The Serpent Mound from above. From local folklore -
'Long ago a young maiden called Beithir, lived at the bottom of the Cruachan mountain range in Argyll. Venturing up to the corries one day she found a magic stone which she used to plug up a pool of water. She bathed in the pool and was surprised to find she felt younger. As the years went by she returned to the pool to retain her youth. One day however she took the stone away to let the water run out. When she returned to the green hills below, she found the water had created Loch Awe. In the process the young maiden suddenly became a Cailleach (old woman). The Cailleach hobbled back to the pool where she plugged up the gap and slipped into the pool to be reborn as a young maiden, thereby continuing the cycle of death and rebirth...'I never gave the snake symbol much thought until I encountered a real one on a sunny day some years back. It was an adder - as big as they can get - and it slithered past my compost box in the garden. I went to play with it with the spade and got one hell of a shock to find it rear up in front of me, cobra style and launch a few attacks in a lightning-quick manner. The hiss it made was out of this world. I was shaken by the encounter and was converted at that point to having respect for all snakes.
Years later an artist informed me that Britain's only serpent mound happened to lie just 2 miles away from my flat in the town of Oban. This wasn't known to me at the time. I wondered, were any adders lurking in the mound?
Distant Ben Cruachan cup, as seen from the head of the serpent mound. On visiting the serpent mound it surprised me that it is so unknown. It lies very close to the main road and its head is huge. Alas the chamber within the head has fallen in but the winding body is clear (approximately 10 feet high) as are the eyes (several small cairns and hollows) which lie beyond the fallen chamber. Perhaps the eyes were illuminated from a distance by two fires during ceremonies in the past.
The sun rises between the two peaks of Ben Cruachan and Stob Diamh from the position of the serpent's head roughly two weeks away from the Spring and Autumn equinox. Cruachan is Gaelic for 'the hip'. Stob Diamh translates roughly into the 'the thrust of God'. Actually Diamh doesn't have any definite meaning but 'Dia' prefixes anything do with god, goddess, Satan or blasphemy.
Ben Cruachan and Stob Diamh from above Loch Nell. Notice the Nessie style serpent winding down on the right. On clear days the simulacrum can form an eye and smiling mouth on the head, made up from snow. One ridge on the mountain is called Ghlas Drochaid, meaning the green or securing bridge. This lies between Ben Cruachan and Stob Diamh. The serpent mound sits in alignment to the Cruachan cup, with its tail nearest the range.
Much serpent and dragon symbolism uncovered by archaeology appears to be feminine in nature. Such symbols usually represented chaos, in the sense of the primordial void. Perhaps within this Cruachan-Diamh-Serpent trinity we find reverence being shown for the mystery of sex and birth personified with the sun in the form of the goddess.
I wonder if there was a goddess or god named and represented by the serpent mound itself? According to Celtic mythology the goddess Bride was often associated with the serpent. Perhaps it's more likely however that this particular mound had a local name for the serpent. The maiden Goddess, Beithir, based at Cruachan, is a Gaelic name and may be a survival of this local serpentine worship. The first translation of Beithir in Maclennan's dictionary of Gaelic is a, 'prodigiously large serpent', followed by other translations such as a thunderbolt, large skate or bear. Modern versions of the Cruachan myth have Beithir down as the similar named Cailleach Bheur (Toothless Hag). But if you're willing to trawl through the local library in Oban you'll eventually find just one early version of the myth which doesn't go in for the old ugly witch cliche.
Looking inside the head of the collapsed chamber. The serpent mound seems to date back to the Neolithic or Bronze Age. The position of the serpent is that of coming from the sun. If you were to look at the rising equinox sun from its head, you could imagine the magical serpent having been conceived from the Securing Bridge of Cruachan and Stob Diamh; born out of the sun; crawling down the range; then into Loch Nell (symbolic of breaking of water) and then out onto the grass to bask in the sunlight (warmth of the nurturing mother).
