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Snakes were central to many mythologies because of their perceived quality of being both familiar and exotic. The behaviour of snakes and their facial features (e.g. the unblinking, lidless eyes) seemed to imply that they were intelligent, that they lived by reason and not instinct, and yet their thought-processes were as alien to humans as their ways of movement. In some cultures snakes were fertility symbols, for example the Hopi people of North America performed an annual snake dance to celebrate the union of Snake Youth (a Sky spirit) and Snake Girl (an Underworld spirit) and to renew fertility of Nature. During the dance, live snakes were handled and at the end of the dance the snakes were released into the fields to guarantee good crops. "The snake dance is a prayer to the spirits of the clouds, the thunder and the lightning, that the rain may fall on the growing crops.." In other cultures snakes symbolised the umbilical cord, joining all humans to Mother Earth. The Great Goddess often had snakes as her familiars - sometimes twining around her sacred staff, as in ancient Crete - and they were worshipped as guardians of her mysteries of birth and regeneration. ==Immortality== Some cultures regarded snakes as immortal because they appeared to be reincarnated from themselves when they sloughed their skins. Snakes were often also associated with immortality because they were observed biting their tails to form a circle and when they coiled they formed spirals. Both circles and spirals were seen as symbols of eternity. The circle was particularly important to Dahomeyan myth where the snake-god Danh circled the world like a belt, corsetting it and preventing it from flying apart in splinters. In Egyptian myth, the state of existence before creation was symbolised as Amduat, a many-coiled serpent from which Ra the Sun and all of creation arose, returning each night and being reborn every morning. Also, the snake biting its tail (Ouroboros) symbolised the sea as the eternal ring which enclosed the world. In Egypt the snake has healing abilities. Hymns and offerings were made to it since it was believed that the Goddess could manifest through the snake. "In a hymn to the goddess Mertseger, a workman on the Necropolis of Thebes relates how the goddess came to him in the form of a snake to heal his illness (Bunn1967:617).'' In the Sumerian culture snakes were also very important as a healing symbol. In Hammurabi’s Law Code (c. 1700 BC) the god Ninazu is identified as the patron of healing, and his son, Ningishzida, is depicted with a serpent and staff symbol (Bunn 1967:618) 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Snakes in mythology」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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