Set III-4-ser-001. In Late Egyptian, Greek, and Roman mythology, Serapis was a syncretistic deity derived from the cults of the god of the afterlife, the underworld, the dead, and the regeneration Osiris, and associated with the sacred bull Apis, the symbol of fertility. Serapis was introduced as a means to unify the Greeks and Egyptians of the Ptolemaic realm. He was depicted as Greek in appearance, but with Egyptian attributes, and combined iconography of many deities, signifying both abundance and resurrection.
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“ A husbandman was digging a trench in a vineyard in order to plant some fine, choice cutting, when he brought down his mattock upon a sacred asp [ἀσπίς] that had its lair below the soil and was far from hostile to man, and without knowing it cut the snake [Ø] in half. And as he was breaking up the soil he caught sight of the tail involved in the sand, while the severed portion from the belly upwards to the neck was still crawling and covered with gore from the cut. He was horror-struck, went out of his mind, and passed into a state of real madness of the most acute description. By day he lost control of himself and of his treason; moreover at night he was in a state of frenzy, and would leap out of bed saying that the asp [ἀσπίς] was pursuing him, and as though he was on the point of being bitten would utter the most horrifying cries and shout for help. He would even say that he saw the form of the snake [Ø] which he had slain, angrily threatening him; at times he avowed that he had been bitten, and it was evident from his groans that he was in pain. So when his affliction had lasted for some time, his relations took him as a suppliant to the temple of Serapis and implored the god to remove and abolish the phantom of the aforesaid asp [Ø]. Well, the god took pity on the man and cured him. But I have described how the asp [ἀσπίς] had not to wait for its revenge, and a very sufficient revenge too. „
● Claudius Aelianus (175-235 AD), On the Characteristics of Animals XI: 32 | Translated by Alwyn F. Scholfield. Copyright © 1958-1959.
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“ The following story too is like the above and concurs with it. One Cissus by name, a devoted servant of Serapis, was the victim of a plot on the part of a woman whom he had once loved and later married: he ate some eggs of a snake [ὄφις], which caused him pain; he was in a grievous state state and in danger of death. But he prayed to the god, who bade him buy a live moray [μύραινα] and thrust his hand into the creature's tank. Cissus obeyed and thrust in his hand. And the moray fastened on and clung to him, but when it was pulled off it pulled away the sickness from the young man at the same time. It was because this moray was a minister of the god's healing power that the tale reached my hearing. „
● Claudius Aelianus (175-235 AD), On the Characteristics of Animals XI: 34 | Translated by Alwyn F. Scholfield. Copyright © 1958-1959.
| Editorial notes: {...} - Omitted text; [...] - Translation back to the original, clarification, or curator's commentary. |
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