Happy New Year of the Snake
Celebrating the Year of the Snake artefacts exhibition
Year of the Snake
The lunar New Year of the Snake commences on 29 January 2025 and ends on16 February 2026. The snake is the 6th symbol that identify the year and the protective guardian of the 12 zodiac animals based on the Chinese calendar.
In the exhibition Celebrating the Year of the Snake at the Art Museum of The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), rubbings, ceramics, scrolls, seals, and paintings dating from the Qin dynasty commemorate the incoming new year with an exhibition featuring auspicious snakes.
Related Gold Glitters in Luxurious Hand Made Ceramics
In China, the historical image of the snake is complex: it is associated with creation myths, serves as a spiritual animal alongside shamans and is closely related to the dragon. Additionally, the snake is paired with the tortoise to symbolise the northern guardian, Xuanwu.
Dangerous and Poisonous
The snake also embodies danger, as its lethal venom instils fear, categorising it among the Five Poisonous Creatures. With a unique serpentine form, the snake is the inspiration for numerous works of art and design.
Related Serpentine bamboo sculptural art forms by Inkgo Lam
The snake, being limbless, possesses the remarkable ability to consume prey larger than itself. With its ability to shed its skin, it is both mysterious and distinctive in the natural world, making it historically a subject of reverence for the ancients.
In Chinese mythology, the ancestral figures of humanity, Fuxi and Nuwa, are depicted as having human heads and serpent bodies (or dragon-like forms).
The exhibition features the stone carvings from the Wo Liang Shrine in Jiaxiang, Shandong, which illustrate the myths of Chinese creation. Such depictions of serpent deities were particularly popular during the Han dynasty (206 BCE-220 CE) and can be found in various stone carvings across the region.
Serpent shaped deities
Beyond the snake itself, there are snake-wearing shamans who can control snakes, referred to as snake-wearers.
Related Chinese myth and muse the Year of the Dragon
There are also serpent-bodied deities responsible for overseeing mountains and seas, referred to as snake-stompers.
Myth lead to Year of the Snake
The Snake-wearer shamans wear snake earrings, while snake-stompers appear in the Shan Hai Jing (Classic of Mountains and Seas), which depicts scenes of bird-headed deities engaging with snakes.
Related Startling and Stunning ancient relics from Sanxingdui
In Chinese mythology, serpent-bodied deities often hold a higher status than those who can control snakes, reflecting the important role of the snake itself.
Snake as a spiritual being
The divine beings that created everything are said to have evolved from the serpents, while deities that govern nature reveal their divinity through practices like wearing and handling snakes, gradually taking on more human characteristics.
During the Qin (221-206 BCE) and Han dynasties, the snake was highly esteemed as a spiritual animal, even holding an essential place in official seal designs.
An example is the Qin dynasty’s displayed Xiangyin deputy seal. At the time, seal knobs with animal designs primarily featured turtles, along with fish, and the snake was included among these spiritual beings.
Related Dragon Lodge Haunted Spiritual Energy Found
The snake, together with the turtle, forms one of the Four Holy Beasts, symbolising the northern guardian, Xuanwu.
Snake like fearsome creature
Originally depicted mainly as a turtle-like creature, Xuanwu gradually evolved into a combined form of turtle and snake, with instances of standalone turtles becoming rare after the Eastern Han period (25-220 CE). Among the Four Holy Beasts, only Xuanwu developed into a dual-animal representation.
Related Hong Kong wild life photos by Lawrence Hylton
Despite its sacred image, the snake remains an inherently fearsome creature. In the left stone chamber of the Wu Family Shrines, an image depicts a terrifying scene of a large snake entwining around people.
Accompanying this image are various insects and a small snake; some scholars refer to it as an exorcistic depiction, potentially linking it to the later concept of the Five Poisonous Creatures.
Related Rare wildlife creatures at Kadoorie Farm and Botanic Garden
The Dragon Boat Festival, celebrated on the 5th day of the 5th lunar month, coincides with the onset of summer, when snakes and insects proliferate, making the expulsion of evil and disease a significant concern.
The so-called Five Poisonous Creatures – including the snake, toad, centipede, gecko (or spider), and scorpion – are poisonous creatures that also carry medicinal properties, serving as emblematic motifs of the festival.
Although the snake represents venomous beings in related artefacts, it often displays a whimsical and fantastical style, becoming a unique aspect of the festive celebrations.
Snake presence in Chinese art dating to ancient times
The snake has a deep-rooted presence in Chinese art, dating back to ancient times. Archaeological discoveries from the Neolithic period, such as those at the Majiayao site in Gansu and the Chahai site in Liaoning, have revealed pottery adorned with snake patterns.
Related Neolithic artefacts clues to Origins of Chinese Civilisation
During the Eastern Zhou period (771-256 BCE), bronze craftsmanship entered a period of innovation, with the imagery of the intertwined snakes inspiring the creation of decorative designs like the panhu (coiled hui-snake) or panchi (coiled dragon) patterns.
These motifs became the most representative bronze designs of the time, creating a sense of spatial depth through the overlapping lines of the snake’s bodies, while the repetitive patterns produced a rich visual effect. Such designs were widely popular, reflecting a common belief among the people of that era.
However, as paintings became the dominant art form in China, the snake gradually became an uncommon subject, with depictions of snakes becoming relatively rare.
The CUHK collection includes a few notable examples of such depictions, which feature realistic studies, narratives of the human-snake stories, or thematic works related to the Dragon Boat Festival.
Among these, one scroll by Wang Su illustrates the supernatural tale of the Tang dynasty poet Li Shen, who, when asleep, was seen by a monk to have transformed into a snake.
Related Tang Dynasty Antiquities
Additionally, the Shanghai School painter Xu Gu is one of the few artists renowned for his snake paintings, which are characterised by flamboyant and twisting red serpents.
Text The Art Museum of The Chinese University of Hong Kong and Martin Wray /Photo Martin Wray
