Ophiophagy

Ophiophagy in myth and legend

The mythic associations of snakes are discussed at Serpent (symbolism).

A snake-eating raptor appears in a legend of the ancient Mexican people, who gave rise to the Aztec empire; this is represented in the Mexican flag. The Mexica people, guided by their god Huitzilopochtli, sought the place where a bird lands on the prickly pear and devours a snake. They found their sign on an island in Lake Texcoco, where they erected the city of Tenochtitlan ("Place of the Prickly Pear Cactus"; present-day México City) in 1325. On the coat of arms of México, this bird is said to be depicted as a golden eagle, though it is also often said to be a crested caracara. It is also possible that the bird was inspired by a laughing falcon or red-tailed hawk, both raptors which feed on a large number of reptiles, including snakes.

The golden eagle will actually eat snakes, but does not specialize in them, preferring larger mammalian prey, from medium-sized rodents and lagomorphs to mustelids even small mammalian carnivores, all the way to deer fawns and lambs. However, snakes are the most common type of reptile to appear in the golden eagle's overall diet, making up about 2.9% of the remains from all studied golden eagle nests.

The Mayans also had the legend of ophiophagy in their folklore and mythology.

Guatemala may derive its name from the Nahuatl word coactlmoctl-lan, meaning "land of the snake-eating bird."

Christian scripture associates snakes with “evil” (see serpent), and considers anything that destroys them “good” (i.e., Saint Patrick allegedly having “driven” all of the snakes from Ireland, through the power of God). An example for this tradition is further seen, metaphorically, in Rudyard Kipling's short story Rikki-Tikki-Tavi (part of The Jungle Book), in which a mongoose named Rikki-Tikki defends a human family against a pair of evil cobras. On a basic, natural level, most species of mongoose (and meerkats) are known to hunt and eat snakes much larger than themselves, including some of the most venomous cobras, vipers, boomslangs and mambas, instinctively avoiding the venom glands.

In Hindu and Buddhist folklore, Garuda (the eagle-deity mount of Vishnu) is the enemy of the Nāgas, a race of intelligent serpent- or dragon-like beings, whom he hunts.