Snakes (also known as serpents) are an important motif in Chinese mythology. There are various myths, legends, and folk tales about snakes.

Chinese mythology Chinese mythology () is mythology that has been passed down in oral form or recorded in literature throughout the area now known as Greater China. Chinese mythology encompasses a diverse array of myths derived from regional and cultural tradit ...

refers to these and other myths found in the historical geographic area(s) of

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

. These myths include Chinese and other languages, as transmitted by

Han Chinese The Han Chinese, alternatively the Han people, are an East Asian people, East Asian ethnic group native to Greater China. With a global population of over 1.4 billion, the Han Chinese are the list of contemporary ethnic groups, world's la ...

as well as other ethnic groups (of which fifty-six are officially recognized by the current administration of China). Snakes often appear in myth, religion, legend, or tales as fantastic beings unlike any possible real snake, often having a mix of snake with other body parts, such as having a human head, or magical abilities, such as shape-shifting. One famous snake that was able to transform back and forth between a snake and a human being was Madam White Snake in the Legend of the White Snake. Other snakes or snake-like beings sometimes include deities, such as

Fuxi Fuxi or Fu Hsi ( zh, c=伏羲) is a culture hero in Chinese mythology, credited along with his sister and wife Nüwa with creating humanity and the invention of music, hunting, fishing, domestication, and cooking, as well as the Cangjie syste ...

and

Nüwa Nüwa, also read Nügua, is a mother goddess, culture hero, and/or member of the Three Sovereigns of Chinese mythology. She is a goddess in Chinese folk religion, Chinese Buddhism, Confucianism and Taoism. She is credited with creating humani ...

and Gong Gong. Sometimes, Fuxi and Nuwa are described as snakes with human heads and sometimes as humans with dragon or serpent tails.

Myth versus history

In the study of historical Chinese culture, it is important to note that many of the stories about characters and events of the distant past have a double tradition: one which presents a more historicized account and one which presents a more mythological version.

Snake-like deities

River deities

In ancient China, some of the river gods which were worshiped were depicted in the form of some sort of snake or snake-like being:

Directional deities of the north

Vm-4378-Beijing-Observatory-Black-Tortoise

In the ancient China of the

Han dynasty The Han dynasty was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China (202 BC9 AD, 25–220 AD) established by Liu Bang and ruled by the House of Liu. The dynasty was preceded by the short-lived Qin dynasty (221–206 BC ...

(206 BCE – 220 CE), worship of Four Directional deities developed, the directions were east, south, west, and north. With the direction of the middle, there were five major directions, each associated with a divine being or beings, a season, and a color (with the "middle direction" being associated with the emperor and the color yellow). This set of correlations of five ''whatevers'' included many more than mentioned here, in the elaborated philosophical system of Wǔ Xíng (五行), although some of the basics related to directional deities was much older. The north was associated with a pair of divine beings, the Dark Warrior ( Xuán Wǔ, 玄武), a tortoise-and-snake creature, with the season of winter, and with the color black (also often considered to be a deepish shade of blue). Each of the directions was also associated with one of the ''wǔ xíng'', or five "elements" (sometimes also translated as "phases" or "materials"): that of the north was

water Water is an inorganic compound with the chemical formula . It is a transparent, tasteless, odorless, and Color of water, nearly colorless chemical substance. It is the main constituent of Earth's hydrosphere and the fluids of all known liv ...

. According to Anthony Christie, the tortoise and snake combination was known as the Black Warrior. And, that although the worship of the other directions was an ancient practice, the worship of the north was usually avoided because the north was considered the dwelling place of a destructive deity of the ocean wind. However, the worship of the north was practiced, with sacrificial ceremonies to the Black Warrior, by the rulers of the Han dynasty, which claimed to rule with the protection of water and the north. Although the Black Warrior is generally depicted as a snake entwining around a turtle, sometimes, they are viewed as two separable generals.

Yanwei

Yanwei (延维) is a snake deity in Chinese mythology, depicted with a human head and a snake’s body, featuring two heads. Its body is purple, its heads are red, and it measures roughly the length of a cart's yoke. Yanwei is known to abhor thunder, becoming motionless whenever it occurs. Worshiping Yanwei is believed to grant the power to dominate the world.

Deities from snake

Bai Suzhen and Xiaoqing became deities from snakes.

The nine-headed baby

In Chinese mythology, Jiuying (九嬰, "the nine-headed baby") is an ancient monster with nine snake-like heads, capable of spouting water and breathing fire. Its name comes from its cry, which resembles a baby’s wail. During the reign of

Emperor Yao Emperor Yao (; traditionally c. 2356 – 2255 BCE) was a legendary China, Chinese ruler, according to various sources, one of the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors. Ancestry and early life Yao's ancestral name is Yi Qi () or Qi (), clan ...

, when ten suns appeared in the sky and caused widespread suffering, Jiuying was among the creatures that terrorized the people. To protect them, Emperor Yao sent the divine archer Hou Yi, who shot and killed Jiuying near the fierce waters. The creature is mentioned in ancient texts such as the ''

Huainanzi The ''Huainanzi'' is an ancient Chinese text made up of essays from scholarly debates held at the court of Liu An, Prince of Huainan, before 139 BCE. Compiled as a handbook for an enlightened sovereign and his court, the work attempts to defi ...

''.

Culture

In Chinese culture, mythologized snakes and snake-like beings have various roles, including the calendar system, poetry, and literature.

