative energy; of immortality\nand regeneration, from the shedding of his own skin; and of eternity, when\nrepresented in the act of biting his own tail.\n\nOne writer says the world was represented by a circle, intersected by two\ndiameters perpendicular to each other, which diameters, according to\nEusebius, were serpents. Jablonski says the circumference only, was a\nserpent.\n\nKircher says that the elements (or rather what were so considered in\nancient times) were represented by serpents. Earth was symbolized by a\nprostrate two-horned snake; water, by a serpent moving in an undulated\nmanner; air, by an erect serpent in the act of hissing; fire, by an asp\nstanding on its tail and bearing upon his head a globe. \"From these\nhieroglyphics,\" remarks Deane, \"it is clear that the serpent was the most\nexpressive symbol of divinity with the Egyptians.\"\n\nAn engraving in Montfaucon, vol. 2, p. 237, calls for notice here, as\nillustrating the great extent to which the veneration of the serpent once\nprevailed in Egypt. In the year 1694, in an old wall of Malta, was\ndiscovered a plate of gold, supposed to have been concealed there by its\npossessors at a time when everything idolatrous was destroyed as\nabominable. Montfaucon says: \"This plate was rolled up in a golden casket;\nit consists of two long rows which contain a very great number of Egyptian\ndeities, most of which have the head of some beast or bird. Many serpents\nare also seen intermixed, the arms and legs of the gods terminating in\nserpents' tails. The first figure has upon its back a long shell with a\nserpent upon it; in each row there is a serpent extended upon an altar.\nAmong the figures of the sacred row there is seen an Isis of tolerably\ngood form. This same plate, no doubt, contains the most profound mysteries\nof the Egyptian superstition.\"\n\nIt hardly matters where we look in Egypt, this same serpent symbol is\nfound entering into the composition of everything, whether ornamental,\nuseful or ecclesiastical. The basilisk, the most venomous of all snakes,\nand so regarded as the king of the species and named after the oracular\ngod of Canaan OB or OUB, was represented on coins with rays upon his head\nlike a crown; around the coin was inscribed \"Agathodaemon.\" The emperor\nNero in the \"madness of his vanity,\" it is said, caused a number of such\ncoins to be struck with the inscription \"The New Agathodaemon,\" meaning\nhimself.\n\nThe Egyptians held basilisks in such veneration that they made images of\nthem in gold and consecrated and placed them in the temples of their gods.\nBryant thinks that they were the same as the Thermuthis, or deadly asp.\nThese creatures the Egyptian priests are said to have preserved by digging\nholes for them in the corners of their temples, and was a part of their\nsuperstition to believe that whosoever was accidentally bitten by them was\ndivinely favoured.[15]\n\nDeane further mentions that the serpent is sometimes found sculptured, and\nattached to the breasts of mummies; but whether with a view to talismanic\nsecurity, or as indicative of the priesthood of Isis, is doubtful. A\nfemale mummy, opened by M. Passalacqua at Paris some years ago, was\nadorned with a necklace of serpents carved in stone.\n\nBracelets, in the form of serpents, were worn by the Grecian women in the\ntime of Clemens Alexdrinus, who thus reproves the fashion: \"The women are\nnot ashamed to place about them the most manifold symbols of the evil one;\nfor as the serpent deceived Eve, so the golden trinket in the fashion of a\nserpent misleads the women.\" The children also wore chaplets of the same\nkind.\n\nWe must not omit to notice the Caduceus, which forms, it is said, one of\nthe most striking examples of the talismanic serpent. According to\nMontfaucon, Kirchen and others, the notion that this belonged exclusively\nto Hermes or Mercury is erroneous, as it can be seen in the hand of\nCybele, Minerva Amebis, Hercules Ogmius and the personified constellation\nVirgo, said by Lucian to have had her symbol in the Pythian priestess.\n\nVariously represented in the main, the Caduceus always preserved the\noriginal design of a winged wand entwined by two serpents. It is found\nsometimes without the wings, but never without the serpents; the varieties\nconsisting chiefly in the number of folds made by the serpents' bodies\nround the wand, and the relative positions of the wings and serpents'\nheads. It was regarded as powerful in paralyzing the mind and raising the\ndead.\n\nKirchen says that the Caduceus was originally expressed by the simple\nfigure of a cross, by which its inventor, Thoth, is said to have\nsymbolized the four elements proceeding from a common centre.\n\n\"Ophiolatreia,\" says Deane, \"had taken such deep root in Egypt that the\nserpent was not merely regarded as an emblem of divinity, but even held in\nestimation as the instrument of an oracle. The priests of the temple of\nIsis had a silver image of a serpent so constructed as to enable a person\nin attendance to move its head without being observed by the supplicating\nvotary.\n\n\"But Egyptian superstition was not contented with worshipping divinity\nthrough its emblem the serpent. The senseless idolater soon bowed before\nthe symbol itself, and worshipped this reptile, the representative of\nman's energy, as a god.\"\n\nIn addition to the temple of the great serpent-god Cneph at Elephantina,\nthere was a renowned one of Jupiter at Thebes, where the practice of\nOphiolatreia was carried to a great length. Herodotus writes: \"At Thebes\nthere are two serpents, by no means injurious to men; small in size,\nhaving two horns springing up from the top of the head. They bury these\nwhen dead in the temple of Jupiter: for they say that they are sacred to\nthat god.\" AElian says: \"In the time of Ptolemy Euergetes, a very large\nserpent was kept in the temple of AEsculapius at Alexandria, and in another\nplace a live one of great magnitude was kept and adored with divine\nhonours; the name of this place he called Melite.\" He gives the following\nstory:--\"This serpent had priests and ministers, a table and a bowl. The\npriests every day carried into the sacred chamber a cake made of flour and\nhoney and then retired. Returning the next day they always found the bowl\nempty. On one occasion, one of the priests, being extremely anxious to see\nthe sacred serpent, went in alone, and having deposited the cake retired.\nWhen the serpent had ascended the table to his feast, the priest came in,\nthrowing open the door with great violence: upon which the serpent\ndeparted with great indignation. But the priest was shortly after seized\nwith a mental malady, and, having confessed his crime, became dumb and\nwasted away until he died.\"\n\nIn Hewart's tables of Egyptian hieroglyphics we see a priest offering\nadoration to a serpent. The same occurs on the Isiac table.\n\n\"In a tomb at Biban, at Malook, is a beautiful painting descriptive of the\nrites of Ophiolatreia. The officiating priest is represented with a sword\nin his hand, and three headless victims are kneeling before an immense\nserpent. Isis is seen sitting under the arch made by the serpent's body,\nand the sacred asp, with a human face, is behind her seated on the\nserpent's tail. This picture proves that the serpent was propitiated by\nhuman victims.