Snake Lore - 2011 Spring Edition

This morning I was in my backyard when I heard something rustling in the leaves. There are a lot of squirrels in the park next door, so I didn't think much of it. But the noise continued at a slow steady pace, unlike the frenetic scrambling squirrels make.

I went over to investigate, and saw a roiling mass of garter snakes! There were probably six or seven of them in a big tangle, slowly moving their way down a little incline. I got Tony from inside and we watched them for a while. Eventually they stopped churning around and watched us right back.

It seems likely that they were mating. According to Wikipedia, multiple males will mate with females as they emerge from their hibernation, forming big churning masses of snakes. Interestingly, some male snakes emit female pheromones to entice other male snakes to rub over them. Herpetologists say this helps warm up these cold-blooded creatures. Hmm. Maybe we witnessed a bisexual snake orgy in our own backyard?

These were the first garter snakes I saw this year, and they were lucky we aren't living in the 19th century. If we were, I might have been compelled to kill them, as instructed by this little rhyme:

Kill the first snake, And break the first brake, And you will conquer all you undertake.

The word brake here refers to a fern, not part of a car. Happily, these days I think people are more respectful towards both snakes and plants. Love your snakes, don't kill them!

I do wonder how seriously 19th century folks actually took these beliefs about snakes. For example, did anyone really believe in hoop snakes? Supposedly this species of snake grabbed its tail in its mouth, formed a circle, and then rolled rapidly like a hoop after its prey. Once it caught its victim it would stab it with its hard, spike-like tail. The unlikely person or animal would either shrivel up and die, or shatter into pieces. I guess the snake ate the little pieces of flesh? It doesn't seem very efficient, but evolution works in weird ways.

I have some more snake lore here, here, and here. I got today's information and picture from Clifton Johnson's What They Say In New England (1896).

Snake Mania for Spring

A garter snake on top of our hedge this past September. The garter snake is the Commonwealth of Massachusetts' official reptile, and serves an important function in the eco-system.

On the night of March 17 I had a very vivid dream. I was walking up the path to our house, and noticed three big garter snakes emerging from the dirt in our yard. This dream made me very happy.

The next day I realized I had dreamed about the snakes on St. Patrick's Day. According to legend, Patrick drove all the serpents out of Ireland. I guess he sent them some to New England, because in addition to the dream snakes I saw my first physical garter snake today in the park. He was very cute! It's been unseasonably warm, so I think he woke up early this year.

I've posted about snake lore a few times in the past, but there's just so much of it. Our cultural ancestor in New England were fascinated by snakes, and obviously feared them and also respected their natural (and supernatural?) power. Here are a few serpentine tidbits to start your spring right:

• New England used to be home to many, many rattlesnakes. I was going to say "infested with rattlesnakes", but that sounds too harsh. In the Boston area, Charlestown was notorious for having a lot of rattlers. For example, in 1630 Governor Winthrop decided to move the colony's capitol from Charlestown to the Shawmut peninsula (now Boston) because it was free from "the three great annoyances of wolves, rattlesnakes and mosquitoes." (We lived in Charlestown in the 1990s in a house with old window screens - the mosquitoes were still there.) John Josselyn reported seeing a rattle snake as thick as a man's leg eat a live chicken outside a tavern in 1674, but this may be an exaggeration.
• By the 1820s, the rattlesnakes had moved to Malden, where a man named John Elisha claimed he could tame them through magical means.
• Some African slaves believed rattlesnake buttons, or pieces of the rattle, could ward off tuberculosis. A slave in Suffield, Connecticut named Titus Kent wore four rattlesnake buttons over his lungs for this purpose. "These he considered a sovereign remedy for consumption, and of course valued them highly, as more of his best friends had died of that dreaded disease." Titus lived a long life, and didn't die of consumption.
  
• There is a reputed connection between snakes and the weather. Nineteenth century Yankee farmers said if you hang up a dead snake, it will rain. If you bury it, the weather will be fair. The Penobscot of northern New England thought that the thunder spirits, who were seen as either giant birds or superhuman warriors, waged a perpetual battle against turtles and snakes, their ancient enemies.
• The Penobscot also advised against telling legends in the summer. The reason? If a snake overheard and was offended by the story, it would bite the story-teller.

On that note, I'll stop telling stories about snakes. Snakes deserve our love and respect, so please don't kill them!

