God, Demon, or something far more complex？ Rainbow Serpent Complete Breakdown

The Rainbow Serpent, or Rainbow Snake, is one of the most iconic creations in Aboriginal Australian mythology, and it's revered across different regions and in different language groups under many different names. But what is central is that the Rainbow Serpent is a powerful, ancestral creator being associated with water, rainbows, and the life-giving wet season, yet it's also feared as a punisher of transgressions. Much like an archetypal mother or father figure, it is credited with shaping the land's features during the Dreamtime. With the Dreamtime itself being a very complicated concept, holding both the idea of what we would call a mythic past, but the whole point of the everyone is that it's still happening now, that the past, present, and future are just different manifestations of the same thing. The Dreamtime isn't something that happened long ago, but it's always happening. When the Serpent force is benevolent, it brings fertility and life, but when angered or disturbed, it can unleash chaos, floods, storms, and droughts, and even deadly punishments. While some concepts have it animating all things, there's also the concept that individual Rainbow Serpents can reside in deep waterholes or springs, and Aboriginal people traditionally explain that when a rainbow arcs across the sky, that's the Rainbow Serpent traveling between water sources. Some traditions depict the Serpent as a male, others as female, and many as androgynous or dual-gendered, it's both at once, but almost always connected to fertility, this creation of new life, a broader archetype just seen across all humanity, which is usually explained by our ancestors seeing snakes shed their skin, but we'll get into how it could be a lot deeper than that, and sometimes it has this massive serpentine form, even depictions with it having horns or a mane, which might evoke depictions you've seen from other parts of the world, from the Near East, all the way to Central America. The Rainbow Serpent does align with a broad mythic pattern we see in Europe and the Middle East, with the Great Cosmic Serpent, or Dragon, tied to creation, water, storms, fertility, and shaping the world, and since it is spread all over the world, maybe it traces back to a widespread belief throughout Africa before the Out of Africa migrations, and that's why even if it takes many different forms, it still shares this core. It might have come from some widespread mythic archetype throughout Africa that is over 100,000 years old. Now if you watched the Aboriginal Australian video, you know that what makes this place so unique is that it is a continent larger than Europe, and it's actually far more linguistically diverse, and their myths preserve hundreds of independent regional versions of this motif across what are much more isolated nations, because like I've stressed in a ton of videos by now, the Mediterranean, North Africa, the Near East, Central Asia, and even over to China, they were all influencing each other very early on, from around 8,000 BC, and with very deep influences by 2,000 BC, there's the Proto-Silk Road trade route that's just connecting this entire area, let alone by the turn of the Common Era, and that's why many versions of these myths have consolidated, and we have the serpent archetypes like Tiamat, the Leviathan, the Ilianka, and the Greek Dracon, but because the Australians were pre-literate, they didn't have as intense trade networks, and so in a way, although we use the broad term Aboriginal for all the people of Australia, there are unique aspects to the Rainbow Serpent motif that are preserved across different areas, and because the Aboriginal people arrived over 50,000 to 60,000 years ago, with essentially no new populations entering afterward, these serpent traditions evolved in deep isolation, and so we can see their serpent archetype as one of the oldest continuously maintained mythic themes on earth. And I'm always making this point that to anyone that does believe in some version of Out of Africa, you could say that of course all cultures are just future versions of beliefs or cultures of East Africa from around 70,000 years ago. Everything from How to Train Your Dragon to The Legend of Zelda are just different versions or evolutions of the Python cult we see in East Africa. But that's like acting like people groups don't exist just because we all share ancestors. Just because we can trace things back doesn't mean they don't become unique to certain people, be that their genes or memes, physical phenotypes, or artistic styles and stories. Of course Ethiopians, Irish, and Japanese may share genetic ancestry, and when looking at things that are spread all over the world, maybe they're sharing mythic ancestry, but that doesn't mean they aren't unique people groups at some level, and that their myths aren't unique at some level. Of course they are, and they even stay unique within