'Quick and gliding motion' - Sir Thomas Browne on Snakes

 

Sir Thomas Browne (1605-82) held a lifelong interest in the animal kingdom which, combined with his  pioneering studies in comparative religion and symbolism, makes his observations on snakes well worth noting. 

In his Religio Medici (The Religion of a Doctor pub. 1643) the newly-qualified physician informs his reader that unlike many others, he personally does not react badly in the presence of reptiles. His late Renaissance humanism embraced all living creatures, including the reptilian- 

'I cannot start at the presence of a Serpent, Scorpion, Lizard, or Salamander; at the sight of a Toad, or Viper, I finde in me no desire to take up a stone to destroy them'. [1]

No less than a whole chapter of his encyclopaedic endeavour Pseudodoxia Epidemica (loosely translatable as 'Pandemic of Fake News', first edition 1646) is devoted to the study of vipers.  Browne kept vipers captive to discover exactly how they reproduce in order to dispel myths surrounding their reproduction. He also introduced the word 'viviparous' meaning animals that give birth to live young rather than laying eggs in this chapter. 

He was not always successful in his zoological enquiries - 

'for though we fed them with Milk, Bran, Cheese, &c. the females always died before the young ones were mature for this eruption.........[2] 

His patience was eventually rewarded, reporting -

'..... I had enquired the truth hereof, including Vipers in a glass, and feeding them with Cheese and Bran, I undoubtedly found that the Viper was not delivered by tearing of her bowels; but I beheld the young ones excluded by the passage of generation, near the orifice'.[3]

Browne's 'zoographer' enquiries noted that - 

'the Viper hath but two considerable teeth, and those so disposed, so slender and needle-pointed, that they are apter for puncture then any act of incision. And if any like action there be, it may be only some fast retention or sudden compression in the Orgasmus or fury of their lust'; [4]

Browne frequently names his sources from the contents of his extraordinary library, in this case the physician and natural historian Francisco Redi (1626-97) -

'Francisco Redi hath amply discovered in his noble observations of Vipers; from good reasons and iterated experiments affirming, that a Viper containeth no humour, excrement, or part which either drank or eat, is able to kill any: [5]

But by far the greatest 'zoographer' whom Browne admired was the 16th century Italian zoologist, Ulisse Aldrovandi (1525-1605). There can be little doubt that Browne frequently consulted this  Renaissance author, as the pages of Pseudodoxia Epidemica demonstrate. Serpentum et Draconium (Of Serpents and Dragons) is one of several titles listed by Aldrovandi once in Browne's library. The Italian zoologist's books continue to be valuable resources for understanding the relationship between mythology, natural history and scientific inquiry  during the Renaissance period. [6]

  

Its also in Pseudodoxia Epidemica  that Browne displays his pioneering study of comparative religion. Acknowledging the changing symbolism of snakes in the religious beliefs of various nations, how it unjustly acquired its malevolent reputation through the Judaic tradition, and was once sacred to the Greeks and  later the Romans as a symbol of health,  he states - 

'Surely the destructive delusion of Satan in this shape, hath much enlarged the opinion of their mischief. Which notwithstanding was not so high with the heathens, in whom the Devil had wrought a better opinion of this animal, it being sacred unto the Egyptians, Greeks and Romans, and the common symbol of sanity. In the shape whereof Aesculapius the God of health appeared unto the Romans, accompanied their Ambassadors to Rome from Epidaurus; and the same did stand in the Tiberine Isle upon the Temple of Aesculapius. [7]

In all probability Browne read of the Roman adoption of  the Greek god of health Aesculapius from Ovid, one of his favourite Roman poets and author of Metamorphoses. In the 15th and last of his books of poetry in which Ovid describes the transformations of men, gods, trees, rivers and animals, the poet describes how the Greek god of healing Aesculapius appeared in a dream to a Roman consul with advice on how to rid the city of Rome from the disease of plague. [8] 

Browne's philosophical discourse Urn-Burial (1658) on the funerary rites, customs speculations and beliefs on death and the after-life of various world civilizations and religions, includes an allusion to the Pythagorean belief that snakes can give rebirth to themselves- -

