There are many deadly professions in the world. Snake charmer is one of them. In India, the secrets of craftsmanship are passed on exclusively from father to son - and so on from generation to generation. No one will ever reveal to a stranger the nuances of the profession, the secrets that their ancestors possessed - this is considered disrespect for the dead.
Spellcaster Villages
India is full of villages in which hereditary snake tamers live. One of them is the village of Chincholi in Karnataka.
It is home to only 400 inhabitants, but all of them, without exception, perfectly find a common language with poisonous reptiles. Without this skill you simply cannot survive in the village, because snakes are everywhere there.
According to travelers, even women and children are not afraid of creeping reptiles. Here is what the Frenchman Samuel Roche, who had the opportunity to spend 2 weeks in this village, writes: “One morning I was smoking in the courtyard of the house where I was staying, and I saw a giant snake crawling 2 meters from me.
Poisonous? - I asked the hostess of the house, backing away in horror.
- Yes. But don’t be afraid of her, just don’t touch her.
At the same time, the woman continued to calmly hang out her laundry, while her three-year-old son played a meter away from mortal danger.”
Snake catchers
In Chincholi, almost every house has five or six snakes. These are actors who are raised and bred for business. True, since the law on the protection of wildlife was passed, which prohibits keeping snakes in captivity for profit, there have been much fewer people willing to train them. And in order to somehow feed their numerous families, some residents of Chincholi changed their profession and turned from charmers into snake catchers. They simply sell their goods at snake markets, where they can get at least some money for the creeping reptiles.
The smartest residents of Chincholi went further and, joining forces with relatives, created modest companies for catching reptiles in the cities. Such a business in India is a win-win option, because every year 300 thousand people suffer from snake bites, of which 75 thousand die.
But those who have perfectly mastered the art of training snakes earn much more and enjoy great respect among local residents. After all, Indians know very well that even for the most experienced professionals in their field, this business remains incredibly complex and deadly.
Many people mistakenly believe that snake charmers raise their performers from infancy. Actually this is not true. Cobras and vipers come to the trainer as adults. And there is an explanation for this. Young snakes are very aggressive and stupid, and therefore you should stay away from them. Adults are smart, cautious and calm, and therefore bite much less often. Raising them from a young age to accustom them to yourself is a waste of time.
A snake is neither a cat nor a dog, one wrong move - and this ungrateful creature will attack you, despite the fact that you have cared for and cherished it for many years. That is why spellcasters in their work use exclusively the stick method, and not the carrot.
Fakirs buy snakes at special snake markets. Cobra costs 20 rupees, python 5 rupees per yard, viper 6 rupees per dozen. And the rupee costs slightly less than the Russian ruble.
Cruel business
As for the performance itself, of course, cobras with an open hood look most impressive. Sometimes the snake makes sharp throws towards the tamer, but he deftly pacifies it. It seems that the cobra can be trained, that it is obedient to him, but is this really so? Of course not. According to experts, snakes cannot be tamed; you can only change their place of residence, for example, bring them home from the forest or to the serpentarium. And provide your pet with comfortable living conditions.
Experienced tamers know the habits of the animal and use their habitual behavior in their performances. During the performance, it seems that the cobra, swaying from side to side, is closely watching the tamer. In fact, the snake almost does not see what is happening (it receives most of the information through the organ of touch and the organ capable of detecting temperature differences). By sticking out its tongue and vibrating it, it does not so much frighten a possible victim as study it.
Before the performance begins, the artist sleeps quietly in a basket. Only some kind of disturbance can make it come out, for example, a light blow to the lid of the basket. The snake raises its head and begins to vibrate from side to side. The audience thinks that she is carefully listening to the music of the flute, but in fact she is simply trying to defend herself - she opens her mouth, hisses, moves her tongue, opens her hood, moves from side to side behind the flute. At this time, the tamer himself also leans in different directions to the beat of the melody he performs and imperceptibly taps his feet on the ground. The snake becomes even more lost, believing that there is someone else nearby, and behaves quietly.