My sources for all this snake mania were Thomas Palmer's fantastic Landscape with Reptile, the Dublin Seminar's Wonders of the Invisible World, 1600- 1900, Johnson's What They Say in New England, and Frank Speck's article "Penobscot Tales and Religious Beliefs."

More New England Snake Lore

The timber rattlesnake, crotalus horridus - still found in Massachusetts?

I always associate this time of year with snakes, so here's another post about them. My last snake post was about a piece of European lore found in Massachusetts, but the Algonquians had a lot of snake lore as well.

There are many varieties of snakes in New England, including two poisonous species: the copperhead (agkistrodon contortix) and the timber rattlesnake (crotalus horridus). Snakes are powerful creatures, representing the underworld, the soul, and spiritual warfare. It was believed that snakes have the ability to control the weather.

Rattlesnakes were both revered and feared by many Native American groups. For example, if an Ojibwa encountered a rattlesnake, he would address it as Grandfather, propitiate it with tobacco smoke, and ask for its blessing. Alexander Henry, a fur trader in the Great Lakes in the 1700's, relates how a band of Ojibwa sacrificed a dog to a rattlesnake in an attempt to bring favorable weather. Even those Native Americans who killed rattlesnakes did so with great respect. The Potawatomi of Ohio would sprinkle the body of a dead rattlesnake with tobacco and pray over it to avoid its wrath.

Among the Algonquians of southern New England, the underworld god Hobomock would most often appear to shamans as a snake, and dreaming about a snake was a sign that an individual was destined to become a shaman. Rattlesnakes were one of the guardian spirits (along with hawks and crows) that helped shamans heal their clients - and kill their enemies.

After the New England tribes converted to Christianity, they associated snakes with old pagan practices. For example, the Wampanoag of Cape Cod told how Elisha Naughaught, one of their church deacons, was attacked in the 1700's by a group of black snakes. They were perhaps sent by an enemy pagan shaman, and are clearly indicative of underworld powers.

I got my information from two sources: William Simmons's Spirit of the New England Tribes, and Thomas Palmer's Landscape With Reptile, a fantastic book about the history and lore of rattlesnakes in Massachusetts. Once extremely common in Massachusetts, rattlesnakes are now only found in the Blue Hills south of Boston.

The First Snakes of Spring

I was walking in one of my neighborhood's parks on Sunday and saw two garter snakes sunning themselves. It wasn't particularly warm, but I guess they were tired of hibernating. For me, seeing snakes is a sure sign it's finally spring.

The garter snake is the official reptile of Massachusetts, according to a bill passed by the state Senate and House a couple years ago. This pro-snake attitude is a big change from the state's past. Early settlers in Massachusetts really hated snakes, but also attributed them lots of supernatural power. As a result there is a lot of particularly crazy snake folklore. The following story, which is one of my favorites, was recorded by Clifton Johnson in the late 1800's.

A farmer and his wife had a young daughter with a strange habit. Every evening, she refused to eat dinner with her family, but instead took her plate and ate alone outside. Since she was young, her parents at first humored her odd request. But after the little girl did this for several weeks, her father became curious and secretly followed her outside one evening.

He was surprised to see his daughter sitting by an old stone wall, calmly sharing her dinner with a large rattlesnake that she addressed as Graycoat. Fearing for her life, the farmer rushed from his hiding place and killed the rattlesnake with a shovel, despite his daughter's pleas. Shortly thereafter, the little girl began to sicken. Despite their best efforts, the farmer and his wife watched helplessly as their daughter wasted away and died from an unknown ailment.

Although the girl's parents were puzzled at her death, we shouldn't be. Ancient European legends teach that snakes are often more than simple reptiles. They may really be fetches or fylgias - human souls in animal form. When the father killed the snake, he destroyed his daughter's soul. Medieval legends from Europe teach similar lessons. For example, a legend from Silesia tells how a man found a large dead snake in front of the house after his mother died, while Olaus Magnus wrote in 1555 that a snake will become imbued with the soul of a child whose bowl it shares. If the snake is killed, the child will die. (I found that piece of lore in Claude LeCouteux's excellent book, Witches, Werewolves and Fairies: Shapeshifters and Astral Doubles in the Middle Ages.)

It's pretty amazing that a belief from medieval Europe could still be found in Massachusetts in the 1800s! Please avoid killing snakes, in case it is true.