\"[16]\n\nIt is noteworthy that in Egypt as in Phoenicia and other places serpent\nworship was not immediately destroyed by the advance of Christianity. The\nGnostics united it with the religion of the cross, and a quotation from\nBishop Pococke will, just here, be most appropriate and interesting.\n\n\"We came to Raigny, where the religious sheikh of the famous Heredy was at\nthe side of the river to meet us. He went with us to the grotto of the\nserpent that has been so much talked of under the name of the Sheikh\nHeredy, of which I shall give you a particular account, in order to show\nthe folly, credulity, and superstition of these people; for the Christians\nhave faith in it as well as the Turks. We went ascending between the rocky\nmountain for half a mile, and came to a part where the valley opens wider.\nOn the right is a mosque, built with a dome over it, against the side of\nthe rock, like a sheikh's burial-place. In it there is a large cleft in\nthe rock out of which they say the serpent comes. There is a tomb in the\nmosque, in the Turkish manner, that they say is the tomb of Heredy, which\nwould make one imagine that one of their saints is buried there, and that\nthey suppose his soul may be in the serpent, for I observed that they went\nand kissed the tomb with much devotion and said their prayers at it.\nOpposite to this cleft there is another, which they say is the tomb of\nOgli Hassan, that is of Hassan, the son of Heredy; there are two other\nclefts which they say are inhabited by saints or angels. The sheikh told\nme there were two of these serpents, but the common notion is that there\nis only one. He said it had been there ever since the time of Mahomet. The\nshape of it is like that of other serpents of the harmless breed. He comes\nout only during the four summer months, and it is said that they sacrifice\nto it. This the sheikh denied, and affirmed they only brought lambs,\nsheep, and money to buy oil for the lamps--but I saw much blood and\nentrails of beasts lately killed before the door.\n\n\"The stories are so ridiculous that they ought not to be repeated, if it\nwere not to give an instance of their idolatry in those parts in this\nrespect, though the Mahometan religion seems to be very far from it in\nother things. They say the virtue of this serpent is to cure all diseases\nof those who go to it.\n\n\"They are also full of a story, that when a number of women go there once\na year, he passes by and looks on them, and goes and twines about the neck\nof the most beautiful.\n\n\"I was surprised to hear a grave and sensible Christian say that he always\ncured any distempers, but that worse followed. And some really believe\nthat he works miracles, and say it is the devil mentioned in Tobit, whom\nthe angel Gabriel drove into the utmost parts of Egypt.\"\n\nThe bishop is of opinion (in which he is joined by others) that the above\nsuperstition is a remnant of the ancient Ophiolatreia.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII.\n\n    _Derivation of the name \"Europe\"--Greece colonized by Ophites--Numerous\n    Traces of the Serpent in Greece--Worship of Bacchus--Story of\n    Ericthonias--Banquets of the Bacchants--Minerva--Armour of Agamemnon--\n    Serpents at Epidaurus--Story of the pestilence in Rome--Delphi--Mahomet\n    at Atmeidan._\n\n\nBryant and Faber both derive the name of \"Europe\" from \"Aur-ab, the solar\nserpent.\" \"Whether this be correct or not,\" says Deane, \"it is certain\nthat Ophiolatreia prevailed in this quarter of the globe at the earliest\nperiod of idolatry. The first inhabitants of Europe are said to have been\nthe offspring of a woman, partly of the human and partly of the dracontic\nfigure, a tradition which alludes to their Ophite origin.\n\n\"Of the countries of Europe, Greece was first colonized by Ophites, but at\nseparate times, both from Egypt and Phoenicia; and it is a question of\nsome doubt, though perhaps of little importance, whether the leader of the\nfirst colony, the celebrated Cadmus, was a Phoenician or an Egyptian.\nBochart has shown that Cadmus was the leader of the Canaanites who fled\nbefore the arms of the victorious Joshua; and Bryant has proved that he\nwas an Egyptian, identical with Thoth. But as mere names of individuals\nare of no importance, when all agree that the same superstition existed\ncontemporaneously in the two countries, and since Thoth is declared by\nSanchoniathan to have been the father of the Phoenician as well as\nEgyptian Ophiolatreia; we may endeavour without presumption to reconcile\nthe opinions of these learned authors by assuming each to be right in his\nown line of argument.\"\n\nIn Greece there are numerous traces of the worship of the serpent--it was\nso common indeed at one time that Justin Martyr declared the people\nintroduced it into the mysteries of all their gods. In the mysteries and\nexcesses of Bacchus it is well-known, of course, to have played a\nconspicuous part. The people bore them entwined upon their heads, and\ncarrying them in their hands, swung them about crying aloud, \"enia, enia.\"\nThe sign of the Bacchic ceremonies was a consecrated serpent, and in the\nprocessions a troop of virgins of noble family carried the reptile with\ngolden baskets containing sesamum, honey cakes and grains of salt,\narticles all specially connected with serpent worship. The first may be\nseen in the British Museum, in the hands of priests kneeling before the\nsacred serpent of Egypt. Honey cakes, according to Herodotus, were\npresented once a month as food to the sacred serpent in the Acropolis at\nAthens.\n\nThe most remarkable feature of all in the Bacchic orgies is said to have\nbeen the mystic serpent. \"The mystery of religion was throughout the world\nconcealed in a chest or box. As the Israelites had their sacred ark, every\nnation upon earth had some holy receptacle for sacred things and symbols.\nThe story of Ericthonius is illustrative of this remark. He was the fourth\nKing of Athens, and his body terminated in the tails of serpents, instead\nof legs. He was placed by Minerva in a basket, which she gave to the\ndaughter of Cecrops, with strict injunctions not to open it. Here we have\na fable made out of the simple fact of the mysterious basket, in which the\nsacred serpent was carried at the orgies of Bacchus. The whole legend\nrelates to Ophiolatreia. In accordance with the general practice, the\nworshippers of Bacchus carried in their consecrated baskets or chests the\nMystery of their God, together with the offerings.\"[17]\n\nAt the banquets of the Bacchantes, or rather, after them, it was usual to\ncarry round a cup, which was called the \"cup of the good daemon.\" The\nsymbol of this daemon was a serpent, as seen on the medals of the town of\nDionysopolis in Thrace. On one side were the heads of Gordian and Serapis\non the other a coiled serpent.