Snake worship snake for a tail and a serpentine mane), the serpent-tailed Chimaera, the serpent-like water beast Hydra, and the hundred-headed serpentine dragon Ladon. Both the Lernaean Hydra and Ladon were slain by Herakles. Python, an enemy of Apollo, was always represented in vase-paintings and by sculptors as a serpent. Apollo slew Python and made her former home, Delphi, his own oracle. The Pythia took her title from the name Python. Amphisbaena, a Greek word, from amphis, meaning "both ways", and bainein, meaning "to go", also called the "Mother of Ants", is a mythological, ant-eating serpent with a head at each end.
The Great Snake The Great Snake "The Great Snake" or "The Great Serpent" (, lit. "Of the Great Serpent") is a folk tale (the so-called "skaz") of the Ural region of Siberia collected and reworked by Pavel Bazhov. It was first published in the 11th issue of the "Krasnaya Nov" literary magazine in 1936 and later the same year as a part of the collection "Prerevolutionary Folklore of the Urals". It was later released as a part of "The Malachite Casket" collection. The story was translated from Russian into English by Alan Moray Williams in 1944, and by Eve Manning in the 1950s.