Queen Elizabeth I and the coiled serpent

Queen Elizabeth I, unknown artist, ca. 1575-1580
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The National Portrait Gallery discovered that in this portrait
Queen Elizabeth I originally held a a serpent twined around
her fingers. The unknown artist, painting around the late 1580s,
clearly had a last-minute panic about the ambiguity of the
image: the scaly blue-green and black serpent was painted
out, and replaced with the safe ‑ if slightly oddly shaped ‑ posy.
Is difficult to know exactly why the serpent may have been
originally included, or how common this motif might have
been. The queen certainly owned jewellery and costume
including emblems of serpents, which were probably
understood as a symbol of wisdom
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Read about the painting here

Detail from the portrait of Queen Elizabeth I showing
the outline of the coiled serpent she originally held
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An artist's impression of how a serpent may have looked
in a 16th century painting of Queen Elizabeth I.
By Gillian Barlow
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