\n\nThe serpent was mixed up to a considerable extent with the worship of many\nother of the Grecian deities. The statues, by Phidias, of Minerva,\nrepresent her as decorated with this emblem. In ancient medals, as shown\nby Montfaucon, she sometimes holds a caduceus in her right hand; at other\ntimes she has a staff around which a serpent is twisted, and at others, a\nlarge serpent appears going in front of her; while she is sometimes seen\nwith her crest composed of a serpent. It is remarkable too, that in the\nAcropolis at Athens was kept a live serpent who was generally considered\nthe guardian of the place, and Athens was a city specially consecrated to\nMinerva.\n\nExamples of Grecian Ophiolatreia might easily be multiplied to a\nconsiderable extent, but we have space for little more than a brief\nglance. It is known that upon the walls of Athens was a sculptured head of\nMedusa, whose hair was intertwined with snakes, and in the temple at Tega\nwas a similar figure which was supposed to possess talismanic power to\npreserve or destroy. The print in Montfaucon represents the face of Medusa\nas mild and beautiful, but the serpents as threatening and terrible. There\nis a story current, that a priestess going into a sanctuary of Minerva in\nthe dead of the night, saw a vision of that goddess, who held up her\nmantle upon which was impressed a Medusa's head, and that the sight of\nthis fearful object instantaneously converted the intruder into stone.\n\nThe armour of Agamemnon, king of Argos, was ornamented with a three headed\nserpent; Menelaus, king of Sparta, had one on his shield, and the Spartan\npeople, with the Athenians, affirmed they were of serpentine origin and\ncalled themselves _ophiogenae_.\n\nAt Epidaurus, according to Pausanias, live serpents were kept and fed\nregularly by servants, who, on account of religious awe, were fearful of\napproaching the sacred reptiles which in themselves were of the most\nharmless character. The statue of AEsculapius, at this temple, represented\nhim resting one hand upon the head of a serpent, while his sister, Hygeia,\nhad one twisted about her. It is reported that the god AEsculapius was\nconveyed by a woman named Nicagora, the wife of Echetimus, to Sicyon under\nthe form of a serpent.\n\nLivy, Ovid, Florus, Valerius Maximus, and Aurelius Victor, relate that a\npestilence of a violent and fatal character once broke out in Rome, and\nthat the oracle of Delphi advised an embassy to Epidaurus to fetch the god\nAEsculapius. This advice was taken, and a company of eleven were sent with\nthe humble supplications of the senate and people of Rome. While they were\ngazing at the statue of the god, a serpent, \"venerable, not horrible,\" say\nthese authors, which rarely appeared but when he intended to confer some\nextraordinary benefit, glided from his lurking place, and having passed\nthrough the city went directly to the Roman vessel and coiled himself up\nin the berth of Ogulnius the principal ambassador. Setting sail with the\ngod, they duly arrived off Antium, when the serpent leaped into the sea,\nand swam to the nearest temple of Apollo, and after a few days returned.\nBut when they entered the Tiber, he leaped upon an island, and\ndisappeared. Here the Romans erected a temple to him in the shape of a\nship, and the plague was stayed with wonderful celerity.\n\nDelphi appears to have been the principal stronghold of serpent worship\nin Greece. Strabo says its original name was Pytho--derived from the\nserpent Python, slain there by Apollo. From this story Heinsius concludes\nthat the god Apollo was first worshipped at Delphi, under the symbol of a\nserpent. It is known that the public assemblies at Delphi were called\nPythia, these were originally intended for the adoration of the Python.\n\nIn Gibbon and the _Annales Turcici_ we have interesting matter about the\nserpentine column. The former says it was taken from Delphi to\nConstantinople by the founder of the latter city and set up on a pillar in\nthe Hippodrome. Montfaucon, however, thinks that Constantine only caused a\nsimilar column to be made, and that the original remained in its place.\nDeane says, \"this celebrated relic of Ophiolatreia is still to be seen in\nthe same place, where it was set up by Constantine, but one of the\nserpent's heads is mutilated.\"\n\nFrom the _Annales_ we get the following explanation of this inquiry. \"When\nMahomet came to Atmeidan he saw there a stone column, on which was placed\na three-headed brazen serpent. Looking at it, he asked, 'What idol is\nthat?' and, at the same time, hurling his iron mace with great force\nknocked off the lower jaw of one of the serpent's heads. Upon which,\nimmediately, a great number of serpents began to be seen in the city.\nWhereupon some advised him to leave that serpent alone from henceforth,\nsince through that image it happened that there were no serpents in the\ncity. Wherefore that column remains to this day. And although in\nconsequence of the lower jaw of the brazen serpent being struck off, some\nserpents do come into the city, yet they do harm to no one.\"\n\nCommenting upon this story Deane remarks--\"This traditionary legend,\npreserved by Leunclavius, marks the stronghold which Ophiolatreia must\nhave taken upon the minds of the people of Constantinople, so as to cause\nthis story to be handed down to so late an era as the seventeenth century.\nAmong the Greeks who resorted to Constantinople were many idolators of the\nold religion, who would wilfully transmit any legend favourable to their\nown superstition.\" Hence, probably, the charm mentioned above, was\nattached by them to the Delphic serpent on the column in the Hippodrome,\nand revived (after the partial mutilation of the figure) by their\ndescendants, the common people, who are always the last in every country\nto forego an ancient superstition. Among the common people of\nConstantinople, there were always many more Pagans than Christians at\nheart. With the Christian religion, therefore, which they professed,\nwould be mingled many of the pagan traditions which were attached to the\nmonuments of antiquity that adorned Byzantium, or were imported into\nConstantinople.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX.\n\n    _Ophiolatreia in Britain--The Druids--Adders--Poem of Taliessin--The\n    Goddess Ceridwen--A Bardic Poem--Snake Stones--The Anguinum--Execution\n    of a Roman Knight--Remains of the Serpent-temple at Abury--Serpent\n    vestiges in Ireland of great rarity--St. Patrick._\n\n\nIt will probably be a matter of surprise to many, but it is a fact that\neven in Britain in ancient times Ophiolatreia largely prevailed. Deane\nsays: \"Our British ancestors, under the tuition of the venerable Druids,\nwere not only worshippers of the solar deity, symbolized by the serpent,\nbut held the serpent, independent of his relation to the sun, in peculiar\nveneration. Cut off from all intercourse with the civilized world, partly\nby their remoteness and partly by their national character, the Britons\nretained their primitive idolatry long after it had yielded in the\nneighbouring countries to the polytheistic corruptions of Greece and\nEgypt. In process of time, however, the gods of the Gaulish Druids\npenetrated into the sacred mythology of the British and furnished\npersonifications for the different attributes of the dracontic god Hu.