the Aboriginal people, even if it is useful to see similarities and at one level group them under the rainbow serpent stories. So first I want to look at the core elements, and then we'll explore regional variations in more detail. First is the idea of the creation of landforms. In the Dreaming, the great snake emerges from underground or water and travels across the primordial flat country, its enormous body carving out rivers, gorges, hills, and waterholes. The Noongar people say their rainbow serpent, the waggle, shaped the swan and caning rivers, and even the darling scarp hills. And it's the idea that creation emerges from its body as well. Its tracks are what make water and gives birth to plants, its shed skin or scales turn into forests, and there are various ways that the creatures of the world are carried by or released by the serpent. And that's connected to the broader theme of water and fertility. It's especially the keeper of waterholes, rivers, rain, and symbolized by the rainbow. The normal most basic explanation for why this is always connected to snakes is because if you go up on a mountain and look down at a river, it's snakes around things. Flowing water takes this serpentine form, and then the rainbow itself, which comes after rains, is in this long thin band. Water is needed for humans, animals, and plants to live, and there's that snake shedding its scales thing where it seems to be renewing itself. In the ancient mind, maybe they collapsed all of these into one entity. With the rainbow serpent, we get specific details that its belly sometimes is said to carry spirit children that are deposited in waterholes. And so when women are drinking this water, they're taking in the spirit children, and that's how they become pregnant. But also that which gives life can take it away. Even with the same means, delivering too much water, these wet season monsoons flash floods that could drown someone in an area that is usually a desert. And since it's in the clouds bringing rain, it's also connected with thunder and lightning, which themselves also can look like snakes. Now if you watched my now series of videos on the myth of Atana, you know that it's kind of the opposite of our modern connotations of the snake being treacherous, sneaky, or evil, and the eagle being the noble one. In that ancient Sumerian myth, the snake is actually the one who appeals to Shamash to uphold justice. The eagle is the one who broke the oath, who without any reason came in and killed the serpent's children. And similarly here in Australia, the rainbow serpent frequently acts as a guardian of law and morality, punishing those who violate sacred laws or fail to show proper respect for the land. If you enter restricted sacred spaces, if you break taboos, or neglect rituals, all of this can provoke its wrath. In the Yongu traditions, in the Arnhem Land, the serpent is said to enforce tribal law by consuming wrongdoers and regurgitating them as a form of spiritual transformation or rebirth. In desert regions, the rainbow serpent Wanampi is even said to dwell in waterholes and will strike at intruders or rule breakers, causing sickness or death. But those who follow the proper laws and honor the serpent are protected, and the serpent establishes the codes of conduct. Everything from what foods can be eaten, the separation of sacred duties for men and women, and how to treat certain areas. Essentially, it is the lawgiver in Dreamtime. And laws, just like when we think of them in terms of laws of physics, they act in perpetuity. It's a good way to conceptualize the Dreamtime. The laws that it set back in what we call the mythic past are still just as true and binding today. Aboriginal elders warn that loud noises, blood, or pollution near these places can disturb the serpent, and many groups avoid speaking the serpent's true name aloud too often. You might have heard of a similar thing with the very name of Bear in Eastern Europe. Whenever it is something to be feared or respected, humans often tend to use euphemisms. There seems to be this natural, magical thinking that just saying its name might bring it about. And there are a wide array of rituals ranging from offerings of ochre, everything from quiet individual prayers to large ceremonies that are all performed to please the serpent, keeping it calm and benevolent. If these rites are neglected, some myths say that the serpent can break out and wreak havoc. So now let's dive into the really fascinating individual regional differences here. First up is the Wollonga and the Ramunga region of Central Australia. This is one of the earliest documented rainbow serpent stories. Anthropologist Baldwin Spencer and F.J. Gillen recorded the Wollonga tradition in the early 1900s, noting its special status among totemic beings. According to the Ramungu myth, the Wollonga is an enormous water snake that emerged in the dream time from a sacred waterhole called Kajanaroa, which is found today in the