'In carnall sepulture, corruptions seem peculiar unto parts, and some speak of snakes out of the spinall marrow'. [9]

Browne's source for ophic revitalization originates once more from the Roman poet Ovid, who repeated the Pythagorean belief in his Metamorphoses that-

'There are those who believe that when the spine decomposes, interred in the tomb, human marrow forms a snake'. [10] 

Ovid's allusion to snakes formed from spinal marrow must have fascinated Browne. Some twenty years after Urn-Burial among the many curios in Museum Clausum (circa 1678) an imaginative inventory of fictitious, rumoured and lost books, paintings and objects, there can be found the curious exhibit of -

 'The Skin of a Snake bred out of the Spinal Marrow of a Man'. [11]

Antithetical to Urn-Burial in theme, imagery, truth and literary style, its diptych twin, the 'highly hermetic' discourse The Garden of Cyrus focusses upon life, birth and germination along with the coincidence of patterns found in nature. A variety of snake skin designs which display either decussation or chiasmus (X and Criss-cross patterned) are cited, Browne naming no less than four snake species, including the 'quick and gliding motion' of the so-called ant-hill eating snake - 

'A like correspondency in figure is found in the skins and outward teguments of animals, whereof a regardable part are beautiful by this texture. As the backs of several snakes and serpents, elegantly remarkable in the Aspis, and the dart-snake, in the chiasmus and larger decussation upon the back of the rattlesnake, and in the close and finer texture of the mater formicarum, or snake that delights in ant-hills; whereby upon approach of outward injuries, they can raise a thicker phalanx on their backs, and handsomely contrive themselves into all kinds of flexures: Whereas their bellies are commonly covered with smooth semi-circular divisions, as best accommodable unto their quick and gliding motion'. [12]

Browne's study of comparative religion ensured he knew of what is the basic mandala of alchemy, the tail-eating serpent known as the Ouroboros which fertilizes, gives birth, feeds, destroys and gives rebirth to itself, not unlike successive generations known as homo sapiens. The symbol of the Ouroboros originated in ancient Egypt. Adopted by the Greeks, and later by the Gnostics of early Christianity, it retained its vitality as a potent symbol of spirituality until the 17th century, the 'Golden Age' of alchemy. Browne alludes to it in his A Letter to a Friend  (circa 1656) thus - 

'that the Tail of the Snake should return into its Mouth precisely at that time, and they should wind up upon the day of their Nativity, is indeed a remarkable Coincidence, which tho' Astrology hath taken witty pains to salve, yet hath it been very wary in making Predictions of it'. [13]

And some have made particular note of the Ouroboros-like nature of Browne's life-span, with his dying upon the same date of his birthday. (October 19th)

In his old age Browne penned a moralistic advisory known today as Christian Morals. Full of spiritual wisdom gleaned from a lifetime's experience in observation as a physician on the human condition in sickness and in health, Browne utilized ophic or snake imagery one last time. His advice on how best to behave when confronted with all that is fearful or hated, advocated love no less - 

'While we look with fear or hatred upon the Teeth of the Viper, we may behold his Eye with love'. [14]

Header Artwork - by Ms. Julie Curl with thanks

Notes

[1] Religio Medici Part 2 Section 1

[2] Pseudodoxia Epidemica Book 3 chapter 16 

[3] Ibid.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Ibid. The 1711 Sales Auction Catalogue  lists Redi but its an Italian book dated 1684 (p. 40 no. 33) so presumably  Browne cites some other source unknown to us ! 

[6] 1711 Sales Auction catalogue page 18 no. 25 Serpent. & Draconium Historia cum fig, Bologna 1640 [7]  P.E Book 3 chapter 28

[8]  Ovid's Metamorphoses Book 8 Book 15 lines 622-744

[9] Urn-Burial (1658)

[10]  Ovid Bk. 15  line 391

[11] Miscellaneous Tract 14 Museum Clausum Rarities Item 12

[12] The Garden of Cyrus Chapter 3

[13] A Letter to a Friend ( circa 1656)

[14] Christian Morals Part 1 Section 28

Books Consulted

Thomas Browne: Selected Writings ed. Killeen OUP 2014

Ovid Metamorphoses  trans. Mary Innes Penguin pub. 1955