However, this is only apparent humility. And the trainer needs to be extremely careful and attentive. Sometimes unscrupulous spell casters take the path of least resistance and remove the organ containing the poison from the snake. The animal becomes lethargic and absolutely safe, but does not live long. After the death of an actor, careless fakirs buy a new product, and this continues ad infinitum. It's a tough business. This is why snake shows are now officially banned in India.
Posture matters
During times of danger, all snakes try to defend themselves and assume a fearsome pose. The cobra spreads its neck ribs, and we see an unusual wide hood. The rattlesnake vibrates the scales at the end of its tail, and we hear the peculiar tapping sound of the rattle. The viper raises its head, hisses and shakes its head threateningly from side to side. However, we must remember that a snake never attacks a person first. She is secretive, timid and always tries to avoid collisions with large animals, and especially with humans. She does not at all seek to waste her only means of defense and hunting - poison. After all, in order to synthesize it again, she will need a lot of time and energy.
The secret of the magic pipe
The snake is unable to recognize its owner. For her, he and the audience are one, they are enemies, disturbers of her peace.
But what the snake recognizes immediately is the pipe. When she sees her, she immediately becomes quiet. And it’s not about any special melody - snakes are deaf and do not hear music, this was established 50 years ago by French herpetologists who played melodies for the reptiles, but they did not react to them in any way. The secret lies in the pipe itself, as well as in the smooth swaying of the caster from side to side.
During numerous training sessions, snakes develop a fear of the pipe. First they tease her, forcing her to stand up, and when she rushes at the offender, they hit her on the head with a pipe. If the snake tries to crawl away, it receives blow after blow until it stands up again. And so every day - they tease and beat. Attempts to get rid of the hated object lead to nothing - the musical instrument does not care about snake teeth. Eventually the snake stops biting, because by its nature it is not inclined to waste poison in vain.
Snake charmers
For many peoples, snakes have been a symbol of lightning - striking energy - since ancient times. The snake, thanks to its striking resemblance to lightning and its striking speed, acquired the symbolic meaning of the punishing but wise will of the gods.
Speaking about the semi-mystical, supernatural connection between believers and their deity, one remembers ophiolatry - the deification of snakes, the oldest example of animal worship. Snake worship has survived. And now you can see the picturesque, risk-filled, chilling “snake” dance performed by young priestesses of the famous snake cults of Myanmar (Burma).
The object of worship here is the king cobra othiphagus hannan, the world's largest venomous snake: its length reaches five meters. Cobra is considered one of the most aggressive snakes. Intending to attack, it stands on its tail, and the front part of its body, raised almost vertically, is at least one meter in length. When meeting with this majestic representative of the fauna, a person tries to increase the distance separating him from the cobra. The snake priestess from Myanmar has a completely different task - to dance with her poisonous deity.
As soon as the location of the king cobra is determined, the priestess begins her performance right in front of the cobra, at a distance of one or two meters. She manipulates the hem of her long dress like a matador and very skillfully dodges deadly throws. Soon the priestess’s robe becomes wet, and golden droplets of poison flow down it. But the biggest danger is yet to come. At the end of her performance, the priestess suddenly leans forward and kisses the cobra. Sometimes to the head, sometimes right to the lips. The girl repeats this twice. Then he slowly backs away, joining the rest of the snake worshipers and giving the snake the opportunity to retreat. The snake does this, and very hastily. The dance is completed, the deity has left.
How do you learn to dance with a cobra? Girls from an early age undergo training on non-venomous species of snakes or “cold” (lacking a poisonous tooth) cobras. Their task is to thoroughly study the behavior and movements of the snake in order to be able to anticipate them in advance, in a split second. The dance of the priestess has a special musical accompaniment. It distracts or even hypnotizes the snake, reducing the speed and accuracy of its strikes.
The double sting of the snake, which wants to reach the body of the young priestess, speaks of duality. It is further strengthened by the image of two snakes entwined with each other. Duality is two halves interacting with each other. Any interaction generates an energy wave. Being a symbol of duality, the snake denotes “Through the Looking Glass”, the reflected world of material, attracting to itself. There is a legend about the ability of snakes to hypnotize their victims with their gaze or measured swaying, i.e. rhythm.
