éloge des serpents

In this Year of the Snake, I keep finding excuses for celebrating our serpentine friends!

The title means "high praise for snakes." The red-and-white critter is not a collage trick: that's a real two-headed albino milk snake. In the upper left is a Minoan snake goddess figure, circa 1500 B.C.E. In the lower right is a Greek marble relief, circa 400-575 B.C.E. The black and white snakes are from a Navajo sand painting, 1930s.