Snake unlikely to have killed Cleopatra

Phys dot org ^ | October 21, 2015 | Mike Addelman

[Larry Lucido]

You’re thinking of Buckwheat. Or Francisco Franco.

[thackney]

ays venomous snakes in Egypt -- cobras or vipers -- would have been too large to get unseen into the queen's palace.

BS. I know a family that lost a 13 Burmese python in their house.

They figure it eventually left the house, but not at the time. It was winter in Ohio.

I'm thinking there were a lot more cracks and crevices in her day than modern building.

[Inyo-Mono]

"That's not to say they aren't dangerous: the venom causes necrosis and will certainly kill you, but quite slowly

He needs to read up on cobras, people have been known to die within 10 minutes of being bitten.

[SunkenCiv]

Hey, just because a cobra is wearing a hoodie...

[sportutegrl]

Where’s Elizabeth Taylor?

[bert]

outstanding observation sir

[piasa]

Andrew Gray, curator of herpetology at Manchester Museum, says venomous snakes in Egypt -- cobras or vipers -- would have been too large to get unseen into the queen's palace.

Those Egyptian snakes must be very unusual - over here big snakes are just grown up little snakes. Do theirs somehow hatch out or get born fully-grown?

[Pete from Shawnee Mission]

Regarding what is going on in the painting;

“According to Plutarch (quoted by Ussher), Cleopatra tested various deadly poisons on condemned persons and concluded that the bite of the asp (from aspis - Egyptian cobra, not European asp) was the least terrible way to die; the venom brought sleepiness and heaviness without spasms of pain. The asp is perhaps most famous for its alleged role in Cleopatra’s suicide (From Wikipedia article on Asp (reptile))

In looking at the picture I do see a sinister man with a phial (Ha Pharmakos) perhaps an apothecary, or, a poisoner. (It all depends on the dose!) I do not see a snake, but I do see 2 test subjects, one dead, one dying.

Crazy English Herpto-hunter says he thinks it was an Egyptian cobra.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hi1Y9hXw6QY

It could, of course, have been a small cobra, or alternatively, a large basket of figs.