18th Century (AD) star chart showing the constellations of Draco and Hydra. Draco is shaded green. Hydra is shaded blue/lilac.

p. 213 Star Myths: "The [star charts] are reproduced with some simplifications from Erastothenis Catasterismi cum Interpretatione Latina et Commentario, edited by J.C. Schaubach (Gottingen, 1975)." Condos.

"The origin of [Draco] is apparently Phoenician. There is no evidence of a Babylonian serpent constellation." Star Myths p.103.

Right: Earring from the Aigina Treasure, from p.195 The Arts in Prehistoric Greece by Sinclair Hood Isbn: 0140561420

Amazon link

The earring above, found in the Chrysolakkos funerary complex on Krete, has been dated to between c. 1700-1550 BC. Although attributed to the Minoans, the author feels that it is instead attributable to Theran craftsmanship. It represents the cosmos with a double-headed earth-encircling serpent surrounded by seven celestial bodies (sun, moon, and 5 planets visible to the unaided eye) which are "mirrored" by their bird avatars. Enclosed are 2 Aegean spiral-tailed dogs which in turn stand on monkeys.

There is some evidence for these monkeys in later Classical Greek mythology. But this information survives only in later commentary, such as the Suidas which includes the curious tale of two mischievous monkeys, the Kerkopes (Cercopes) who were turned to stone when they attempted to deceive ZEYS.  

(As it is the author's contention that ideas that coalesced in the Aegean eventually found their way to India, it is probably in Hindu myths involving the monkey that additional aspects of these monkeys might be found.) 

The above representation is of what has come to be known as the "Nebra Star Disc" found in Germany. This disc represents the heavens around which courses an encircling river. A boat is represented sailing along the rim of the disc.

Addenda 23 Feb 2008
Andis Kaulins proposes an alternative interpretation. He proposes a "revised interpretation of the Nebra Sky Disk [which] concludes that the Nebra Sky Disk records the solar eclipse of April 16, 1699 BC for posterity. That solar eclipse took place next to the Pleiades at sunrise near the point of the Vernal Equinox, together with a near conjunction of the planets Mercury, Mars and Venus as "bridesmaids" for the "wedding" of the Sun and the Moon - a total solar eclipse - a rare and spectacular event for the ancients. This interpretation allows not only for a partial explanation of the Nebra Sky Disk but in fact explains all of the elements found on the disk in an integrated astronomical context." (Kaulins is the author of Stars, Stones and Scholars: The Decipherment of the Megaliths As an Ancient Survey of the Earth by Astronomy. His conclusion, and the means by which it was arrived at, can be found in the following pdf: http://www.megaliths.net/nebraskydisk.pdf

My only objection to his proposal is that he dismisses possible Mycenaean/classical Greek aspects, on the grounds that they are, as he claims, first attested to one thousand years after the date of the Nebra disc. However, he accepts "Baltic folk songs known as the Latvian Dainas [and] (Lithuanian Dainos)", for which there is no independent evidence until around 100 years ago, as being perfectly reasonable; that is, he considers an interpretation which includes tales 3,500 years after the disc was made to be far more valid.

Dating to 1600 BC it is contemporary to the Minoan snake goddess, and predates by 50 years the shaft graves of Mycenae. The Nebra Star Disc is also contemporary with the Theran representation of the cosmos which features an earth-encircling serpent. It is not an accident that both Greek and Norse mythologies shared an idea of an earth encircling ocean and an accompanying water serpent (Hydra for the Greeks, the Midgard Serpent for the Norse). The Nebra Star Disc shows that even by the early bronze age Europe had, despite many differences, a shared view of the cosmos, one entirely different from that of either Egypt or the Near East. 

[Additionally, the documantary makers and other commentators have inferred what they claim is the "star-cluster" between the "sun" and "moon" to be the Pleidaes constellation. This too is probably wrong. This "cluster" corresponds to later representations of the planet Venus, in which Venus is represented in the same manner to show the rays of her "radiance".]

The pole of the double-axe represents the "pole" from earth to the polar axis: the "trunk" of the world tree. The forms of the twin double-headed snake, and the central double-axe take  the form of the later Greek trident, symbol of Zeus' thunder-weapon.

Note: The 2 crescent moons form outlines which form the complete circle of the full-moon, symbolising the Indo-European division of the phases of the moon into 3: 3x3x3. It should be noted that the "Semitic" tradition divided the phases of the moon into 4x7.

Left: Illustration from p.43 Art of Crete, Mycenae, and Greece by
German Hafner. Isbn 0810980215.
Amazon Link

(Amazon link).

The original image appears in Marshack's book, p.45.

