The Serpent as a Fertility symbol

The Sign of the Serpent is derived from the spiraling motion of all energy Beginning with the primal formative process which spawned our galaxy and Solar system, as seen in the configuration of a spiral Nebula and reflected in the formation of sea-shells and flowers, in the nature of the flow of energy in an electrical current, in the human body and in the double helix of the DNA molecule, the transmitter of genetic information throughout the physical entity.

A common sight throughout the rural areas of South India, occurring sometimes at the entrance to a village or town, near Siva temples and shrines, in the corner of a temple courtyard, near a stream or most often under peepul or neem trees, is a cluster of erect stone slabs planted in the ground rising to about 3 feet in height on the face of which appear effigies of the Cobra or Nag. In relation to the afore-mentioned trees, generally ‘married’ to each other, they are symbolic of ‘life’, with the Serpent representing their spirit or life energy.



The stone slabs are known as Nagacoils and are mostly placed there by childless
Wives who vow to install a ‘snake-stone’ if they are blessed with offspring; probably
the greatest desire of the average female Indian mentality. Various rituals complement
the desire. It is one belief, for example, that a woman will obtain children if she walks
around a sacred tree 108 times daily for 48 consecutive days. The action is an invocation
to the Queen serpents, the Royal Nagini, whose name may vary from state to state though
the land. (in Bengal, for instance, she is most popularly known as Manasa.)


At many Siva temples and Cobra shrines, women are often seen in prayer or receiving
the blessings of the attending priest. Small gifts of fruit or flowers are offered to the Deity.
The nearby Nagacoils act not only as testaments to the fact that the devotee’s prayers have
been answered but as tributes to the Serpent Goddess.


Throughout the southern and western parts of India the live snake itself is also the object
of veneration, and at a multitude of Cobra shrines and in temples it is fed on milk, sugar, etc., nurtured and worshipped as being the bodily vehicle of that higher cosmic power or spirit which is to be approached with reverence and honoured.


In the State of Kerala on the Malabar coast, it is popularly considered good fortune to have
a Cobra living in the garden. A patch of undergrowth, preferably under a tree, is cultivated and preserved for the snake. It will be fed and attended accordingly. To harm or kill a Cobra is considered sacrilegious by many people and such an act can only bring misfortune. The Cobra, normally a non-aggressive animal, is widely known as ‘the good snake’. In the northern states it is essentially the image of the Serpent that is worshipped.


Siva is the Serpent King, patron of the Yogis, possessor of the ultimate wisdom on the earthly or material plane, insists that spiritual evolution through ‘illumination’ can occur in a single lifetime, thus eliminating a succession of rebirths. His devotion is to the destruction is to the destruction of ignorance; his credo is ‘hastened evolution’ or, in popular terms, ‘nature must be given a helping hand’. The Tree of Knowledge is the appropriate analogy.


The God Siva, who represents in his higher aspect universal intelligence and in his lower aspect metamorphosis, renewal and re-generation, governs these principles relating to the creative and dissolution process in nature, and that is why the God’s image is always depicted with the Cobra adorning his person. To the yogis he is venerated as the king of Serpents the possessor of the ultimate wisdom- the Great Guru. At the social level he is the ‘father of fertility’, procreation and re-generation.