The English writer Lawrence Greene wrote in his book “The Last Secrets of Old Africa”: “Snake charming is an amazing and dangerous profession. Almost all the spellcasters I knew died from snake bites. These fearless people could not master one secret - how to stay alive.
The art of snake charming originated in Egypt, which was the cradle of many arts. Snakes are the scourge of the Egyptian village. Perhaps that is why the most skilled snake hunters and charmers appeared there.
Cobras were symbols of royal greatness. Cobra-shaped tiaras crown the heads of Egyptian statues. Cleopatra died from a cobra bite. Magicians at the court of the pharaohs could turn a snake into a stick, repeating the miracle once performed by the prophet Moses. Apparently, they squeezed the snake’s neck so that the brain was paralyzed and the snake became as hard as a stick.
African sorcerers have excellent knowledge of snakes. Europeans in tropical Africa often turn to witches if they suspect the presence of a snake in their home. And it almost never happens that the mganga does not discover the snake and leaves without reward. And what does five or ten shillings mean when a house gets rid of a mamba?
Usually the sorcerer brings a pipe with him and begins to play his melody in different parts of the room, waiting for the mamba to slip out into the open. A lithe, graceful creature, but it carries enough poison in its tooth to kill an elephant. The sorcerer seizes the moment, quickly grabs the snake with a forked stick at the end and throws it into his bag. These days it's almost always a scam. The sorcerer usually throws a tamed snake into the house, whose poisonous teeth have been pulled out, and then uses the power of “charm” to call it out of its shelter.
The best spellcaster of his time was probably Sheikh Musa of Luxor, known to many thousands of tourists. Musa's grandfather and father were also spellcasters and died from snake bites. The same fate befell Musa's youngest son when he went into the desert to look for snakes. Musa always believed that the same end awaited him. Indeed, he died in 1939 when he tried too persistently to remove a cobra from its nest.
Sheikh Musa never resorted to deception. Before the start of the performance, he allowed himself to be searched and even undressed. The snakes he removed from holes under the mud huts were not tame. He could smell a scorpion hiding under a stone, or a snake in its hiding place. According to Musa, the smell of the snake is reminiscent of ammonia.
With monotonous singing, he lured snakes from their nests and called them to him. Sometimes the cobra attacked him. Musa gently drove her away with his wand. Then the cobra stood up and looked intently at the snake charmer. Musa was waiting for this moment. Continuing to hum, he slowly approached the snake. Then he lowered his hand to the ground, and the cobra laid its head on his palm.
Other charmers, including the head keeper of the London Zoo named Budd, could perform such performances. The snake act was the highlight of the very capable charmer Hussein Mia, who performed it in Cape Town for many years. But old Musa had other amazing numbers, and only a few spellcasters of the past and present could repeat them.
Having drawn a circle in the sand with a stick, Musa put the newly caught cobra there, and it remained in this circle as if tied until Musa let it go. At the end, Musa placed four or five snakes in the same circle and bewitched them all. The spectators clearly saw that the snakes were trying to get out of the circle, but none crawled far while Musa was looking at it.
There is no doubt that Musa simply wanted to influence the public with his singing, since snakes hear almost nothing. However, they perceive high-pitched flute sounds. There is an opinion that the skin of a snake or the tips of its ribs react to certain vibrations in the air, for example from steps on the ground. And the sounds of a flute excite the cobra rather than put it to sleep.
Watch the charmer and his flat baskets, and you will see that he does not lure out snakes with the sounds of a flute. The caster lightly taps the basket, and then a snake appears. There is nothing supernatural in the art of a snake charmer. But viewers rarely understand what is really happening. It seems to them that the snake is wriggling and swaying to the beat of the music, but in reality it follows the movements of the person’s hand. Take a close look at the caster and you will see that the skillful movements of his hand and body direct the actions of the snake. He always removes the snake slowly, fearing to excite it. If the snake shows signs of irritation, he puts it back in the basket and chooses another one for presentation.
