The Snake-Bird creation motif can also be found in the Mesopotamian myth of Etana, an early Sumerian king to whom fable has been attached.¹²  As depicted on a cylinder seal from about 2300 BCE,¹³ Etana, carried on the back of an eagle, accomplishes a shamanic-type flight to heaven in search of an Elixir of Birth.  This shamanic theme, however, seems clearly to have been grafted upon a distinct theme represented here by the conflict between this eagle and its one-time partner, a snake.  In this apparently separate myth, the eagle and the snake nest peacefully in opposite ends of a poplar tree, having contracted not to attack each other’s nest but rather to work together in order to prosper.  The eagle, however, breaks the contract and devours the snake’s young.  The snake, righteously indignant, complains to Shamash, the Sun God, that, although the snake has not betrayed the natural order set by Shamash, the eagle has.  Thus, in this apparently inverted motif of our theme, the interplay of the Snake and the Bird who occupy opposite ends of the World Tree entails both peaceful coexistence and destructive conflict. And yes, I have intentionally substituted “World Tree” for “poplar” in the foregoing sentence, because the interpretive methods (known collectively as hermeneutics) by which we bring meaning to narrative allows us to recognize this myth-become-fable as an instance of the Snake-Bird motif of the creation theme.  Similar instances in other Mesopotamian myths, such as the Sumerian myth of Gilgamesh and a halub tree, as well as the myth of Inanna (the planet Venus) and The Huluppu-Tree,¹⁴ support this interpretation.  In the latter variant, the crown and roots of the huluppu tree are home to the Anzu-bird and an untamable serpent, respectively.  And according to Diane Wolkstein, the tree itself, which “represents the first living thing” and “mirrors the larger world”, “was born from the confrontation of life’s opposing forces”.¹⁵  Evidently, the World Tree―whose leaves grow Birds and whose roots grow Snakes―was well-known throughout the ancient Mediterranean world.
In Greece, the motif of the Snake-Bird in conjunction with the World Tree finds expression in the mythic complex of the Tree of the Western Stars―the Hesperides.  These female spirits were, in one version, daughters of Hesperis (‘Sunset’) and Atlas, the god of the Western Mountain.  Hesperis herself seems to be representative of Venus as the Evening Star―known as Hesperos―who sets in the West and brings on the Night, just as his sibling, Eosphoros (‘Dawn-Bringer’) rises in the East and brings Eos, the Dawn.₁₆  If this is correct, then the Hesperides are the Star-