\nThis deity was called \"The Dragon Ruler of the World\" and his car was\ndrawn by serpents. His priests in accommodation with the general custom of\nthe Ophite god, were called after him \"Adders.\"[18]\n\nIn a poem of Taliessin, translated by Davies, in his Appendix, No. 6, is\nthe following enumeration of a Druid's titles:--\n\n  \"I am a Druid; I am an architect; I am a prophet; I am a serpent\"\n        (Gnadr).\n\nFrom the word \"Gnadr\" is derived \"adder,\" the name of a species of snake.\nGnadr was probably pronounced like \"adder\" with a nasal aspirate.\n\nThe mythology of the Druids contained also a goddess \"Ceridwen,\" whose car\nwas drawn by serpents. It is conjectured that this was the Grecian\n\"Ceres;\" and not without reason, for the interesting intercourse between\nthe British and Gaulish Druids introduced into the purer religion of the\nformer many of the corruptions ingrafted upon that of the latter by the\nGreeks and Romans. The Druids of Gaul had among them many divinities\ncorresponding with those of Greece and Rome. They worshipped Ogmius (a\ncompound deity between Hercules and Mercury), and after him, Apollo, Mars,\nJupiter, and Minerva, or deities resembling them. Of these they made\nimages; whereas hitherto the only image in the British worship was the\ngreat wicker idol into which they thrust human victims designed to be\nburnt as an expiatory sacrifice for the sins of some chieftain.\n\nThe following translation of a Bardic poem, descriptive of one of their\nreligious rites, identifies the superstition of the British Druids with\nthe aboriginal Ophiolatreia, as expressed in the mysteries of Isis in\nEgypt. The poem is entitled \"The Elegy of Uther Pendragon;\" that is, of\nUther, \"The Dragon's Head;\" and it is not a little remarkable that the\nword \"Draig\" in the British language signifies, at the same time, \"a fiery\nserpent, a dragon, and the Supreme God.\"[19]\n\nIn the second part of this poem is the following sacrificial rites of\nUther Pendragon:--\n\n  \"With solemn festivity round the two lakes:\n  With the lake next my side;\n  With my side moving round the sanctuary;\n  While the sanctuary is earnestly invoking\n  The Gliding King, before whom the Fair One\n  Retreats upon the veil that covers the huge stones;\n  Whilst the Dragon moves round over\n  The places which contain vessels\n  Of drink offering:\n  Whilst the drink offering is in the Golden Horns;\n  Whilst the golden horns are in the hand;\n  Whilst the knife is upon the chief victim;\n  Sincerely I implore thee, O victorious Bell, etc., etc.\"\n\nThis is a most minute and interesting account of the religious rites of\nthe Druids, proving in clear terms their addiction to Ophiolatreia: for we\nhave not only the history of the \"Gliding King,\" who pursues \"The Fair\nOne,\" depicted upon \"the veil which covers the huge stones\"--a history\nwhich reminds us most forcibly of the events in Paradise, under a poetic\ngarb; but we have, likewise, beneath that veil, within the sacred circle\nof \"the huge stones,\" the \"Great Dragon, a Living Serpent,\" moving round\nthe places which contain the vessels of drink-offering; or in other words,\nmoving round the altar stone in the same manner as the serpent in the\nIsiac mysteries passed about the sacred vessels containing the offerings.\n\nThe Golden Horns which contained the drink offerings were very probably of\nthe same kind as that found in Tundera, in Denmark.\n\nThe sanctity of the serpent showed itself in another very curious part of\nthe superstition of the British Druids, namely, in that which related to\nthe formation and virtues of the celebrated _anguinum_, as it is called by\nPliny, or _gleinen nadroeth_, that is, \"snake-stones,\" as they were called\nby the Britons. Sir R. C. Hoare in his _Modern Wiltshire_, Hundred of\nAmesbury, gives an engraving of one, and says: \"This is a head of\nimperfect vitrification representing two circular lines of opaque skylight\nand white, which seem to represent a snake twined round a centre which is\nperforated.\" Mr. Lhwyd, the Welsh antiquary, writing to Ralph Thornley\nsays:--\"I am fully satisfied that they were amulets of the Druids. I have\nseen one of them that had nine small snakes upon it. There are others that\nhave one or two or more snakes.\"\n\nA story comes to us, on Roman authority (that of Pliny), that a knight\nentering a court of justice wearing an anguinum about his neck was ordered\nby Claudius to be put to death, it being believed that the influence would\nimproperly wrest judgment in his favour.\n\nOf this anguinum (a word derived from _anguis_, a snake,) Pliny says: \"An\ninfinite number of snakes, entwined together in the heat of summer, roll\nthemselves into a mass, and from the saliva of their jaws and the froth of\ntheir bodies is engendered an egg, which is called 'anguinum.' By the\nviolent hissing of the serpents the egg is forced into the air, and the\nDruid destined to secure it, must catch it in his sacred vest before it\nreaches the ground.\"\n\nInformation relative to the prevalence of this superstition in England\nwill be found in Davies' _Myths of the Druids_, Camden's _Britannia_, and\nBorlase's _Cornwall_.\n\nPerhaps the most remarkable of all British relics of this worship are to\nbe found on the hills overlooking the village of Abury, in the county of\nWiltshire. There, twenty-six miles from the celebrated ruins of\nStonehenge, are to be found the remains of a great Serpentine Temple--one\nof the most imposing, as it certainly is one the most interesting,\nmonuments of the British Islands. It was first accurately described by Dr.\nStukeley in 1793 in his celebrated work entitled _Abury, a Temple of the\nBritish Druids_. It was afterwards carefully examined by Sir R. C. Hoare\nand an account published in his elaborate work _Ancient Wiltshire_. Dr.\nStukeley was the first to detect the design of the structure and his\nconclusions have been sustained by the observations of every antiquary who\nhas succeeded him.\n\nThe temple of Abury consisted originally of a grand circumvallation of\nearth 1,400 feet in diameter, enclosing an area of upwards of twenty-two\nacres. It has an inner ditch and the height of the embankment, measuring\nfrom the bottom of the ditch, is seventeen feet. It is quite regular,\nthough not an exact circle in form, and has four entrances at equal\ndistances apart, though nearly at right angles to each other. Within this\ngrand circle were originally two double or concentric circles composed of\nmassive upright stones: a row of large stones, one hundred in number, was\nplaced upon the inner brow of the ditch. Extending upon either hand from\nthis grand central structure were parallel lines of huge upright stones,\nconstituting, upon each side, avenues upwards of a mile in length. These\nformed the body of the serpent. Each avenue consisted of two hundred\nstones. The head of the serpent was represented by an oval structure\nconsisting of two concentric lines of upright stones; the outer line\ncontaining forty, the inner eighteen stones. This head rests upon an\neminence known as Overton, or Hakpen Hill, from which is commanded a view\nof the entire structure, winding back for more than two miles to the point\nof the tail, towards Bekhampton.