Deer kills snake

While reading "Vlahs and Old Balkan Pre Christian symbolism of deer on stećak stones", I came across this interesting bit: 

Deer was, by Early Christians, identified with Christ, because according to Physiologus, "deer kills snake/dragon"???

The Physiologus (Greek: Φυσιολόγος) is a Christian text containing allegorical stories about animals, written or compiled in Greek by an unknown author, in Alexandria; its composition has been traditionally dated to the 2nd century AD.

I personally don't believe that the stories compiled in Physiologus originated in Alexandria. I would suggest that they originated somewhere in Asia Minor, and were possibly compiled or written down in Alexandria...I'll explain later why I believe so...

Anyway, The book was translated into Armenian in 5th c.  into Latin by the early 6th c. and then into Ethiopic, Syriac, and many European and Middle-Eastern languages. The original image of the deer killing snake shows one of many 6th c. AD mosaics from Theodorias (Qasr Libya)...

The Physiologus says that when the serpent flees into cracks in the earth, the stag drinks from a stream and spits the water into the crack, driving out the serpent. The stag then stamps on the serpent, killing it. You can read this bit here. 

Illustration from 1577 edition, Rome.

Now I know that deer sometimes, very very rarely, kill and eat snakes. A recent video of a deer eating a snake caused a sensation on the internet, precisely because this is such a rare thing to be witnessed. 

Which is why it is so strange that "deer kills snake (in some editions dragon)" was the main theme of the allegory about deer from Physiologus. And which is why I believe that "deer kills snake" is indeed an allegory 🙂. constructed from animal calendar markers...

Snake is a pure solar animal. It is in our world when sun is here (day, hot half of the year) and it is in the underworld when sun is there (night, cold half of the year)...

I talked about it in these posts:  "The chthonic animal", "Enemy of the sun", "Beotian solar pyxis", "Mystery seal", "Snake god from Hatra", "Goat and snake from Kortik tepe", "Pegasus and Chimera"...

This is 3rd millennium BC, Bactrian seal depicting the sun god (see heat rays emanating from his shoulders) holding snakes, symbols of sun's heat...See snakes, Solar animals number one, the symbols of sun's heat...I talked about it in my post "Nude winged hero dominating snakes"...

And dragon is just "an old snake", the symbol of the destructive sun's heat of the late summer which burns everything and brings drought...

I talked about this symbolic link in these posts:

Europe: "Dragons always get killed", "Letnitsa treasure", "Dragon who stole rain", "The damned"

China: "Blue boy", "White thunder cloud"

Mesopotamia: "Seven headed dragon", "Angra Mainyu"

Central Asia: "Bactrian snakes and dragons"

When I say late summer, I mean Jul/Aug, period of the year marked with a lion, Leo. Which is why Mesopotamians depicted Nergal, The God of Death, The  Destructive Sun, as lion man...I talked about this in my post "Winged superhuman hero" and many others...

BTW Nergal most likely candidate for "Proto Devil"...

Because sun's heat is strongest in Leo, is the reason why in Iraq, in Tell Asmar, people depicted dragons with lion body. But also with seven snake heads, one of each sunny, hot month of the old Sumerian summer...I talked about this in my post "Seven headed dragon"...

Oh look, dragon killers and princess...

BTW In Levant, Mot, the god of death, "The Devil", the enemy of Baal, "The (rain) God" was equated to the Sun. In the deserts of Levant, Middle East and Arabia, it was The Sun who was "The God of Death". It is in climate and nature it produces, that we find the root of all our religions... Pic: Over 2000 years old poem about the god of death Mot.  I talked about this in my post "The oldest Arabic poem"...

And

Azhi Dahāka? Aždaha? Zahak? Arimanius? Ahriman? Angra Mainiu? Nergal? Dragon? Lion? Sun. 

Destructive sun of summer, which causes drought and death. Summer which starts in Apr/May, when vipers start to mate...

So, snake is the symbol of sun's heat, but also snake is an animal calendar marker of the beginning of summer, Apr/May, because this when the most common Eurasian snakes,  vipers, begin their mating season...

Ok, but what about deer? Well, here we come to the reason why I don't believe that Physiologus was written in Alexandria. The Physiologus says that the stag "longs for flowing streams"...

This is not something you would write in Egypt. Wrong hydrology. Egypt has no flowing streams as sources of fresh water. It has the Nile.

Also, it seems that deer is not and never was native to Egypt...

If deer and snake are indeed animal calendar markers, and if snake is the animal calendar marker for the start of the dry season

then deer that "longs for flowing streams" and "kills snake/dragon" has to be an animal calendar marker for the start of the wet season.

This is what this looks like on the climatic year chart:

Considering that animal calendar markers are usually derived from the time of the mating season of the animal in question, then deer would be an animal calendar marker for Sep/Oct/Nov, the time of the deer rut...

Now in Levant, we today only find Persian fallow deer, which mates in Aug/Sep. 

But once, red deer also lived in Levant and red deer mates in Sep/Oct/Nov...

And this is Climate chart for Levant...Deer (Animal calendar marker for Aug/Sep/Oct/Nov) longs for (occurs just before) flowing streams (which get filled with rain which arrives in Oct/Nov)...

I talked about deer animal calendar marker linked to rain and winter in my posts: "For all people who forgot who they are", "Winter deer", "War season", "Dancing with deer and birds", "Sirens"...

In Levant, when rains arrive and the weather gets cool, snakes go to hibernation...Remember what Physiologus says: "When the serpent flees into cracks in the earth, the stag drinks from a stream and spits the water into the crack..."

BTW, The Epiphanius version of the Physiologus says that the deer is similar to a "goat of the woods"...Ibex (mountain, wood, wild) goat is another ancient "snake killer"...Why? Cause the mating season of ibex goats also coincides with the beginning of the rain season. 

I talked about this in my post "Master of Animals from Tepe Giyan"... 

Or should we say animal calendar marker for the beginning of the rain season...

That's it. To read more about ancient animal and plant calendar markers, start here…Then check my twitter threads I still didn't convert to blog post...I am way way behind...