Murchison Ranges. Unlike many other creator ancestors who eventually died or turned into natural features of the land, the Wollonga is believed to still live in the waterhole, in the surrounding underground waterways. In the dream time, Wollonga traveled across Woramungu country, pushing up the earth into hills and sand ridges as it moved, and leaving behind a trail of waterholes. At various places it paused. Sites like Pitungari, Atiparinga, and Jungunari, the snake rose up and then dove back into the ground, creating these prominent features. Each stop is remembered in ceremonies, and if you look at some of these song line maps, maybe these radiating circles are meant to evoke what you see when a water drop hits the water surface. Spencer and Gillen described how the Wollonga Totem Clan believes that their descendants are from the snake spirit children left at those sites, making Wollonga their direct ancestor. This is a similar concept we see all over the world. Think the demigods or how certain cities were said to be traced back to some divine ancestor. These people knew they had human mothers, but in this case Wollonga was the father. And it takes on a particular religious status, whereas most totemic animals are often revered in a diffused sense, any actual hawk you see out in nature is evoking this same idea, whereas the Wollonga is a specific being, and with that mix of reverence and fear akin to worship. Spencer and Gillen witnessed elaborate Wollonga ceremonies in 1901, men creating large ground drawings of a snake with wavy lines of red ochre to represent Wollonga's body, and danced and chanted its journey. These rites are aimed to appease and control the snake, and elders told Spencer and Gillen that if they did not perform the ceremonies correctly, or if they spoke Wollonga's name too freely, the serpent could no longer be contained. It might burst out from underwater and devour them, and they said that this had happened in the past, devouring some of their ancestors. At the climax of one ritual, two senior men led the visitors to the edge of the sacred waterhole, Tha Paorlu, which is where Wollonga lives. The men bowed their heads and whispered into the water, effectively speaking directly to the snake. They begged Wollonga to stay calm and not harm them, saying, we are mates of yours, and explaining that they had brought two white men to see him. Spencer noted that the solemn sincerity of the elders made it clear that they truly believed Wollonga was alive below, watching them. It's a funny western bias here, that there's always the question in the back of your head of how literal did they take it, while these westerners that witnessed this tradition first hand, said that these people believed that they were actually speaking to the rainbow serpent. But there's also the interesting aspect that Wollonga connects with fire. In some tellings, Wollonga at one point reared up so high that his head reached the sky. There it saw a great brush fire burning on the land. Fearing this flame, the serpent fled back to its waterhole for refuge. And this is said to symbolize the seasonal shift, the end of the rain season, dominated by the water symbol Wollonga, and the onset of the dry season, dominated by fire and heat. And the snake is not only a creator of the landscape, but something that you are constantly in contact with, and so it reinforces the authority of the clan's laws and rituals. Like much of the rest of the world, the general population believe that the priests, or elders, are the ones to thank for this natural stability. In northeast Arnhem land, particularly among the Yongu peoples, the rainbow serpent is known as Jörlinger. Jörlinger features prominently in one of the most dramatic creation sagas, the story of the Wawalak Sisters. This myth is recorded in a ton of different forms by researchers like Catherine and Ronald Burnham, and A.P. Elkin, and it's actually foreshadowed by A.R. Radcliffe Brown's early notes in the 1920s. It's foundational to Yongu ceremonial law, and it tells how Jörlinger enforced the separation of sacred knowledge and established key initiations and rituals. According to the Wawalak story, two sisters, often named Waymariri and Bolari, were traveling across Arnhem land during the Dreamtime, collecting bush foods and caring a child. They belonged to the kinship divisions of Yongu society, an unwittingly trespassed near Mirumina, a sacred waterhole belonging to the opposite Moeri. When the elder sister gave birth by the waterhole, her afterbirth blood flowed into the pool, polluting the sacred water and awakening Jörlinger. At the same time, the younger sister was preparing food over a fire, but as Jörlinger stirred, the animals and plants they gathered magically came back to life and escaped into the water. Jörlinger lifted his head out of the well and caused the water to rise. He removed a huge rock from the well's bottom, unleashing a flood upon the land. Thunder clouds gathered