\n\n_Hakpen_ in the old British dialects signified _Hak_, serpent, and _pen_,\nhead, _i.e._, Head of the Serpent. \"To our name of _Hakpen_,\" says\nStukeley, \"alludes _ochim_, called 'doleful creatures' in our\ntranslation.\" Isa. (13 v. 21), speaking of the desolation of Babylon,\nsays: \"Wild beasts of the desert shall lie there, and their houses shall\nbe full of _ochim_, and owls shall dwell there, and satyrs shall dance\nthere.\" St. Jerome translates it \"serpents.\" The Arabians call a serpent\n_Haie_, and wood-serpents _Hageshin_; and thence our _Hakpen_; _Pen_ is\n\"head\" in British.\n\n\"That the votaries of Ophiolatreia penetrated into every part of Britain\nis probable from the vestiges of some such idolatry even now to be found\nin Scotland and the western isles. Several obelisks remain in the vicinity\nof Aberdeen, Dundee and Perth, upon which appear devices strongly\nindicative of Ophiolatreia. They are engraved in Gordon's _Itinerarium\nSeptentrionale_. The serpent is a frequent and conspicuous hieroglyphic.\nFrom the Runic characters traced upon some of these stones it is\nconjectured that they were erected by the Danes. Such might have been the\ncase; but the Danes themselves were a sect of Ophites, and had not the\npeople of the country been Ophites also, they might not have suffered\nthese monuments to remain.\"\n\nRemains indicating the presence of Serpent Worship in Ireland are\nextremely scarce, but we must remember the story prevalent in the country,\naccepted as truthful by a large majority of its inhabitants, that St.\nPatrick banished all snakes from Ireland by his prayers. After all, this\nmay mean nothing more than that by his preaching he overturned and\nuprooted the superstitious practices of the serpent worshippers of his\ntimes.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X.\n\n    _India conspicuous in the history of Serpent Worship--Nagpur--\n    Confessions of a Snake Worshipper--The gardeners of Guzerat--Cottages\n    for Snakes at Calicut--The Feast of Serpents--The Deity\n    Hari--Garuda--The Snake as an emblem of immortality._\n\n\nIn the course of this work we have had occasion frequently to allude to\nIndia as the home of the peculiar worship before us, and perhaps that\ncountry may fairly be placed side by side with Egypt for the multitude of\nillustrations it affords of what we are seeking to elucidate.\n\nMr. Rivett-Carnac from whose paper in the journal of the Bengal Asiatic\nSociety we have already quoted, says:--\"The palace of the Bhonslahs at\nBenares brings me to Nagpur, where, many years ago, I commenced to make,\nwith but small success, some rough notes on Serpent Worship. Looking up\nsome old sketches, I find that the Mahadeo in the oldest temples at Nagpur\nis surmounted by the Nag as at Benares. And in the old temple near the\npalace of the Nagpur, or city of the Nag or cobra, is a five-headed snake,\nelaborately coiled. The Bhonslahs apparently took the many-coiled Nag with\nthem to Benares. A similar representation of the Nag is found in the\ntemple near the Itwarah gate at Nagpur. Here again the Nag or cobra is\ncertainly worshipped as Mahadeo or the phallus, and there are certain\nobvious points connected with the position assumed by the cobra when\nexcited and the expansion of the hood, which suggest the reason for this\nsnake in particular being adopted as a representation of the phallus and\nan emblem of Siva.\n\n\"The worship of the snake is very common in the old Nagpur Province where,\nespecially among the lower class, the votaries of Siva or Nag Bhushan, 'he\nwho wears snakes as his ornaments,' are numerous. It is likely enough that\nthe city took its name from the Nag temple, still to be seen there, and\nthat the river Nag, perhaps, took its name from the city or temple, and\nnot the city from the river, as some think. Certain it is that many of the\nKunbi or cultivating class worship the snake and the snake only, and that\nthis worship is something more than the ordinary superstitious awe with\nwhich all Hindus regard the snake. I find from my notes that one Kunbi\nwhom I questioned in old days, when I was a Settlement Officer in camp in\nthe Nagpur Division, stated that he worshipped the Nag and nothing else;\nthat he worshipped clay images of the snake, and when he could afford to\npay snake-catchers for a look at a live one, he worshipped the living\nsnake; that if he saw a Nag on the road he would worship it, and that he\nbelieved no Hindu would kill a Nag or cobra if he knew it were a Nag. He\nthen gave me the following list of articles he would use in worshipping\nthe snake, when he could afford it; and I take it, the list is similar to\nwhat would be used in ordinary Siva Worship. 1--Water. 2--Gandh, pigment\nof sandal-wood for the forehead or body. 3--Cleaned rice. 4--Flowers.\n5--Leaves of the Bail tree. 6--Milk. 7--Curds. 8--A thread or piece of\ncloth. 9--Red powder. 10--Saffron. 11--Abir, a powder composed of fragrant\nsubstances. 12--Garlands of flowers. 13--Buttemah or grain soaked and\nparched. 14--Jowarri. 15--Five lights. 16--Sweetmeats. 17--Betel leaves.\n18--Cocoa nut. 19--A sum of money (according to means). 20--Flowers\noffered by the suppliant, the palms of the hands being joined.\n\n\"All these articles, my informant assured me, were offered to the snake in\nregular succession, one after the other, the worshipper repeating the\nwhile certain _mantras_ or incantations. Having offered all these gifts,\nthe worshipper prostrates himself before the snake, and, begging for\npardon if he has ever offended against him, craves that the snake will\ncontinue his favour upon him and protect him from every danger.\"\n\nIn the _Oriental Memoirs_ by Forbes, we are told of the gardeners of\nGuzerat who would never allow the snakes to be disturbed, calling them\n\"father,\" \"brother,\" and other familiar and endearing names. The head\ngardener paid them religious honours. As Deane says, \"here we observe a\nmixture of the original Serpent Worship, with the more modern doctrine of\ntransmigration.\"\n\nStill more striking is the information in Purchas's _Pilgrims_, that a\nking of Calicut built cottages for live serpents, whom he tended with\npeculiar care, and made it a capital crime for any person in his dominions\nto destroy a snake. \"The natives,\" he says, \"looked upon serpents as\nendued with divine spirits.\"\n\nThen there is the festival called \"The Feast of the Serpents,\" at which\nevery worshipper, in the hope of propitiating the reptiles during the\nensuing year, sets by a portion of his rice for the hooded snake on the\noutside of his house.