Few pieces of jewellery have been worn for as long, or by as many different people, as a snake wrapped around a finger. A Roman woman in Pompeii wore one. So did Queen Victoria. So, in a sense, does every doctor whose badge carries a serpent on a staff. The animal is the same each time. What people meant by it has not always been.
If you are thinking of wearing one, it helps to know which of those meanings you are signing up for. Here is the short version, from the oldest to the newest, and then some practical notes on choosing and sizing a snake ring.
Why a snake, and why on the hand
A snake does something no other animal does in plain sight: it climbs out of its own skin and leaves it behind, whole. To anyone watching, that looks a great deal like dying and coming back. So from very early on the serpent stood for renewal, healing and time that loops back on itself.
It also does something simpler. A snake coils. Put one on a ring and the body follows the finger round without any help from the designer. Very few animals sit on a band that naturally.
Egypt and the snake that eats its tail
In Egypt the rearing cobra, the uraeus, sat on the brow of the pharaoh as a guardian. The same culture gave us the ouroboros: a serpent biting its own tail, drawn as a closed circle. Later Greek writers and alchemists took the image up, and it has meant much the same thing ever since: an end that turns into a beginning, and a cycle that does not stop.
That is why so many snake rings are built as a closed loop, head meeting tail. The ring is already a circle, so the symbol and the object fit together.
Rome: snakes in gold, worn every day
Serpent bracelets and rings were fashionable in the Roman world in the first century AD. Gold examples, some with the coils running several times round the arm, have been excavated at Pompeii and the villas around it. For a Roman the snake was a household guardian and a sign of good fortune, and wearing one was about as ordinary as wearing a signet.
The healer's snake
Asclepius, the Greek god of medicine, carried a staff with a single snake wound around it. The rod of Asclepius is still the symbol of medicine today. It is easy to confuse with the caduceus of Hermes, which has two snakes and wings, but the healer's version has one serpent and no wings. When a snake ring is given as a sign of recovery, this is the old idea behind it.
Victoria's engagement ring
The snake ring became properly romantic in 1839, when Prince Albert proposed to Queen Victoria with a gold serpent ring set with an emerald, her birthstone. To the Victorians a coiled snake meant eternal love, and since the Queen wore one, half of Victorian Britain wanted one too. Snake rings, bracelets and brooches stayed in fashion for the rest of the century, and antique ones from that period still turn up in good numbers.
The Norse world serpent
In Norse mythology Jörmungandr, the Midgard Serpent, lies in the ocean and grows until it circles the whole world, holding its own tail in its mouth. It is Thor's great enemy, and at Ragnarök the two of them kill each other. Here the closed circle has a darker sense: it is what holds the world together, not a promise of love. People who wear a Norse serpent ring usually mean that version: something vast, patient and best left undisturbed.
Asia: nagas, dragons and the zodiac
In India, Tibet and South-East Asia the serpent is the naga, a semi-divine water spirit that guards springs, rivers and hidden treasure. One of the best-known Buddhist images shows the naga king Mucalinda rising up behind the meditating Buddha and spreading his hoods over him like an umbrella during a seven-day storm. The naga is not an enemy there. It shelters the person who is still. We wrote about this at more length in The Naga: Serpents of the Spring, Keepers of the Hidden Book.
In Chinese tradition the snake is one of the twelve zodiac animals, associated with wisdom, intuition and a certain quiet calculation. It is also close kin to the dragon. Many Chinese snake designs carry dragon details, such as cloud scrolls or a ruyi sceptre in the mouth, and that pushes the animal from something feared towards something auspicious.
So what does a snake ring mean today?
Most people who wear one now choose from four ideas, often more than one at once:
- Change. Shedding an old skin: a new job, a recovery, the end of a bad year.
- Endurance and eternity. The closed circle of the ouroboros, or Victoria's eternal love.
- Guardianship. The Roman house snake, the naga at the spring.
- A bit of edge. A snake on the hand is still slightly unsettling, and some people wear one for exactly that reason.
None of these is wrong, and none is the "real" one. The animal has carried all of them for thousands of years.
Choosing a snake ring
Head up or head down. On some rings the head lies flat along the band. On others it lifts off the finger and looks straight out. A raised head reads as alert and confident. A flat one is quieter and wears better under gloves and cuffs.
Open or closed shank. A closed ouroboros loop has to be made to size. An open band, where the head and tail overlap or sit side by side, can usually be eased slightly by hand, which helps if you sit between two sizes.
Plain or carved. Cast snake rings are smooth and regular. Hand-carved ones show individual scales and depth, and the darkened recesses between scales are what make the body look alive when the hand moves. Our own Mystical Serpent Ring is carved scale by scale in S925 sterling silver, with a natural garnet eye, a fire-gilded ruyi in the jaws and refined red copper flames on either side of the head.
One piece or a set. If you like the motif, it carries well across a ring, a cuff and a pendant without looking matched. The same serpent appears on our Mystical Serpent Cuff Bangle, moving through carved waves, and coiled inside its own circle on the Mystical Serpent Naga Pendant.
Which finger?
There is no rule. The index finger gives a snake ring the most presence, because a raised head there points where you point. The middle finger is the most balanced on a wide ring. The ring finger brings back the Victorian engagement meaning, and a slim snake on the little finger is a classic men's choice.
Whichever you pick, measure that finger in particular, at the end of the day when it is slightly larger, and check that the ring will pass over the knuckle. Our guide to measuring your ring size at home walks through two easy methods.
Looking after it
Sterling silver darkens over time, and on a carved snake that is mostly a good thing: the shadow collects between the scales and the raised edges stay bright where they rub against your hand. Wipe it with a soft dry cloth, keep it away from chlorine and perfume, and take it off before swimming if it is set with stones. If you want to know why some silver is darkened on purpose, we cover that in Oxidized Silver: Why Hand-Carved Jewellery Is Darkened on Purpose.
A snake ring has been a sign of change for longer than almost any other piece of jewellery. It still works for that, and it has never really gone out of fashion.