overhead and rain began to fall. The sisters found themselves in a sudden storm with torrential rain and lightning. Not realizing their trespass or the snake was behind it, they hastily built a small shelter to keep dry. When the women finally saw Jörlinger's copper-colored head and long body emerging from the waterhole, they knew they were in danger. The sisters began to sing sacred songs and dance. These were the first ceremonial songs, which today form parts of Yongu, Junggowon, Gunabibi, and Olmark ceremonies. They took turns singing, using the proper sacred words in hopes of placating the great serpent. And these songs did seem to slow Jörlinger's advance and even calm the storm. Jörlinger paused to listen, and the thunder and rain subsided as the women chanted through the night. Eventually, exhausted by hours of ritual singing, the sisters collapsed asleep in their hut. This was the moment Jörlinger had waited for. The rainbow serpent entered the hut and swallowed both sisters and the newborn baby in one giant gulp. The giant snake then rose up to the sky, carrying them in his belly, and began to sing the very same sacred songs the women had been singing. In doing so, Jörlinger took ownership of those songs and, by extension, the ritual authority. The story continues with Jörlinger's journey and a gathering of other ancestral serpents from various clans. In Jörlinger's belly, the sisters were still alive. In some versions, they talk or continue singing inside of him. When Jörlinger met with other snake beings, they all started sharing what they had eaten and realized each spoke different dialects, showing the diversification of languages among the clans. Jörlinger at first tried to hide that he had two human sisters inside of him, but he became sick from the burden. Finally, he admitted the truth and regurgitated the sisters and child, who all came out alive. But then, in this odd act of destruction and creation, he swallowed them again, this time carrying them back west to the sisters' original country. There, he spat them out one final time. The two sisters fell upon the ground and turned into stones, becoming eternal features of the landscape. The baby's fate varies. In some versions, the child became a small creature or is also a stone. But by swallowing and expelling the sisters three times, Jörlinger effectively asserted male spiritual domain over what had begun as a female story, a theme some scholars interpret as representing the transfer of sacred ceremonial powers from women to men in Yonggu culture. Maybe I'll do a video on this one day, but the fact that this idea is also near ubiquitous across the world makes me wonder if matriarchy was the norm, and then in the mind of these superstitious people, if some great massive environmental disaster happened, maybe one of the conclusions you make is that you need new leadership. Because I've seen a similar framework with all sorts of different, supposedly unconnected people, you would think the men in power wouldn't even want to remember this past when women were in power. But for some reason, both elements are usually there, that women did have it, but now the men need to be in charge of these ceremonial rituals. And Jörlinger is often called the great father. And for reasons that are still not fully clear, this myth is connected to circumcision and other rites within the Yonggu people, and for menstrual seclusion. Two cultural aspects that might have you thinking of Hebrew law, but they weren't the first, and they're definitely not the only ones to have both circumcision and the idea that menstruation is somehow polluting things around it. It also enshrines the divisions of clans into moedis. The idea of gods connected to certain people, and to certain areas, definitely also fits with a Near East worldview. And the Yonggur is often depicted with this olive green, or coppery tones, and sometimes with a feathered fringe, said to represent lightning coming off of its body. But you have this feathered serpent motif, from Egypt to the Aztecs. Something that will definitely be explored in its own video. Then in the rock art-rich region of Western Arnhem Land, around Kakadu, and the Arnhem Plateau, their rainbow serpent is commonly known as Galiad. The Kunwinchku people, and related Binnage clans, reveal Galiad as an all-powerful creator that is often depicted with unique features. A combination of snake and crocodile attributes, trying to represent that it's dominant on both land and water, and is sometimes shown with a horned or crested head, leading some to call it the horned serpent, and with the tail of a crocodile or whiskers of a catfish, trying to symbolize that it can go anywhere, from into water, to deep underground, to up in the sky and into storm clouds. Kunwinchku and neighboring people say Galiad dwells in billabongs, waterfalls, and floodplain lagoons, and they see the sound of a waterfall as being the voice of this rainbow serpent. Large cracks or holes in