\n\nThe deities of India and the wonderful temples and caves, as those at\nSalsette and Elephanta, as may be seen in Maurice's _Indian Antiquities_,\nMoor's _Hindu Pantheon_, _The Asiatic Researches_, Faber's _Pagan\nIdolatry_ and numerous other works, are universally adorned with, or\nrepresented by this great symbol. Thus we have the statue of Jeyne, the\nIndian AEsculapius, turbaned by a seven-headed snake; that of Vishnu on a\nrock in the Ganges, reposing on a coiled serpent whose numerous folds form\na canopy over the sleeping god; Parus Nauth symbolized by a serpent;\nJagan-Nath worshipped under the form of a seven-headed dragon.\n\nHari, appears to be one of the titles of Vishnu--that of the deity in his\npreserving quality--and his appearance on the rock, as just mentioned, is\nthus noticed in Wilkins' _Hitopadesa_: \"Nearly opposite Sultan Ganj, a\nconsiderable town in the province of Bahar, there stands a rock of\ngranite, forming a small island in the Ganges, known to Europeans by the\nname of 'the rock of Ichangiri,' which is highly worthy of the traveller's\nnotice for the vast number of images carved upon every part of its\nsurface. Among the rest there is Hari, of a gigantic size, recumbent upon\na coiled serpent, whose heads (which are numerous) the artist has\ncontrived to spread into a kind of canopy over the sleeping god; and from\neach of its mouths issues a forked tongue, seeming to threaten instant\ndeath to any whom rashness might prompt to disturb him. The whole lies\nalmost clear of the block on which it is hewn. It is finely imagined and\nis executed with great skill. The Hindus are taught to believe that at the\nend of every _Calpa_ (creation or formation) all things are absorbed in\nthe Deity, and that in the interval of another creation, he reposeth\nhimself upon the serpent Sesha (duration) who is also called Ananta\n(endlessness).\"\n\nMoor says Garuda was an animal--half bird, half man--and was the _vahan_\nor vehicle of Vishnu, also Arun's younger brother. He is sometimes\ndescribed in the manner that our poets and painters describe a griffin or\na cherub; and he is placed at the entrance of the passes leading to the\nHindu garden of Eden, and there appears in the character of a destroying\nangel in as far as he resists the approach of serpents, which in most\nsystems of poetical mythology appears to have been the beautiful,\ndeceiving, insinuating form that sin originally assumed. Garuda espoused a\nbeautiful woman; the tribes of serpents, alarmed thereat, lest his progeny\nshould, inheriting his propensities, overpower them, waged fierce war\nagainst him; but he destroyed them all, save one, which he placed as an\nornament about his neck. In the Elephanta cave Garuda is often seen with\nthis appendage; and some very old gold coins are in existence depicting\nhim with snakes or elephants in his talons and beaks. Destroyer of\nserpents, Naganteka, is one of his names.\n\nHe was of great use to Krishna in clearing the country round Dwarka\n(otherwise Dravira) from savage ferocious animals and noxious reptiles.\nVishnu had granted to Garuda the power of destroying his as well as Siva's\nenemies; also generally those guilty of constant uncleanness, unbelievers,\ndealers in iniquity, ungrateful persons, those who slander their spiritual\nguides, or defiled their beds; but forebade him to touch a Brahman,\nwhatever was his guilt, as the pain of disobedience would be a scorching\npain in his throat, and any attack on a holy or pious person would be\nfollowed by a great diminution of strength. By mistake, however, Garuda\nsometimes seized a priest or a religious man, but was admonished and\npunished in the first case by the scorching flame, and was unable, even\nwhen he had bound him in his den, to hurt the man of piety.[20] To Rama\nalso, in the war of Lauka, Garuda was eminently useful: in Rama's last\nconflict with Ravana the latter was not overcome without the aid of\nGaruda, sent by Vishnu to destroy the serpent-arrows of Ravana. These\narrows are called \"Sharpa-vana\" (in the current dialect _Sarpa_ a snake,\nis corrupted into _Saap_ or _Samp_, and _vana_, an arrow, into _ban_)\nand had the faculty of separating, between the bow and the object, into\nmany parts, each becoming a serpent. Viswamitra conferred upon Rama the\npower of transforming his arrows into \"Garuda-vanas,\" they similarly\nseparating themselves into \"Garuda's,\" the terror and destroyer of the\n_Sarpa_.\n\nSome legends make Garuda the offspring of Kasyapa and Diti. This\nall-prolific dame laid an egg, which, it was predicted, would preserve her\ndeliverer from some great affliction. After a lapse of five hundred years\nGaruda sprung from the egg, flew to the abode of Indra, extinguished the\nfire that surrounded it, conquered its guards, the _devatas_, and bore off\nthe _amrita_ (ambrosia), which enabled him to liberate his captive mother.\nA few drops of this immortal beverage falling on the species of grass\ncalled \"Kusa,\" it became eternally consecrated; and the serpents greedily\nlicking it up so lacerated their tongues with the sharp grass that they\nhave ever since remained forked; but the boon of eternity was ensured to\nthem by their thus partaking of the immortal fluid. This cause of snakes\nhaving forked tongues is still popularly in the tales of India attributed\nto the above greediness; and their supposed immortality may have\noriginated in some such stories as these; a small portion of _amrita_, as\nin the case of Rahu, would ensure them this boon.\n\nIn all mythological language the snake is an emblem of immortality: its\nendless figure when its tail is inserted in its mouth, and the annual\nrenewal of its skin and vigour, afford symbols of continued youth and\neternity; and its supposed medicinal or life-preserving qualities may also\nhave contributed to the fabled honours of the serpent tribe. In Hindu\nmythology serpents are of universal occurence and importance; in some\nshape or other they abound in all directions; a similar state of things\nprevails in Greece and Egypt. Ingenious and learned authors attribute this\nuniversality of serpent forms to the early and all pervading prevalence of\nsin, which, in this identical shape, they tell us, and as indeed we all\nknow, is as old as the days of our greatest grandmother: thus much as to\nits age, when there was but one woman; its prevalence, now there are so\nmany, this is no place to discuss.\n\nIf such writers were to trace the allegories of Sin and Death, and the end\nof their empire, they might discover further allusions to the Christian\ndispensation in the traditions of the Hindus than have hitherto been\npublished--Krishna crushing, but not destroying, the type of Sive, has\noften been largely discussed. Garuda is also the proverbial, but not the\nutter destroyer of serpents, for he spared one, they and their archetype\nbeing, in reference to created beings, eternal. His continual and destined\nstate of warfare with serpent, a shape mostly assumed by the enemies of\nthe virtuous incarnations or deified heroes of the Hindus, is a continued\nallegory of the conflicts between Vice and Virtue so infinitely\npersonified. Garuda, at length, appears the coadjutor of all virtuous\nsin-subduing efforts, as the vehicle of the chastening and triumphant\nparty, and conveys him on the wings of the winds to the regions of eternal\nday.