Zodiacal snake

In Chinese culture, years of the

Snake Snakes are elongated limbless reptiles of the suborder Serpentes (). Cladistically squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales much like other members of the group. Many species of snakes have s ...

are sixth in the cycle, following the

Dragon A dragon is a Magic (supernatural), magical legendary creature that appears in the folklore of multiple cultures worldwide. Beliefs about dragons vary considerably through regions, but European dragon, dragons in Western cultures since the Hi ...

years, and recur every twelfth year. The Chinese New Year does not fall on a specific date, so it is essential to check the calendar to find the exact date on which each

Year actually begins.

years include: 1905, 1917, 1929, 1941, 1953, 1965, 1977, 1989, 2001, 2013, and 2025. The 12 "zodiacal" (that is, yearly) animals recur in a cycle of sixty years, with each animal occurring five times within the 60-year cycle, but with different aspects each of those 5 times. Thus, 2013 is a year of the yin water

, and actually starts on February 10, 2013 and lasts through January 30, 2014. The previous year of the yin water

was 1953. In Thai culture, the year of the

is instead the year of the little

, and the year of the

is the year of the big

. According to one mythical legend, there is a reason for the order of the 12 animals in the 12-year cycle. The story goes that a race was held to cross a great river, and the order of the animals in the cycle was based upon their order in finishing the race. In this story, the

compensated for not being the best swimmer by hitching a hidden ride on the Horse's hoof, and when the

Horse The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 mi ...

was just about to cross the finish line, jumping out, scaring the

, and thus edging it out for sixth place. The same 12 animals are also used to symbolize the cycle of hours in the day, each being associated with a two-hour time period. The "hour" of the

is 9:00 to 11:00 a.m., the time when the sun warms up the earth, and

Snakes Snakes are elongated Limbless vertebrate, limbless reptiles of the suborder Serpentes (). Cladistically Squamata, squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping Scale (zoology), scales much like other members of ...

slither out of their holes. The reason the animal signs are referred to as "zodiacal" is because a person's personality is said to be influenced by the animal sign(s) ruling the time of birth, together with elemental aspect of that animal sign within the sexegenary (60 year) cycle. Similarly, the year governed by a particular animal sign is supposed to be characterized by it, with the effects particularly strong for people who were born in a year governed by the same animal sign.

Characters

The usual and general Chinese word and character for

is ''shé'' (). As a zodiacal sign, the

is associated with , a proper noun referring to the 6th of the 12

Earthly Branches The Earthly Branches (also called the Terrestrial Branches or the 12-cycle) are a system of twelve ordered symbols used throughout East Asia. They are indigenous to China, and are themselves Chinese characters, corresponding to words with no co ...

, or to the double-hour of 9-00-11:00 a.m.

The Five Noxious Creatures

On the fifth day of the fifth month of the

Chinese calendar The traditional Chinese calendar, dating back to the Han dynasty, is a lunisolar calendar that blends solar, lunar, and other cycles for social and agricultural purposes. While modern China primarily uses the Gregorian calendar for officia ...

is the festival of the Double Fifth (''Duanwu''). Many of the activities traditional on this holiday involve expelling various sources of potential evil influences. One of these involves driving away the Five Noxious Creatures (''wu du''), of which the

is one.

Real and legendary

Some reports of fantastic snakes may belong more properly to the field of

cryptozoology Cryptozoology is a pseudoscience and subculture that searches for and studies unknown, legendary, or extinct animals whose present existence is disputed or unsubstantiated, particularly those popular in folklore, such as Bigfoot, the Loch Ness ...

, legend, or folktale, rather than mythology or religion. An example of this, is the "sudden striker" snake of Sunzi's '' Art of War'' that was supposed to be able to fight with both head and tail, and was used as a simile for how a general who is expert at military deployment does so. The Sudden Striker snake supposedly lived on "Mount Ch'ang": ( Roger T. Ames believes this to have been Mount Heng, but written with a different character to avoid a naming taboo on the given name of Han Wendi).

Other snake-like or reptilian creatures

Other members of certain types of

Chinese dragon The Chinese dragon or loong is a legendary creature in Chinese mythology, Chinese folklore, and Chinese culture generally. Chinese dragons have many animal-like forms, such as Bixi (mythology), turtles and Chiwen, fish, but are most commonly ...

are considered especially snake-like, such as the Teng, which is sometimes known as the "flying snake-dragon". Some reptilians are not at all snake-like, such as the Ao.

Notes

References

* Ames, Roger, translation, introduction, and comments. (1993). Sunzi, et al. '' The Art of Warfare: The First English Translation Incorporating the Recently Discovered Yin-ch'üeh-shan Texts''. (New York:Ballantine Books). *Christie, Anthony (1968). ''Chinese Mythology''. Feltham: Hamlyn Publishing. . * Eberhard, Wolfram (2003 986 (German version 1983), ''A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols: Hidden Symbols in Chinese Life and Thought''. London, New York: Routledge. * Hawkes, David, translation, introduction, and notes (2011 985. Qu Yuan ''et al.'', ''The Songs of the South: An Ancient Chinese Anthology of Poems by Qu Yuan and Other Poets''. London: Penguin Books. *Yang, Lihui, ''et al.'' (2005). ''Handbook of Chinese Mythology''. New York: Oxford University Press. *Yu, Anthony C., editor, translator, and introduction (1980 977. ''The Journey to the West''. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. {{Chinese mythology Animals in Chinese mythology Snakes in popular culture