glided over the cradle of the Virgin Mary, when she was asleep, at the age of a year and a half.* Serpents were also considered tutelary deities of particular places and persons, and were not only the common symbols of the Pythian worship, but also the domestic prophets of the temples. † So universal was ophiolatry in Asia that the symbol of that continent under the Romans was a female figure holding a serpent in her right hand, and in her left the rostrum of a ship. It was not less extensively practised in Africa. Allusion has already been made to the Egyptians; and there is no need to dwell upon their well-known worship of life in every form. But we may recall the fact that the serpent figures largely in their mythology as a symbol. Their very ancient god of silence, Harpocrates, was represented with his left hand on a staff, round which is twisted a snake. The god Cneph, the architect of the universe, was sometimes represented as a serpent with an egg in his mouth. Thoth, the god of healing, was symbolized by a serpent standing upon his tail, and was represented leaning on a stick which was enfolded by a snake. A female deity, corresponding with the Greek goddess Hygeia, is enriched by a serpent, which drinks out of a chalice in her hand. The reptile was also symbolical of Isis; but the species of it peculiarly dedicated to her was the asp. Serapis had a human head and a serpent's tail; and, in short, there is scarcely an Egyptian deity which is not occasionally symbolized by the snake.‡ Figures of this horrible reptile were sculptured and painted on the Egyptian temples, obelisks, and tombs. It was the most expressive symbol among the Egyptians. Serpent-worship has prevailed all over Africa from time immemorial; but it is not a little singular that there should be such similarity between the words used in connection with * Faber, Pag. Idol., ii, 433. + Deane, p. 100, citing Spanheim. it in countries so distant from each other as Canaan and Whydah, or Congo. In the latter kingdoms the black races have great faith in charms in which the teeth and bones of serpents are ingredients. These charms are called Obeah, and those who compound them are called professors of Obi. There is a tribe in Whydah called Eboes or Oboes, who are addicted to serpent-worship, and a neighboring tribe, the Koromantynes, make propitiatory offerings to the Evil Spirit, whom they call Oboni; they offer human sacrifices to him. We have here evidence that in very ancient times there must have been communication between the western coast of Africa and Egypt or Syria; for, certainly, these compounds of the word Ob, in relation to serpent-worship, cannot have been accidentatly formed. The serpent was considered by the natives of Whydah to be so sacred that no native, on pain of death, dared to injure or molest it, however troublesome or mischievous; and it was invoked under all the difficulties and emergencies of life. The English traveller, Bosman, who visited that country in 1697, says that the most celebrated shrine in the kingdom was called "the Serpent's House," to which the people frequently made pilgrimages, daily offered victims, and inquired as to success in business.* The negroes of Congo worshipped serpents, which they fed with their daintiest provisions. But in modern times snakeworship has disappeared in those portions of Africa occupied by Christians or Mohammedans; the latter remorselessly suppressed it by the sword, in obedience to the commands of Mohammed. Let us now turn to Europe, respecting which quarter of the globe there is considerable difference of opinion as to the extent to which serpent-worship formerly prevailed in it. We need hardly say that, as Christianity prevails all over it, "Delubrum regni celebratissimum domum serpentis nuncupant, ad quam peregrinationes frequenter instituunt, hostias quotidie deferunt, atque fortunatum inde in negotiis successum præstolantur." Acta Erudita. Essay on Guinea, p. 265. Purchas, Pilgrims, part 1, p. 768. except among the Turks, who, however, hold serpent-worship in abhorrence, there are now no idolaters of any kind. It has been supposed by eminent scholars, like Bryant and Faber, that the name of Europe was derived from Aur-ab, which, as we have seen, is in Hebrew "the solar serpent; it is the root also of the words Arab, Arabia, "the land of the serpent sun;" and Euboea, or Aub-aia, "the land of Ob." But this derivation is not generally accepted. The common opinion is, that the same is derived from the Greek words εpus, "broad," and the root on, "to see;" though, why the coasts of Europe should seem of greater extent to the ancients than those of Africa and Asia has not been explained; and, as for its being named after the daughter of Agenor, the supposition may be dismissed as a fable. 