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI.\n\n    _Mr. Bullock's Exhibition of Objects illustrating Serpent Worship._\n\n\nUpwards of sixty years ago, there was opened at the Egyptian Hall,\nPiccadilly, what was described as the \"Unique Exhibition called Ancient\nMexico; collected on the spot in 1823, by the assistance of the Mexican\nGovernment, by W. Bullock, F.L.S., &c., &c.\" The illustration attached to\na published description of this collection shows that it contained\nreproductions of some of the most remarkable of the serpent deities to be\nfound in the temples of the western parts of America, and the following\nextract will prove interesting to our readers.\n\n\"The rattlesnake appears to have been the most general object of worship,\nveneration, and fear; indeed it occurs in some manner combined with almost\nevery other, and is still found in many of the Indian villages. It remains\nat Tezcuco, quite perfect at the present time. Broken fragments may be met\nin the exterior of the houses in Mexico in several places; the great head\nplaced at the left of the sacrificial stone is cast from one in the corner\nof the fine building used for the Government Lottery Office, and exposed\nto the street. It must have belonged to an idol at least seventy feet\nlong, probably in the great temple, and broken and buried at the Conquest.\nThey are generally in a coiled up state, with the tail or rattle on the\nback, but they vary in their size and position. The finest that is known\nto exist, I discovered in the deserted part of the Cloister of the\nDominican Convent opposite the Palace of the Inquisition. It is coiled up\nin an irritated erect position, with the jaws extended, and in the act of\ngorging an elegantly dressed female, who appears in the mouth of the\nenormous reptile, crushed and lacerated, a disgusting detail withal too\nhorrible for description.\n\n\"Turning to a letter from Cortes to Charles V., as given by Humboldt, we\nread, 'From the square we proceeded to the great temple, but before we\nentered it we made a circuit through a number of large courts, the\nsmallest of which appeared to me to contain more ground than the great\nsquare in Salamanca, with double enclosures built of lime and stone, and\nthe courts paved with large white cut stone, very clean; or, where not\npaved, they were plastered and polished. When we approached the gate of\nthe great temple, to which the ascent was by a hundred and fourteen\nsteps, and before we had mounted one of them, Montezuma sent down to us\nsix priests and two of his noblemen to carry Cortes up, as they had done\ntheir sovereign, which he politely declined. When we had ascended to the\nsummit of the temple, we observed on the platform as we passed the large\nstone whereon were placed the victims who were to be sacrificed. Here was\na great figure which resembled a dragon, and much blood fresh spilt.\nCortes then addressing himself to Montezuma requested that he would do him\nthe favour to show us his gods. Montezuma, having first consulted his\npriests, led us into a tower where there was a kind of saloon. Here were\ntwo altars highly adorned, with richly wrought timbers on the roof, and\nover the altars gigantic figures resembling very fat men. The one on the\nright was Huitzilopochtli their war god, with a great face and terrible\neyes, this figure was entirely covered with gold and jewels, and his body\nbound with golden serpents, in his right hand he held a bow, and in his\nleft a bundle of arrows. The little idol which stood by him represented\nhis page, and bore a lance and target richly ornamented with gold and\njewels. The great idol had round his neck the figures of human heads and\nhearts made of pure gold and silver, ornamented with precious stones of a\nblue colour. Before the idol was a pan of incense, with three hearts of\nhuman victims which were then burning, mixed with copal. The whole of that\napartment, both walls and floor, was stained with human blood in such\nquantity as to give a very offensive smell. On the left was the other\ngreat figure, with a countenance like a bear, and great shining eyes of\nthe polished substance whereof their mirrors are made. The body of this\nidol was also covered with jewels. These two deities it was said were\nbrothers; the name of the last was Tezcatepuca, and he was the god of the\ninfernal regions. He presided, according to their notions, over the souls\nof men. His body was covered with figures representing little devils with\ntails of serpents, and the walls and pavement of this temple were so\nbesmeared with blood that they gave off a worse odour than all the\nslaughter-houses of Castille. An offering lay before him of five human\nhearts. In the summit of the temple, and in a recess the timber of which\nwas highly ornamented, we saw a figure half human and the other half\nresembling an alligator, inlaid with jewels, and partly covered with a\nmantle. This idol was said to contain the germ and origin of all created\nthings, and was the god of harvests and fruits. The walls and altars were\nbestained like the rest, and so offensive that we thought we never could\nget out soon enough.\n\n\"'In this place they had a drum of most enormous size, the head of which\nwas made of the skins of large serpents. This instrument when struck\nresounded with a noise that could be heard to the distance of two leagues,\nand so doleful that it deserved to be named the music of the infernal\nregions; and with their horrible sounding horns and trumpets, their great\nknives for sacrifice, their human victims, and their blood besprinkled\naltars, I devoted them and all their wickedness to God's vengeance, and\nthought that the time would never arrive that I should escape from this\nscene of butchery, horrible smells, and more detestable sights.\n\n\"'On the site of the church, called St. Jago el Taltelulco, was a temple,\nwhich, we have already observed, was surrounded with courts as large as\nthe square of Salamanca. At a little distance from it stood a tower, a\ntrue hell or habitation for demons, with a mouth, resembling that of an\nenormous monster, wide open, and ready as it were to devour those who\nentered. At the door stood frightful idols; by it was a place for\nsacrifice, and within, boilers and pots full of water to dress the flesh\nof the victims which were eaten by the priests. The idols were like\nserpents and devils, and before them were tables and knives for sacrifice,\nthe place being covered with the blood which was spilt on those occasions.\nThe furniture was like that of a butcher's stall, and I never gave this\naccursed building any name except that of hell. Having passed this, we saw\ngreat piles of wood, and a reservoir of water supplied by a pipe from the\ngreat aqueduct; and crossing a court we came to another temple, wherein\nwere the tombs of the Mexican nobility, it was begrimed with soot and\nblood. Next to this was another, full of skeletons and piles of bones,\neach kept apart, but regularly arranged. In each temple were idols, and\neach had also its particular priests, who wore long vestments of black,\ntheir long hair was clotted together, and their ears lacerated in honour\nof their gods.'