a cliff face are identified as places where the serpent broke through, and like you'd expect, he's credited with forming the landscape and making the abundance of water plants and animals near these waterways. One of their stories tells that in the Dreamtime, a female rainbow serpent named Yungarna was the original creator who gave birth to many creatures. Her son Galiad continued shaping the land and remains active in the world, and in some accounts, Yungarna went off to create other lands, leaving Galiad as the resident rainbow serpent who must be appeased. Sometimes their names are even used interchangeably, but often Yungarna is characterized as the old mother serpent, while Galiad is a slightly younger, potent offspring. And this is reflected in their rituals, with Yungarna being associated with certain women's rites, and Galiad with men's. Again, we see they have the capacity for both creation and destruction. Galiad also swallows humans and regurgitates them, and when he spits them out, they are in a transformed state. In one tale, Galiad angrily swallowed up a group of people who violated some taboo, and later in some versions, his belly was cut open, and other versions, he just vomits them. But either way, the people come back out, and their bodies had changed color. Their very blood had turned into white clay, and all of their limbs had changed. This is the origin of the sacred white ochre, and it's connected to the idea that the serpent's blood can transform those that it swallows. The old you dies as it's swallowed by the serpent, and you are reborn with new knowledge, marked by the serpent's power, shown by painting on the white ochre. Aboriginal painters in this region today say that the reason the rainbow serpent is often painted white, yellow, and red is because those are the three types of ochre paint, which came from the blood of the serpent. And while usually male, Galiad can be shown androgynous, sometimes it has breasts, and a phallus, capturing this idea that it has this totality, both aspects of creation, and doesn't need some other partner. Current day aboriginal painters often show him with dual heads, or lightning shooting out of its body, and Galiad can be intertwined with clan totems, or ancestral figures, showing that it works in tandem with other dreamtime beings. Near this region, there's also the serpent by the name of Bolung, or Borlung, used by Dalaban and Rembarnga speakers, and it's prominent throughout rock art in this region, often using white pigment with wave-like bands, showing the floodwaters that it commands. One story associated with Borlung tells of an ancestral hero that lit a grass fire and threatened to smoke out the serpent, but Borlung retaliated by flooding the plains, which led to the first monsoon. As in the Wurumungu story of the Wolongka and Fire, it's encoding this seasonal interplay of the dry season with fires, and the wet season with its floods. To the west and south of Arnhem Land, in the Dali River region, the Kunmangur serpent is also depicted as hermaphroditic, both male and female parts, and in the Kakadu area, the Merenji is a serpent that brings on the storms and floods. In the eastern Arnhem Land, Witij is another name for the rainbow serpent, particularly among the Galpu clan of the Yongul Dangu people, but this one is described as having come up from the ocean in producing the monsoonal rains, and it is depicted as a very large snake with this iridescent sheen. And like Yurlinger, it's shown with two sister figures, with the same story elements, the sisters transgress, it raises a storm, and swallows the sisters. And we see aspects that are specific to the geography of this clan's region, but it's essentially their version of the Yurlinger story. Though there is the unique Jaruk lightning snake ceremony, which is a rainmaking and healing rite, the Galpu elders will paint themselves with lightning patterns and sing of Witij moving across the sky. They believe that this can ensure the coming wet season and the fertility of their land, and is addressed as both male and female, though it will impregnate a woman by sending a small snake into her womb, demonstrating his male creative power. It is interesting that sperm looks like little snakes, but Witij is also described as the mother of all pythons, who created fresh water. On the opposite side of the continent, in northern Queensland, the Rainbow Serpent is often known as Goriala. A famous version was recounted by Dick Ruffsey, a Lardie elder from Mornington Island, and published as a children's book, The Rainbow Serpent. This narrative has since become widely known, and is often the first Rainbow Serpent story introduced to Australian school children. To summarize it, in the Dreamtime, Goriala the Rainbow Serpent awoke to set off on a grand journey across Australia in search of his own people. In his wanderings from the far south to the north, Goriala's massive body pressed into the earth, creating