Another famous Egyptian snake charmer, Haj Ahmed, a friend of Russell Pasha, claimed that he could bewitch a snake by whistling. He supplied rare snakes to zoos and vaccine manufacturers. Haj Ahmed was a member of Rifan, a secret society of snake charmers that was religious in nature and had strict rules. He got himself vaccinated, like the rest of society. However, there is no complete immunity against snakebite. His career was very successful until the day he died from a cobra bite.
Russell Pasha kept a special expert on the staff of the Cairo city police - the Englishman Bain. Both Russell and Bane studied the spellcasting techniques and came to the same conclusions. They believed that the secret to luring snakes out of their hiding places often lay in the ability of the charmer to imitate the sounds of the snake. Of course, during hibernation, nothing can awaken the snake, but during the mating season, the caster, imitating the specific hiss of the female, forces the male to crawl out towards the sound.
However, I heard another explanation while I was in Egypt. I was told that an experienced charmer uses snake excrement, the smell of which attracts other snakes. In my opinion, this explanation has a scientific basis. They say this method is effective in catching vipers.
Russell Pasha noted that the caster must have a keen eye and quick hands. I would add to this the ability at any age not to be distracted for a moment from the dance of the snake. Many spellcasters died simply because they were thinking about something else during the performance.
When I first encountered the sands and strangeness of Egypt (this was five years after the First World War), I encountered a special type of young snake charmers whose performances were so exciting that the government had to restrict their activities. In a café on Port Said Boulevard or even on the hallowed veranda of the Shepherd Hotel, these desperadoes would approach your table and offer to watch them swallow a live cobra.
There were always thrill-seekers willing to pay for such a spectacle. But even strong men felt bad, and women fainted. And such artists no longer appeared in fashionable hotels.
I remember one young guy who kept scorpions in his long black hair and wore a cobra. Some spellcasters lubricated their bodies with snake oil, hoping thereby to gain favor from the snake tribe. Perhaps they succeeded. The caster grabbed the cobra by the neck, squeezed it so that its huge mouth opened, and spat into it. Not a very aesthetic sight. But the snake’s reaction was completely unexpected: it instantly became stiff and could be manipulated like a cane. It turns out that there was a drug in the caster’s saliva, which had an instant effect on the snake. This is just one of those tricks that seems supernatural.
Some spellcasters, by showing two small wounds on their finger, pretend that they have been bitten by a cobra. You can be sure that the "bite" was there before the show even started. They usually apply a porous "snake stone" to the wound, a remedy they would never use if they were actually bitten by a snake.
Spellcasters always prefer cobra. Undoubtedly, the ominous hood enhances the impression of the spectacle. It must be said that the cobra inflates its hood only in an excited state. Consequently, moving behind the caster's pipe, the snake is not under hypnosis and, of course, it does not dance. Most likely, she is watching the movements of the caster. Of course, the caster also carefully watches the eyes of the snake to know if it is going to grab his hand.
There are seven species of cobras in Africa and there are so many of them everywhere that it costs nothing for the caster to catch as many as he needs. The so-called Egyptian cobra, which is found from the Mediterranean to South Africa, is not a spitting snake, nor is the Caen cobra. But the ring-gal and black-throated snake aim directly at the eyes of their prey and strike them at a distance of seven feet. Performances with them would be tantamount to suicide.
Egyptian spellcasters often display the highly poisonous horned viper. They also catch the dangerous carpet viper. But these are very rare species.
The charmer Hussein Mia sent from time to time for king cobras to Burma. This is an unusually spectacular and largest snake among venomous snakes. When presented, she looks very impressive among her smaller (but no less deadly) brothers. The largest king cobras reach eighteen feet in length. These are cannibals, they eat their own kind. Therefore, a spellcaster who has a king cobra may lose the rest of the snakes if he is not careful.
Unfortunately, the king cobra cannot live long in South Africa. Hussein Mia lost fourteen expensive snakes one after another. But when he had king cobras, the performances became livelier. Some cobras are good-natured, while others are malicious. And yet every spellcaster craves that storm of applause that only a huge, obedient king cobra can bring him. This snake is used in "Kiss of Death". Sometimes it is demonstrated by spellcasters. To kiss a cobra on the open mouth, you really need some kind of hypnotism.