The 19th Century historian Dr Phene claims to have discovered charred bones in the alter of the complete chambered cairn of the serpent mound in the late 1800s. Many burial mounds of the same period contain this same evidence of burning the dead before burial. Was the serpent mound used to return the dead to the solar source? Think of the idea of the dead hitching a lift on the serpent for a cosmic ride. Maybe the bones were sent off by the shaman on the following autumnal equinox of their death. The snake represents transformation and rebirth through the shedding of its skin. By burying the dead in the head of the serpent perhaps the tribal people hoped to achieve the same kind of rebirth for their loved ones, in conjunction with the regenerating power of the sun.
According to folklore snakes will scrape their skin away by squeezing against rough rock - the giant Ben Cruachan cup may have served the same symbolic purpose.
Walking along the back of the snake. Other rites may also have involved initiation for girls menstruating for the first time - a topic often shunned today - but which may have been approached with a healthy and simple enough respect in the past. Primitive societies still ritualise female puberty with the first menstrual cycle. With regards to the Argyll serpent, it may have been celebrated in conjunction with the shedding of the snake's skin, along with the blood-red rising sun.
Some Jewish women still throw a party to celebrate a maiden's first cycle - often to the girl's embarrassment. It seems likely that any similar celebrations at the Argyll serpent would have similarly seen the men pushed out the way, as the female mysteries were explored.While a visit to the serpent mound can prove interesting, a climb up on the hill which overlooks the mound will take you further into the complexity of the landscape. Up here you'll find a collection of standing stones which are also linked to the equinox sun rising from between Cruachan and Stob Diamh - all are aligned with the serpent mound.
The first two stones nearest the mound present two equilateral triangles which flank each side of Cruachan-Stob Diamh when you look at them from a little distance away. They're splendid stones to look at in conjunction with the two triangular peaks of Cruachan.
One of the trinity gateway stones with Diamh-Cruachan in the distance Together they give the impression of a gateway leading to the Cruachan peaks. Walking back from here approximately 250 yards, you'll come to another two stones.
One is massive and rounded. Right next to it lies a large flattened, carved rock which looks as if it would fit snugly on top and sit in a vertical manner. Its base has been carved into a bowl-like shape. This rock has a crescent which has been carved out of it, seemingly to sit at an angle, to cup the Cruachan-Diamh cup in the distance.
Base rock and cupping stone to the left. Looking at the base of the flat rock it looks as if it could be swiveled around when in position. Think of the Flintstones trying to invent the first ever Stone Age telescope as a comical analogy. If you ever pay a visit to replace the cupping stone, make sure you've some strong persons to help you; you'll need three at least.
Cupping rock in foreground, Ben Cruachan cup in distance.
Harry Potter and the Return of the Serpent
Early archaeological evidence tends to place the snake symbolically in the realms of cups, femininity and the Goddess. Later myths have mostly sublimated her role as the weak maiden in danger from the snake or wyrm.
But curiously, the Harry Potter myth has changed the predictable, well-worn myth of the dragon/serpent slayer to one in which the male hero also alternates to the serpent state himself. Harry almost ends up in Slytherin House at his first term in Hogwarts. Later in the Chamber of Secrets, he empathises with a snake during a magical duel. The serpent - as guardian to primordial chaos - isn't just banished with abject terror; instead it is treated as a dangerous ally. This has much in common with ancient Celtic myths such as, The Cattle Raid of Froech, in which the hero, Conall Cernach, is attacked by a serpent and then finds it has entwined itself round his belt as an ally. Neither Conall or the snake come to any harm.
With regard to Harry Potter, it should be interesting to see how Slytherin house is resolved to the rest of the school (if at all) in the 7th volume. Slytherin house is concerned with dark-night stellar symbolism rather than bright sunrises. However, there may have been a combination of both motifs at Loch Nell.
If Potter fans want to visit Europe's only known example of a giant ancient snake, they can find Loch Nell in any Argyllshire map. The serpent mound however usually only turns up in older maps, including one imagines, in the one in Hogwarts : )
Further Reading:
Chaos, Gaia, Eros - Ralph Abraham.
I don't know if this is available yet in a UK imprint. I had to order mine from the US in the mid-Nineties. It's mostly about mythogenesis as a way of analysing culture and history. This was my main source for understanding Neolithic-Bronze Age culture as it morphed into a monotheistic, Sun-God world-view.
Well recommended.