\"\n\nMr. Bullock then proceeds to describe a cast of the great idol of the\ngoddess of war, which he had brought to England with him.\n\n\"This monstrous idol, before which thousands of human victims were\nannually sacrificed on the altar, is, with its pedestal, about twelve feet\nhigh and four feet wide, it is sculptured out of one solid piece of grey\nbasalt. Its form is partly human, and the rest composed of rattlesnakes\nand the tiger. The head, enormously wide, seems that of two rattlesnakes\nunited, the fangs hanging out of the mouth, on which the still palpitating\nhearts of the unfortunate victims were rubbed as an act of the most\nacceptable oblation. The body is that of a deformed human frame, and the\nplace of arms supplied by the heads of rattlesnakes placed on square\nplinths and united by fringed ornaments. Round the waist is a girdle,\nwhich was originally covered with gold, and beneath this, reaching nearly\nto the ground and partly covering its deformed cloven feet, a drapery\nentirely composed of wreathed rattlesnakes which the nations call\ncohuatlicuye or garments of serpents, on each side of which is a winged\ntermination of the feathers of the vulture. Between the feet, descending\nfrom the body, another wreathed serpent rested its head on the ground, and\nthe whole composition of this deity is strictly appropriate to the\ninfernal purpose for which it was used, and with which the personal\nornaments too well accord. From the neck, spreading over its deformed\nbreast, is a necklace composed of human hands, hearts, and skulls--fit\nemblems of the sanguinary rites daily performed in its honour.\n\n\"The death's head and mutilated hands, four of which surround the bosom of\nthe goddess, remind us of the terrible sacrifices of Teoquawhquat,\ncelebrated in the fifteenth century period of thirteen days after the\nsummer solstice, in honour of the god of war and his female companion,\nTeoyamiqui. The mutilated hands alternate with the figure of certain vases\nin which incense was burnt. These vases were called Topxicalli, bags in\nthe form of calabashes. This idol was sculptured on every side, even\nbeneath where was represented Mictlanteuchtli, the Lord of the place of\nthe dead; it cannot be doubted, but that it was supported in the air by\nmeans of two columns, on which rested the arms. According to this\nwhimsical arrangement, the head of the idol was probably elevated five or\nsix metres above the pavement of the temple, so that the priests dragging\ntheir unfortunate victims to the altar made them pass under the figure of\nMictlanteuchtli. The Viceroy of Mexico transported this monument to the\nUniversity which he thought the most proper place to preserve one of the\nmost curious remains of American antiquity. The Professors of the\nUniversity, monks of the Order of St. Dominic, were unwilling to expose\nthis idol to the sight of the Mexican youth, and caused it to be reburied\nin one of the passages of the College. But Mr. Humboldt had it disinterred\nat the request of the Bishop of Monterey.\n\n\"A highly curious specimen of Mexican sculpture is an exceeding hard stone\nresembling hornstein, a coarse kind of jade, it is a species of compact\ntale, of most elaborate workmanship, and the bust of a priest, or perhaps\nof the idol representing the Sun. The head is crowned with a high\nmitre-shaped cap, decorated with jewels and feathers, it has long pendant\nearrings. The hands are raised, the right sustains something resembling a\nknotted club, while the left takes hold of a festoon of flowers which\ndescends from the head; all the other parts are covered with the great\nrattlesnake, whose enormous head and jaws are on the right side of the\nfigure, while the backs and sides are covered with the scales and rattles\nof the deadly reptile.\"\n\nOur prescribed limits are now reached, and we are able to add but little\nto what has already been advanced exhibiting the widespread prevalence of\nthis singular form of worship. Again and again has wonderment been\nexpressed that it should ever be possible for a creature so disgusting to\nbecome an object of worship, but so it has been, and no age or country\nseems to have been strange to it. Very early indeed in history men began\nto worship a serpent, that brazen one of the Exodus, which Hezekiah\ndestroyed on account of the idolatry into which it led the people. But if\nthat object was put away, the hope that the worship would cease was vain,\nfor it started up amongst the Assyrians, the Chaldeans, the Phoenicians,\nthe Egyptians, and spread into Greece, Esthonia, Finland, Italy, Persia,\nHindustan, Ceylon, China, Japan, Burmah, Java, Arabia, Syria, Ethiopia,\nBritain, Mexico, and Peru.\n\nSuch was its extent--wide as the world itself, and vast beyond estimate or\ndescription was its influence over the minds of those who came within its\nreach. Let the curious reader who would know more, and who would make\nhimself acquainted with the multitudinous forms in which the emblem was\ndepicted, study the works of such writers as Kingsford and Montfaucon,\nwith their numerous and well executed plates, and he will meditate with\nastonishment upon the singular fascination which this repulsive reptile\nseems to have exercised over the human mind. He is said, we know, so to\nfascinate the victim he is about to seize as his prey that the unhappy\ncreature is deprived of all power of resistance, a fascination no less\noverwhelming seems to have paralyzed the human mind and caused it to adopt\nfrom some cause or other such a repelling reptile as an object of worship.\nThe spell is broken now, however, and but little remains of what was once\nso universal, beyond the earth mounds where its temples stood and the half\nruined sculptures collected in the museums of civilized countries.\n\n\nTHE END.\n\n\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[1] Deane.\n\n[2] Eusebius.\n\n[3] Aristoph.\n\n[4] Cory's Ancient Fragments, Intro. 34.\n\n[5] Origin Pagan Idol., Vol. 1, p. 175.\n\n[6] Landseer's Sabaean Res.\n\n[7] Coleman's Hind. Mythology.\n\n[8] Origin Pagan Idol., vol. 1, p. 45.\n\n[9] Herrara, Hist. America, vol. iv., pp. 162-3.\n\n[10] Trav. in Yucatan.\n\n[11] Clavigero, vol. 1.\n\n[12] Faber.\n\n[13] Deane.\n\n[14] McCulloch's American Researches, p. 225.\n\n[15] Gesner, Hist. Anim. p. 54, citing AElian.\n\n[16] Deane.\n\n[17] Deane.\n\n[18] Davies' Mythol. of Druids.\n\n[19] Owen's Dict. Art. Draig.\n\n[20] Asiatic Res., vol. 5, p. 514.\n\n[21] Moor's Hindu Pantheon 342.\n\n\n\nTranscriber's Notes:\n\nPassages in italics are indicated by _italics_.\n\nCharacters in larger font are indicated by =large=.\n\nFoonote 21 appears on page 98 of the text, but there is no corresponding\nmarker on the page.","title":"Ophiolatreia: An Account of the Rites and Mysteries Connected with the Origin, Rise, and Development of Serpent Worship in Various Parts of the World","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":41487}