"In the Louvre, there is a famous green steatite vase carved for king Gudea of Lagash (dated variously 2200& 2025 BCE),
 dedicated by its inscription to Ningizzida, "Lord of the Tree of Truth" which bears a relief of serpents twined round a staff"
( http://www.reference.com/browse/wiki/Serpent )

During the period of Guti rule, and while surrounded by the Guti, Lagash was able to gain some independence. A product of what is claimed to be the Lagash "renaissance" of Sumerian civilization is this serpent vase, on which serpents, previously absent from mesopotamian art, are represented......

GIGLAMESH
How does Gilgamesh fit?
There exists a desire in academia, particularly scholars whose speciality are the civilizations of the Near East, to demonstrate that their interests are not peripheral to the course taken by human civilization, but central to it. Although Gilgamesh has the identical  historicity as Herakles, authors like Dalley write, without embarrassment , that though  "there is no evidence that any of the Gilgamesh stories were written down before about 2150 BC" and that "[though] precise dates cannot be given for the lifetime of Gilgamesh, [his "lifespan" is] generally agreed to be between 2800 and 2500 BC." pp. 41 & 40 respectively, Myths from Mesopotamia. Stephanie Dalley Isbn 0192835890 (Amazon link)

Another translator of the Gilgamesh stories, Andrew George, includes for our benefit in his The Epic of Gilgamesh a "time chart" which shows Gilgamesh as having actually lived at c.2800 BC, and that he was king of Uruk! 

There are a number of problems associated with this which cannot be reconciled :
a/ there is no mention of Gilgamesh on any inscription at all before 2150BC;
b/ there is no archaeological proof whatever that Gilgamesh ever existed;
c/ the King Lists which include Gilgamesh and from which is inferred the kingship of Gilgamesh is as confused as the family line of the Herakleide (those born to Herakles), and the biblical genealogies that were used to calculate that the Jewish YHWH created the world at about 5000BC;
d/ the "King List" itself is an artificial construct created by Th. Jacobsen in 1939. It was "compiled from about fifteen different texts" (Roux, Ancient Iraq, p. 109).  This reconstructed king list ends at the 18th century BC. It is evident therefore that the approximate date at which these various lists were compiled & in which the past, and hence the kings of that past  was reconstructed, dates only as far back as the 18th century BC; that is, the kings lists end at the 18th century BC because that is when they were compiled (the compilers of these lists worked backward from the date they made their compilation);
e/ in the earliest accounts that do mention Gilgamesh like those of  king Shulgi, "who ruled Ur from c.2150-2103 BC... [it is] claimed that...Gilgamesh was [Shulgi's] brother." Dalley Myths from Mesopotamia p.42. That is, Gilgamesh does appear as an historical figure, but is peripheral to the subject of the myths in which his name appears; and more importantly, on face value, he actually lived in the 22nd century BC and no earlier (if it is accepted that he lived at all).

Though George's "time chart" lists the earliest written poem of Gilgamesh as dating to the 21st century BC, the earliest version that exists and which he translates dates to the 18th Century BC, no earlier. The date for this composition conforms to Stephanie Dalley's dating the earliest poems to the 18 century BC. Both the Old Babylonian Version (translated by Dalley) , and the Sumerian Version (translated by George) date only as far back as the 18th century BC. 
The dating of Gilgamesh and the sleight-of-hand involved in the scholarship surrounding Gilgamesh might, at this stage, seem to be a considerable digression from the discussion of the snake. However, it is the author's contention that the Gilgamesh tale only dates to the period following the rule of the "stinging serpent of the hills", the Guti , that it is related to their expulsion, and that in the Gilgamesh tales there might be found a reflection of Guti beliefs and cosmology.

There are distinct and irreconcilable differences between the various versions of the Gilgamesh tales. The Old Babylonian Version (dated to c 1750BC) is substantially different from its Sumerian contemporary (of the same period), and both of these are as different from one another as they are to the Standard Babylonian Version which was written onethousand years later.

As Dalley acknowledges (p.43 Myths from Mesopotamia) some Gilgamesh tales are variously set in the Zagros mountains (Iran) whilst others are set in the forests of Syria or Lebanon. It is clear however that the tale of Gilgamesh in all versions is set in the mountains, and not the mesopotamian river-plains, precisely the location of the Guti & of the Elamites, both serpent-worshipping regions.

