The Crucified Snake in Fullmetal Alchemist
When I was searching for images of the Crucified Snake for my post about Dorne in the Game of Thrones opening credits, I found this:
This is the “Flamel” tattoo worn by the main characters of the Japanese manga series Fullmetal Alchemist. The resemblance to the French and German crucified snake images I posted before is obvious. The Japanese image just adds the wings and crown on top.
In the book of hieroglyphs attributed to Nicolas Flamel, the idea is the same--the snake is nailed to a cross--but it’s draped on the cross rather than coiled around it.
In alchemy, the snake/serpent is a symbol of the basic material that the alchemist starts with--the prima materia or Mercurius. Nailing it--or stabbing it--symbolizes the fixation of the volatile, which is the “coagula” part of the solve et coagula process that is endlessly repeated in the Great Work.
Lyndy Abraham (p. 49) cites several alchemists to explain the meaning of the crucified snake.
--Abraham Eleazar: “Therefore know that if you can fasten the serpent Python to this cross with a golden nail, you will lack nothing in wisdom.”
--”John Dee’s Hieroglyphic Monad stated that the cross is composed of four lines which unite at a central point. The four lines represent the four elements which, at their point of union, form the magical fifth element. Thus the cross contains within it not only the symbol of the dismemberment or sacrifice of the old body or outmoded state, but also the image of the creation of a new state of unity.”
Abraham concludes:
“The alchemists saw the death of their matter in the alembic as analogous to the crucifixion of Christ on the cross. One of their most often stated ideas is that regeneration and resurrection of the matter of the Stone can only come about through an initial stage of death and corruption.”
In other words, in that most basic maxim of alchemy, “no generation without corruption.”
I expect I’ll be revisiting this imagery when I get to Theon’s torture by Ramsey Bolton.
