Ouroboros: meaning of the snake biting its own tail

Found in many mythologies, beliefs and philosophies, the ouroboros fascinates. But why a snake biting its own tail? Infinity? Eternity? A never-ending story?

Origins, meanings, myths: here is everything this ancient symbol tells us.

✦

The origins of the ouroboros

Its name comes from Greek: oura, the tail, and boros, devouring. The ouroboros is therefore “the one who eats its tail”. One of its oldest known depictions appears in Egypt, on a gilded shrine from the tomb of Tutankhamun, in the 14th century BC: there, the snake embodies eternal protection. It appears later on the papyrus of Dame Heroub, around 1000 BC. It is also said to have symbolized the cycle of the Nile floods, vital to the life of Egypt.

Many civilizations share this symbol, from Greece to India, from Scandinavia to China. Did you know that it even appears on the famous painting of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen of 1789? There, it encircles the triangle as a sign of eternity.

✦ ✦

What does the ouroboros mean?

Its meanings vary, but they are alike: all are linked to the idea of renewal and cycles.

By biting its tail, the snake wounds itself, but it is also its way of surviving: life feeds on death to create an endless cycle. For alchemists, it evokes both stability, through the circle, and transformation, through the cycle: it is transcendence and immanence, the one who creates itself.

✦

A symbol across the myths

Jörmungandr, the World Serpent

In Norse mythology, Jörmungandr, son of Loki, the trickster god, is a sea serpent that grows so large it encircles Midgard, the world of humans, and bites its own tail. It thus holds the world in balance and unity: legend has it that Ragnarök, the end of the world, begins if it lets go of its tail.

The lemniscate and the double ouroboros

The lemniscate ouroboros takes the shape of a figure eight on its side, the symbol of infinity. The double ouroboros shows two snakes biting each other's tails: this is the Auryn, the amulet of The NeverEnding Story.

In the sky and in the lodges

In some European mythologies, the ouroboros represents the Milky Way. It is also linked to the Serpent Bearer, Ophiuchus, a constellation lying between Scorpio and Sagittarius: a man holding a snake split in two, head and tail. Freemasons, finally, associate it with the motto Ordo ab Chao, “order out of chaos”: the snake devours itself, that is chaos; but it forms a closed circle, that is unity.

✦ ✦

Wearing the ouroboros: a talisman

If you are looking for a talisman, a piece of jewelry or a tattoo design, the ouroboros is a strong choice: it carries balance and the ability to transform, to change, to create and recreate yourself.

• As jewelry, wear it during a time of transition, to remind yourself that every ending prepares a beginning.
• Draw it on the first page of a notebook or a new project: a circle that promises continuity.
• Meditate on it when a cycle keeps repeating in your life: what is asking to be transformed?

The snake has many other meanings: discover the snake as a spirit animal.

✦ ✦