Deo Æsculapio, & Hygeæ, conservatoribus.
Deo Æsculapio, & Deæ Hygeæ.
N. B. The Title of Conservator, or Saviour, was the ordinary Elogium of Æsculapius.
In the Isle of Co, there was a Coin whereon Æsculapius was called the Saviour; and so on a Coin of Ancyra. Games are also mentioned, instituted in honour of him as Saviour. The Symbol of Æsculapius was a Serpent, or Dragon, about a little Rod, as may be seen in several Medals, and by the Testimony of the Poet[[404]]. Wherever he was worship’d in Statues of a human Figure, a Staff was put into his Left-hand, with a Serpent about it.
[404]. Ovid. Metam. lib. 5. Qualis in æde.... Esse solet, baculumque tenens agreste sinistra.
This seems to be the reason why Antiquity represents the first Masters of Physick (as Hermes, Æsculapius, Hippocrates, in their Statues and Medals) with a Viper added to their Figure; and also why they worship’d those Physicians under the Form of Serpents[[405]].
[405]. Salomonis Cellarii—Origines & Antiquitates Medicæ. Printed at Hall in Saxony.
The Serpent of Æsculapius, the reputed God of Physick, had its Rise from the miraculous Cures done by Moses’s Serpent in the Camp of Israel. Serpents of bright and golden Colour were all counted sacred to Æsculapius, and were cicur’d, or made tame by human Arts. A Dragon was usually annex’d to his Image, and to that of Health, nothing being thought available without the Presence of a Serpent.
At Pella in Macedonia, the Royal Seat, and Alexander’s Birth-place, were Dragons of a large Bulk, but of a gentle Nature, maintain’d at the Expence of the Government, as Creatures bearing a sacred Character, and worthy of the publick Regard. Because many tame Serpents were kept in that Place, the fabulous Poets said, Alexander was born of a Serpent.
The People of Argos in Greece, had Serpents in such great Veneration, that nobody was suffer’d to kill them with impunity[[406]]. The Pagan Temples were wont to be haunted with Serpents, in so much that it grew into a Phrase of Speech, the sacred Serpent[[407]]. And thus Serpents are deified and solemnly enrolled among the Gods.