The Snake in Ancient Jewelry

From protective symbol to enduring form

The Snake in Antiquity

A snake is a strange thing to wear. Cold, controlled, alert. It coils. It watches. It could strike.

And yet, across more than two thousand years, people have chosen to wrap it around their wrists. Not once, but again and again.

Snake jewelry appears throughout the ancient Mediterranean in Greece, Ptolemaic Egypt, and across the Roman world. The form rarely changes: a coiled body with a raised head.Sometimes it is set with stones for eyes, sometimes it is detailed down to each individual scale (Figures 1 & 2). Many are gold, others, silver. While the workmanship evolves, thegeneral form of the snake persisted for centuries.

Figure 1. Gold bracelet in the form of a snake, Greek (Ptolemaic), ca. 300–250 BCE. The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

In the Greco-Roman contexts, the snake belonged to the god of health and healing, Asclepius. As a chthonic creature – one that slithered and hid in the earth - it was tied to hidden knowledge and the underworld. Most importantly, it shed its skin, becoming “born” again. For this reason, it was a symbol of rebirth after death.

Figure 2. Gold snake ring, Roman, 2nd–3rd century CE. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. A coiled serpent forms the ring, with a raised head and subtly textured surface suggesting scales.

The snake therefore had a force, and snake jewelry transmitted its powers to those who wore it against their skin. Ancient writers like Pliny the Elder recorded these beliefs, sometimes skeptically, but never dismissing how widely they were held. Some thought that the snake’s powers extended to other objects with snake-like properties. For example, he tells us that serpentine, a stone with winding veins, could cure headaches and relieve snakebites. [2]

The most illustrative examples of snake jewelry— like the Hellenistic bracelets now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art — appear as more than casual ornaments (Figure 3). They were carefully weighted, precisely formed, and were designed to sit and move with the body. That is, their physical form communicates that they were objects that interacted with their wearers.

Figure 3. Ancient Roman serpent bracelet, crafted from gold with green glass eyes, dating from the 1st century CE. Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.

In Egypt, the Greek healing serpent met the cobra of divine protection. In Rome, the theology shifted, but the apotropaic (i.e., “protective”) properties remained. Snakes could also be worn to encourage fertility. [3]

Snake jewelry declined in popularity in the 1st cen. AD. [4] Today, the sacred aspects of the snake as a protective symbol and amulet gave way to aesthetic appreciation for its ancient forms.

The Snake Today

The snake never ceased from inspiring jewelers over time, with ancient objects inspiring modern forms. Bvlgari’s Serpenti Collection, for example, presents coiled, geometrically- scaled snakes, wrapping the wrist exactly as it did two thousand years ago (Figures 4 & 5).

.Figure 4. Bvlgari Serpenti bracelet, contemporary. Image courtesy of Bvlgari.

 It is unlikely that modern people wear snake jewelry believing it will heal them or protect them from the unseen. The old power is gone, but perhaps new meaning can be attributed to the snake today. The snake carries a tension that few forms do. It is controlled, but not tame. Beautiful, but not soft. When the snake is wrapped or held against the body, it can appear as threatening or affectionate, leaving one wondering if it is binding or embracing the person who wears it.

A snake bracelet, ring, or necklace does something that simple bands and chains cannot: it gives the body the sense of a dormant but powerful force.

Figure 5. Bvlgari Serpenti High Jewelry Necklace and Serpenti Collection Bracelet, contemporary. Image courtesy of Bvlgari.

References

[1] Ogden, Jack. Ancient Jewellery. London: British Museum Press, 1992. pp. 8-9.

[2] Pliny the Elder. Natural History, Book XXX, Chapter 56. Translated by W.H.S. Jones. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press (Loeb Classical Library), 1963.

 [3] See [1].

 [4] Higgins, R.A. Greek and Roman Jewellery. London: Methuen, 1961. pp, 181, 183.

Figures