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 Worship of the Serpent worship, not just confined to Europe, but indeed all over the world. Deane goes on in his title to list a number of associations to the serpent such as the dragon and the leviathan. So thorough (albeit outdated) is his research, that he has "traced THE WORSHIP OF THE SERPENT from Babylonia, east and west, through Persia, Hindûstan, China, Mexico, Britain, Scandinavia, Italy, Illyricum, Thrace, Greece, Asia Minor, and Phœnicia." (Ch VIII) The Worship of the Serpent The Worship of the Serpent by John Bathurst Deane is an 1833 study of snake worship and specifically the snake mentioned in the