The OBV and Sumerian rendition of the tale both share a related version of the subjugation of Humbaba (alternately, Huwawa) in which one version has it that Humbaba is subdued, another that he is killed. However, one Sumerian version alone recounts the "solitary tree of the Euphrates" and how it came to be occupied by a demon-woman and snakes. The 18th century BC Sumerian: "Bilgames [Gilgamesh] in the Netherworld" (as translated by George) is thus of considerable interest:

As has been shown in the earlier portion of this essay snake motifs representing snakes coiled around the pole on which the heavens rotate were prolific in the Balkans for 3 millennia prior to either the Lagash vase or the Sumerian version of the Gilgamesh tale, and that their representation continued though the Minoan and Mycenaean period and into the Classical period of Greek civilization. According to Dalley's glossary (p.319), Demons, "asakku" are illness and misfortune personified; evil. And, according to the Sumerian version, the holy world tree was possessed by evil, demons, an affliction in the form of the serpent, the demon maiden, and thunderbird (eagle). These "demons" were expunged by Gilgamesh. The Gilgamesh myth is recounting in mythological form one of two occurrences:

1/ an idea that sacred mesopotamia had been hijacked by foreign dieties/beliefs, and that these usurpers were expunged by a human leader named Gilgamesh who came to be diefied by later generations;
2/ or a myth in which a divine (though not actual) Gilgamesh destroyed a corrupted cosmos to create a new cosmos purified of the evil that afflicted it. The pole around which the the heavens revolved, the world tree came to grow from the source of the "waters of the abyss" and was then occupied by demons. Once the world tree was "possessed" by these demons it became a symbol of corruption which could not be cured but had to be expunged for the "desecration" to be purified. By destroying the world tree the past is delineated from the future and Gilgamesh founds a purified world order without a world tree. That is Gilgamesh replaced the idea of the world tree with one more acceptable to mesopotamian beliefs which did not include a world tree, the simple cosmic hole-in-the-sky, from which flowed the waters of the abyss. 

As is later discussed in this essay, pre-Guti Mesopotamian civilization viewed the "void" (the pole around which the heavens rotated) to be the "abyss" from which flowed the waters of the world including the galaxy/milky way  which was seen as the river in the sky. This river in the sky was the origin of both the rivers Euphrates and Tigris and (in some instances) and was the river that flowed through the underworld. The idea is that a tree had been planted at this part of the cosmos and like a vine had usurped the cosmos. The world tree was in conflict with traditional mesopotamian beliefs. Only a divine or semi-divine entity can destroy the corrupted cosmos and thus purify it from its corrupted state and thus restore the old cosmic balance as it was before.

Either way, it points to a foreign element having entered mesopotamia, which was expelled. The earliest occupation that we know of is that by, as the mesopotamians themselves referred to them, the "stinging serpent of the hills", the Guti, and it is evident that  their beliefs are remarkably like those whose origins lie in the Balkans, indeed Europe, of which both Greek and Norse cosmology are a continuum. What Gilgamesh destroys is consistent with what has come to us as the central cosmic beliefs of the Indo-Europeans. This begs the question: when did Indo-Europeans arrive at mesopotamia?

The image on the right shows Kadmos (Cadmus) killing the Drakon. The Drakon is coiled around a pillar of the "well-house". This represents at once the pillar of the world tree around which a snake coils, and the idea that the void was a sacred spring. 
It is this sacred spring to which Odin sacrificed one of his eyes to gain wisdom, and the same well described by Snorri (Prose Edda) as the third root of the world tree in heaven where lies the well in which the gods preside over the world. Staying with Norse mythology, it is the reason why, when Sigurd (the "dragon slayer") , kills the serpent Fafnir, & licks the blood from his finger, he gains wisdom: it is a metaphor for the dragon, Drakon, who guards the spring of wisdom. The pedigree of this idea is traceable at least as far back as the Vinca bowls.

Snake vase, dated to "Susa B" c.3900 BC

Walther Hinz, plate 22 (below) reproduces a bitumen relief showing 2 naked priests with an intertwined "sky-snake" which Hinz dates to "Susa B".

Plate 20, of Hinz's book reproduces a vase (left) depicting a snake, which is dated by Hinz to "Susa A".

This snake is reproduced in Potts', fig. 3.3, p.49 and is referred to as an example of "Susa 1 pottery". Susa 1 dates are from around 4300-3500 BC.  (Note: the actual dates given by Potts are from 4395-3955 BC to 3680-3490 BC. p.49). Hinz dates the serpent vase to the 4th millennium BC. 

On Balance:

This means that:

the "snake vase" (left) dates to c.3900BC;

the priests (below) date to c.3400-2800 BC.

Two naked priests are depicted (above). In the centre of the relief above the priests is depicted an intertwined double-headed serpent. It dates to "Susa B", and is tentatively dated to approximately  3400-2800BC

Serpent Thrones proliferate in Elam (modern Iran) during the sukkalmah period, which dates to c. 1930-1600 BC (Potts p.182). Note: The earliest representation of the snake thrones predate by up to 150 years the first epics of Gilgamesh.

[THE BATTLE-AXE & TRIDENT]
 
 

Image source: illus 102 The Art of the Ancient Near East
by Pierre Amiet
[end of on-line commentary]

Images source, back-cover dust-acket of THE CAMBRIDGE ATLAS OF ASTRONOMY, Introduction by Bernard Lovell. Isbn: 0521263697