66 But, whatever may be the true derivation of the name Europe," it is an indisputable fact that serpents figure very largely in the early traditions and mythologies of its inhabitants. Take, for instance, the legend of Cadmus, who led a Phoenician colony into Greece, and there founded the Boeotian Thebes. When he followed the cow to the spot where she sank down, and whereon the citadel was subsequently built, he sent some persons to a neighboring well to fetch water; but they were killed by a "dragon" which guarded it. Then Cadmus slew the monster, and sewed its teeth in the ground, out of which came up armed men. At the close of his career, he and his wife, Harmonia, were changed into serpents, and removed by Zeus to Elysium. One of the survivors of the armed men was named after the Phoenician serpent-god, Ophion. The transformation of Cadmus into a serpent, and his removal to Elysium, seem to indicate that he was deified and worshipped under the symbol of a snake. The legend of Cecrops has a similar meaning. His name is derived by Allwoodt from Ka-nvp-op, "the temple of the Faber, Cabiri, vol. i, p. 180. + Literary Antiquities of Greece, p. 259. Draco (Spanov, (Δρακων, Supreme Ops;" and he is represented as half man and half serpent. He led a colony from Egypt, took possession of Attica, and founded Athens. The first altar which he erected there was to Ops or Ob, the serpent deity. a dragon) is said to have been the first king of Athens, whence Deane concludes that Cecrops and Draco were the same person.* The fourth king of Athens, Erichthonius, was, when a child, concealed in a chest, which was intrusted to three persons, with strict orders not to open it; but they disobeyed the command, and, on opening the chest, they saw the child in the form of a serpent, or entwined by one, whereupon they were seized with madness, and they destroyed themselves. Erichthonius, after his death,was worshipped as a god. Minerva, the special protectress of Athens, was sometimes represented as a serpent and as attended by a serpent. In the Acropolis was kept a live serpent, and on the walls was sculptured a head of Medusa, whose hair was intertwined with snakes. This same head was in the breast-plate of the goddess, and was supposed to convert beholders into stone: at all events, Pausanias relates a story of a priestess being thus changed at the sight of the unfortunate Medusa's hair.† In celebrating the mysteries of Bacchus, the Greek assistants crowned themselves with serpents, and carried them in their hands, brandishing them over their heads, and shouting Evia, to denote the female serpent. In the Bacchic orgies the virgins carried golden baskets, each containing small pyramids, honey-cakes, sesamum, wool, salt, and a serpent. The honey-cakes were marked with the sacred Omphalos, or navel, and were offered at the shrine of the serpent, which was kept in the Acropolis. The Omphalos was also represented by a figure of a coiled snake: it was sacred to the serpent-god. § Bryant derives the word "Omphalos" from the Phoenician Omphi-el, "the oracle of the sun; " and this etymology is corroborated by the fact of • Ibid., p. 177. Pausanias, lib. x. + Lib. ix. its (the navel's) being represented by a coiled serpent. In short, the symbolical worship of the serpent was so general in Greece that Justin Martyr accused the Greeks of making the serpent the great symbol and mystery in all that related to their gods.* Their kings and chieftains adopted it as their device; Agamemnon and Menelaus bore one of a tripleheaded serpent on their breast-plates and baldricks; the Theban Hercules had on his shield the device of two dragons lifting up their heads. A serpent was carved on the tomb of Epaminondas; and at Thespiæ, a young man, chosen by lot, was offered annually to the serpent. The famous Pythonic oracle at Delphi has been already noticed. The oracle of Apollo at Delos had an image of a dragon erected to Apollo. In the cave at Trophonius, in Phocis, were two figures, a male and a female, holding sceptres encircled by serpents. Bryant conjectures that the name Trophonius is derived from Tor-oph-on-"the temple of the serpent of the sun." In this cave live serpents were kept, and offerings of cakes in baskets were made to them by those who entered it; but it was said that no one ever came out of it smiling: perhaps this was because of the stupor occasioned by the serpents. The worship of the serpent prevailed, also, in the Peloponnesus. This portion of Greece was colonized by the Syrian Pelops, whose name was really P'-El-Ops-" the serpentgod; and his descendants were serpent-worshippers, as were the Argives and Spartans. Antinöe, the foundress of Mantinoa, was guided to the spot by a snake, and the first colony in Laconia was established under the auspices of a sacred serpent brought from Argolis.t The Cretan Jupiter was attended by two serpents. Divination by snakes was resorted to by the Greeks, who borrowed it from the Syrians; a notable instance of it occurs in the Second Book of the Iliad, where Calchas, the soothsayer, officiates at the heca * Παρὰ παντὶ των νομίζομενων παρ' ὑμιν θεῶν Όφις συμβολον μέγα και μυςήριον ἀναγρεφεται, Apolog. lib. i. |