Hussein Mia loved Cape Town very much and called himself Charlie from Cape Town. He, as befits a hereditary Indian magician, graduated from Pune University in magic, fire swallowing and snake charming. Hussein Mia came to South Africa at the end of the 19th century, and there is hardly a single village in Northern and Southern Rhodesia and the Union of South Africa where this bearded, smiling artist in a turban, with a small tom-tom and snakes has not been seen. He claimed to have performed at Buckingham Palace. “I made snakes dance for King Edward and King George,” he boasted.
Among Hussein Mia's performances there was one comic skit. Hussein was placing a small basket with a lid on the ground. Then he chose a suitable victim from the crowd, usually some scoffer who mocked the performance. He was asked to carefully examine the basket and show everyone present that it was empty. Hussein covered the lid with a piece of cloth, played a few mysterious bars on the flute, took out a basket from under the cover and asked the summoned person to put his hand into it and take for himself everything that was there. They hinted to him that the basket had mysteriously filled with money. This was the special success of the issue. The next moment, the frightened “victim” discovered a live snake in his hand. It was a non-venomous snake, but it did not look harmless.
Hussein Mia could give a performance for several hours in a row without repeating a single number. When his son Ibrahim was little, Hussein Mia performed an exceptionally practiced act with a wicker basket. Ibrahim climbed into the basket, and his father pierced its wicker sides with a dagger. But above all, Hussein was a snake charmer. He sent his son to Pune to properly polish his art and continue his father’s work.
Hussain Mia's performances have entertained me since childhood. When he died, I was already a mature man. Hussein Mia lived to be seventy years old. This is probably a record age for people in such a dangerous profession. During World War II, at a performance near the Mount Nelson Hotel, he was bitten on the thumb of his right hand by a Caen cobra. His son was urgently called, who at that moment was giving a performance in another place. When he arrived, Hussein was already unconscious; he was taken to the hospital too late.
Dr. Hamilton Fairley, who was interested in this dangerous activity, followed the fate of twenty-one spellcasters over a period of fifteen years. During this period, nineteen of them died from snake venom.
The most famous of them was Bertie Pierce, known to scientists all over the world. His main occupation was selling snakes to museums, as well as “squeezing out” snake venom for serums.
For Pierce, with his weak heart, this was not a suitable occupation. Each bite made him wonder if he could handle the treatment. One day he was bitten on the hand by an African viper. He did not have a vaccine, and he burned the bitten area. There were terrible scars on my arm. Once in Cape Town, in the absence of his assistant, Pierce entered a pit with snakes to entertain the public. A small cobra bit him on the ankle - a very dangerous place because of the many small blood vessels located there. Pierce was treated, but this time the treatment did not help. This was the tenth and fatal bite.
Why don’t spell casters “squeeze out” the snake venom before picking up the snake? The fact is that the poisonous sacs very quickly fill up with poison again. And forcing a snake to endlessly bite a rag before a performance until the entire bag is empty is a tedious and lengthy procedure. Of course, the charmer can pull out the snake's teeth. But those who are proud of their profession rarely do this. In addition, snakes without teeth do not live long.
One day, Dr. Desmont Fitzsimons, a South African snake expert, saw a show with a viper. It was so unusual that he began to take a closer look. The viper turned out to be a harmless carpet snake. But it was so skillfully painted that from a distance it was almost indistinguishable from an African viper.
In Southern Rhodesia, in the town of Sinoia, there lived a sorcerer who became famous for fearlessly taking green mambas into his hands. During one of the performances he received a fatal bite. A local surgeon sent one of the sorcerer's snakes to Fitzsmons to determine its species. It turned out to be a light green variety of boomslang, or tree snake. Boomslang's poisonous teeth are located deep in the mouth, on the back edge of the upper jaw, so it rarely manages to bite someone and release its deadly poison. The sorcerer was unlucky. This was just such a rare case. But when the species of the snake was determined, the sorcerer’s secret was revealed. No spellcaster, no matter how skillful he may be, could perform so many performances with the mamba with impunity, allowing her to approach the flute itself.