mountains, ridges, and gorges. He travelled for days and days. His meandering track became the course of creeks and rivers. He eventually reached the northeast coast, by Cape York, and heard singing on the wind. Following the sound, he came upon a large group of aboriginal people who were holding a bora ceremony. He watched the dancers and listened to the songs, then revealed himself. He told the men that they were not dancing properly, or wearing the correct ornaments. Watch me and I will show you the right way, said the Rainbow Serpent. He taught them how to make a headdress with feathers and beeswax, and how to perform the sacred dances, then instructing them in law and the ceremony. As Goriala was preparing to leave, a big storm blew up, for he carries the wet season with him. All the people hurried to build shelters from the rain, and two young brothers, the Bilbil, Rainbow Lorikeet brothers, came back too late and found no shelter left for them. They were turned away by everyone, even their own grandmother who said her hut was full. Desperate and soaked, the boys ran to Goriala. Goriala only had a small shelter and initially told them there was no room. But seeing their suffering, he finally said, The Great Serpent opened his jaws wide, so wide that they reached the sky, and the Bilbil brothers ran straight into his mouth to take shelter from the rain. Goriala closed his mouth and swallowed them, keeping them safe and dry in his belly. The people realized the two boys were missing. Some had seen Goriala's strange behavior and grew suspicious. Armed with spears, the men set off after the Rainbow Serpent, and Goriala could tell they were angry about the boys and decided to flee northward. He traveled all the way to a place called Bora Banaru, where he finally rested inside a mountain. The warriors followed his trail. Goriala fell asleep, snoring loudly, and while he slept, two clever lizard brothers, often identified as the Goanna brothers, crept up and cut open the serpent's belly with their stone knives. Out jumped the Bilbil boys, miraculously still alive. But Goriala's stomach acids had transformed them into beautiful rainbow lorikeet birds, which fluttered away into the trees. When Goriala eventually woke and discovered the boys were gone and his belly was slit, he flew into a terrible rage. The Great Serpent thrashed and coiled violently around the mountains, causing it to crumble and collapse. Rocks and earth flew everywhere. It brought on floods and earthquakes as he dove in and out of the ground. The pursuing people were caught in the cataclysm. Goriala swallowed some of them, struck others with lightning, and continued devastating the land. Finally exhausted but still furious, the Rainbow Serpent rose into the sky, his scales reflecting all the colors, and from there he pronounced judgment. He declared that any people who had been swallowed and later spat out would become different creatures. In Roughsea's account, all the animals, insects, and plants of Australia originate from this moment. Each person transformed into a new species as a result of Goriala's decree. Thus the world became as we know it, populated with birds, fishes, kangaroos, lizards, trees, and flowers. Each once people, but who had been transformed by the Rainbow Serpent's power. And Goriala himself changed to become the rainbow in the sky, watching over his creation. The rainbow arc in the sky is seen as protective, in a reminder or promise that the wet seasons rains and thus life will return each year. Again some near east parallels, in Yahweh setting the rainbow in the skies, as a sign of his promise to never send the flood again. There are many more examples that I can give, Ungud in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, Wangal of the Noongar people in Southwest, Wanampi in the Central and Western Deserts, Kanmari in the North, Dadalic in the Southeast, Mindy in parts of Victoria. But they are all of this same general theme, protecting locations with fresh water, tied to their rituals, and concerned with protecting these spots against impurity. But I hope you see how these themes are very similar to what we see all over the world, with people who are believed to have been separated at least around 40,000 years ago. An androgynous serpent, lawgiver, sometimes with horns or being a feathered serpent, who does provide, but who isn't exactly kind to people, worshipped as a way to keep it at bay, to make sure that it does not explode in fury, and whose symbol of its promise is the rainbow. If you have any questions, or if I was just unclear about certain parts, please leave any thoughts you have down in the comments. The comment section has inspired a ton of videos, and I really look at each of these as an ongoing discussion, inspiring future videos, pulling out more nuance each time, and refining our understanding on all these very complex things. Please hit that like button, it really does help out, and I'll see you in the next one.