To the Greeks and Romans snakes were not such very terrible creatures, since the kinds found in South Europe are small and harmless—only the viper being poisonous—and they regarded the serpent as a beneficent creature, the familiar of Esculapius the god of medicine, companion of the household gods (the Lares), and guardian of sacred places, tombs, and concealed treasure ([Fig. 27]). The snake was the special earth-god, subterranean in habit, cunning, subtle, and gifted with powers of divination. The conception of the serpent as an avenging monster kept continually thrusting itself from the East into the popular mythology of the Greeks, and finally led to the building up of the dragon as a winged and clawed creature distinct from the harmless but cunning snake familiar to them. Even in India there arose a sort of double attitude towards the snake (as is not uncommon in regard to deities). On the one hand he was regarded as all that was terrible, destructive, and evil, and on the other as amiable, kindly, and wise. The services of the beautiful rat-snake in destroying house rats rendered him and his kind welcome and valued guests. In Egypt we find representations of small winged snakes without legs, and the ancient traveller, Herodotus, believed that they represented real creatures, as did the Roman naturalist, Pliny. Very probably the belief in winged snakes is due to the similarity of the snake and the eel in general form, since the paired fins of the eel close to the head (see Figs. [24] and [25]) correspond in position with the wings shown in the Egyptian drawings of winged serpents. The particular form of winged snake pictured on Egyptian monuments (see Figs. [26], [27]) appears to me to be a realisation of stories and fancies based on real experience of the locust. It was the terrible and destructive locust of which Herodotus tells—calling it “a winged serpent.” The Egyptian pictures of winged serpents have wings resembling those of an insect (see Figs. [26] and [27]), and sometimes they are represented with one and sometimes with two pairs.
Fig. 24.—A votive tablet (ancient Rome) showing what is meant for a snake, but has been “improved” by the addition of fins like those of the eel.
Fig. 25.—Ancient Roman painting of a so-called marine serpent—really an eel-like fish—inaccurately represented. The fins show how, from such pictures, the belief in winged serpents might take its origin.
Aristotle says that, as a matter of common report in his time, there were winged serpents in Africa. Herodotus, on the contrary, says there were none except in Arabia, and he went across the Red Sea from the city of Bats in order to see them. He did not, however, succeed in doing so, though he says he saw their dead bodies and bones. He says that they hang about the trees in vast numbers, are of small size and varied colour, and that they are kept in check by the bird known as the Ibis, which on that account is held sacred, since they increase so rapidly that unless devoured they would render it impossible for man to maintain himself on the earth. They invade Egypt in swarms, flying across the Red Sea. All this agrees with my suggestion that the winged “serpents” heard of by Herodotus were really locusts; and the creature drawn in [Fig. 27] may well be a locust transformed by fancy into a winged snake.