The spell of snakes probably dates back to the ancient cult of snake worship. Each temple had its own snakes. Healers were also spellcasters, and to this day the snake symbolizes medicine. It is therefore not surprising that the rifan - the most skilled snake charmers of Egypt - are religious.
Undoubtedly, snake charmers still have secrets, and they do not reveal them to any outsiders.”
The French naturalist Armand Denis was convinced of this, who in the 30s. XX century I shot the film in Singapore.
For the film's finale, he purchased about a dozen king cobras. These were adults, very warlike individuals. Denis placed them in a tightly built box with a strong wire mesh lid. Soon it was abundantly doused with deadly poison: the snakes furiously protested against the disrespectful attitude towards them.
After some time, a Chinese boy appeared at the hotel, dressed in a strange white outfit with long wide sleeves. He offered Dany his services for working with snakes and asked for one of the king cobras as payment.
The boy said that for him, handling a snake, no matter what condition it was in, was neither difficult nor dangerous. Then he lifted the edge of the box. Denis became terribly worried and asked the boy to leave the snakes alone. In response, the boy lowered the box for a moment and took out a small bottle of green liquid from the folds of his sleeve.
When he removed the plug, the smell of freshly cut grass filled the room. The boy took some liquid into his mouth and lowered himself to the box until his face was very close to the bars. The snake prepared to strike, but the boy got ahead of the cobra, and quite unexpectedly. Moving even closer to the box, he suddenly spat out the liquid, dousing the cobra he had chosen. Then he waited a little and, to Denis’s surprise and boundless horror, he reached into the drawer and took out “his” cobra, holding it with both hands in the middle of his long body. The green liquid inexplicably made the cobra unnaturally sluggish. The snake raised its head, looked at the boy indifferently, but did not make a single attempt to rush at him.
The technique in this case is even more inexplicable than in the case of the dancing cobra. Science does not know any substances that can affect the behavior of snakes. About a hundred years ago, journalists reported that in some areas of Ohio (USA) rattlesnakes were driven away by white ash leaves, but modern research has refuted this data.
The family of snake charmers Mia continues its work in our time. Such a case is known.
...The Bangladeshi police were unable to neutralize the gang of thug Nisar Shah. After the next attack, the bandits disappeared without a trace in the dense tropical forests.
Law enforcement agencies managed to introduce their agent into the gang. Soon he reported that Nisar Shah had launched an armed attack on an agricultural credit bank in the town of Nyryyan-Gan.
At night, on the eve of the raid, an ambush was secretly set up in the bank. As two trucks with bandits shooting in the air rushed along the main street towards the bank building in the central square, the police rained down a barrage of fire on the raiders from the windows. Almost all the bandits were killed on the spot. Nisar Shah himself was not injured. As a precaution, together with his assistant Yakki Khan, he followed the trucks at some distance in a passenger car. When the ambush revealed itself, Nisar Shah turned around and rushed to the exit from the city. The police, who did not expect this, did not pursue him.
The leader would have managed to escape if his car had not been stopped by a police checkpoint near the last houses of Nyryyan-Gan. The bandits jumped out of the car and disappeared into a small stone house about a hundred meters from the edge of the rice field.
At this time, the head of the operation, Captain Afzal, arrived at the scene of the skirmish. He came up with a surprising plan to force Nisar Shah and Yakki Khan to surrender.
...In appearance he is not yet old, with lush bright red hair and a thin mustache, Dudu Mia does not look like a movie star, but the whole of Bangladesh knows his face. Not a single herpentologist can compare with him in knowledge of snakes and the ability to catch them. Dudu Mia incomprehensibly knows how to control poisonous reptiles. They say that he knows the language of snakes and can communicate with them at ultra-low sound frequencies, inaudible to the ordinary human ear.
