Late Roman double serpent symbolism

[Caballo]

I saw in the pictures of the late Serbian orthodox patriarch and his staff with the double headed serpent as seen in the Notitia Dignitatum. I saw similar symbols in Istanbul when I went there.

See second and third rows for examples


Also used by Fectio


is there a symbolic meaning to this double headed dragon/ serpent?

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

"Beware the Two Headed Serpent!?

[john m roberts]

It's the standard of Thulsa Doom. Tell Conan.

[Epictetus]

Well, I'm at a loss. I checked everything I could think of - Ovid's Fasti, Lucian's Alexander the False Profit / Glycon, Pliny's Natural History, Alexander the Great's being fathered by a serpent, Hercules strangling a snake in a crib, Asclepius, Ophiuchus, the caduceus, Virgil's Aeneid... and I can't find anything about a double-headed snake. :?

[Caballo]

Found this on Greek Orthodox website
"Pastoral Staff: A tall staff of precious metal topped by two serpents with a cross in the center. This is a sign of the Bishop's authority. The serpents represent the visible and invisible enemies of the Church and the Cross symbolizes the power which Christ has granted to the Church and is entrusted to the Bishop. The staff also reminds us of the staff of Moses with which he led the Israelites to the promised land and the good shepherd tending to his flock."
http://www.stbasil.ct.goarch.org/vsItem ... od=display

And from a wiki (use with care!!) on Greek orthodoxy :-
"An episcopal staff called a crozier is carried by the bishop, as a shepherd's crook, to be reminiscent that he is a shepherd of Christ's flock. It has a cross at the top, just above a double crook. This double crook is sometimes in the shape of serpents' heads, symbolizing the serpent lifted up by Moses in the wilderness. (Now Christ lifted up on the Cross.) "

[Epictetus]

Aha! I was looking in the wrong direction. I had expected roots in Greco-Roman iconography.

[Gaivs Antonivs Satvrninvs]

I confess to ignorance in this but I do have an observation. The cross in the center seems like a later addition to the ancient symbol. The shield emblem of Fectio looks like wolves to me rather than snakes, possibly representing the Roman "twins"??????????? :roll:

[Iagoba]

The Notitia picture is not so clear to say that... :|

[M. Demetrius]

Didn't Hermes carry a serpent/stick object?

[Iagoba]

Didn't Hermes carry a serpent/stick object?

I also thought that, but the caduceus is different:


Aslo, Asclepius rod is different:


Both are snakes around a staff, not a two-headed snake.

[Blossio]

It reminds me the dragon pair/zoomorphyc lyre so common in Celtic art, specially abundant in scabbards between the 4th and 2nd centuries BC. Although the time gap and cultural changes are perhaps too big to see any clear connection...

[Iagoba]

I was looking something unrelated when I saw this here:



Its origin & provenance is a guess, very probably medieval...its named ivory cross with "two-headed snake" but in the description it says that are wolf heads (like the Fectio shield! :roll: ).

[Caballo]

Thanks- very interesting. This led me to search some other sources....

A 16th century Russian crozier


Italian 12th century (just the one serpent / wolf)


An ivory crozier- "A crozier volute in elephant ivory or possibly the branch of a Tau cross. It is an arc or penannular ring of ivory, one end terminates in an animal head. There is an inscription on either side. One side reads: NON EST …….DB CUL …..OESUS.. CUN. E, and the other side reads: PRINCIPES……EST AGESCOUS. This may be from the same biblical quotation." Lombardic, 12th century, "dragons head"


Anyone know any Greek/ Russian/ Armenian Orthodox people who could help decode all this?

I'm coming to the conclusion that the double (and perhaps the single) serpents/ dragons/ wolfs head on Late Roman shields had some religious and possibly protective significance?

[PhilusEstilius]

I'm not so sure just what the symbol is but it appears to be one of the regiments under the command of the Magister Equitum Praesentalis.
Infact this was the title given to Theodosius by the Emperor Valentinianus on his return from Britain in succession to Valens Jovinus, it was normally the senior Field Marshal second to the Emperor alone.
I don't think it has so much to do with the Christian Religion

[Peroni]

Looking at The ND illustrations, there seem to be both mammalian (wolf/dog) and reptilian (serpent/dragoneque) heads opposing each other.