Shortly before the police operation against Nisar Shah's gang, the town of Nyryyan-Gan was attacked by cobras. Dudu Mia, who arrived on call, caught some of the snakes, and the rest disappeared somewhere by themselves. After this, Dudu Mia stayed in the town for some time in case the reptiles decided to repeat the invasion.
The savvy captain suggested using Dudu Mia’s unusual abilities. Half an hour later, his assistant brought Dudu Mia, who took with him two lidded baskets with cobras. On the way, the policeman briefed the snake catcher on the planned plan. He said that he could send the bastards to the house where the bandits were holed up. And so the red-haired magician, bending down, carefully crept up to the house about fifty meters, dragging his baskets behind him. Through binoculars, the captain clearly saw how Dudu Mia took out cobras from them and, having said something, lowered them into the grass. The captain could not believe that after this the cobras would crawl into the house, and not to the neighboring rice field.
The results of the actions of the creeping “capture group” did not have to wait long. No more than half an hour passed before random shooting began in the house, and then both bandits jumped out of it with their hands raised and rushed towards the police. “It was some kind of devilish obsession. Damned cobras suddenly crawled out of all the cracks, and the bullets didn’t take them,” Nisar Shah admitted, barely moving his lips after the horror he suffered, when he was handcuffed.
From the author's bookSnakes Snakes represent the primal energy of the unconscious, they are poisonous. The venom of some snakes (especially those belonging to the cobra family) causes ecstatic visions. Perhaps this is why the snake is also a symbol of wisdom. Since ancient times, snake venom has been used as
Every year in the village of Hadaithala, which is located 100 km from Calcutta, a conference of representatives of one of the most amazing professions on Earth - snake charmers - is held. Thousands of reptile tamers gather together to honor Manasa, the patron goddess of snakes in the Hindu religion. In front of the public, the spellcasters demonstrate various tricks: wrapping poisonous reptiles around their bodies, squeezing drops of poison from a snake’s mouth into their mouths and swallowing them, and also luring cobras out of a wicker basket with a flute and forcing them to sway smoothly, supposedly to the beat of a melody. For some reason, it is the last trick that invariably delights the audience.As soon as the fakir begins to play the flute, or rather, emit a thin piercing sound from it, shaking his head from top to bottom, the angry reptile that flew out of the basket immediately calms down and, without taking his eyes off the instrument, begins to sway to the beat of the melody. (Although snakes hear virtually nothing, they respond to high-pitched flute music. One theory is that a certain vibration in the air strikes the scales of the snake's skin or the tips of the ribs, much like the feet hitting the ground when walking.) Of course, such a trick makes a great impression on the uninitiated. However, the solution is quite simple. The thing is that for the caster the flute is not a musical instrument, but a club with the help of which he trains his poisonous “artist”. This is how one of the eyewitnesses describes the training procedure: “The cobra, already quite stunned from the still unusual way of sitting locked up, opens its hood and rushes at the trainer with quite obvious intentions. He meets it fully armed - and the weapon, as you might guess, is a flute. Time after time. at once the cobra shows its evil temper, but the “musical blows" eventually force it to flee. She is not allowed even this - the tamer beats her with a flute until the poor fellow is completely exhausted, and the wicker basket in which she has to live, does not seem to her a tempting and desirable refuge. After the first lesson, the trainee fakir takes over the cruel training of the snake, and everything repeats itself..." During the performance, it is not the cobra that bends to the beat of the music, but the fakir moves to the beat of the movements of the snake; when she raises her head, the fakir raises his flute. The snake remembers the brutal blows it received during its “training” and therefore sways sluggishly, trying to figure out if it will be able to escape. When she gets tired, the caster interrupts the melody, and it seems as if he managed to do it first. That's the trick. In addition, some spellcasters, fearing that they will still be bitten, take extreme measures: they teach snakes not to bite or even sew up their mouths.
True, the above tricks are used only by simple street charmers who perform in front of gullible tourists for a small fee. As E.P. wrote Blavatsky, “real snake charmers have established their reputation too well in the East to resort to such techniques. On this subject, there is testimony from too trustworthy travelers, including scientists, not to accuse them of charlatanism.”
Despite the fact that India is primarily famous for snake charmers (today there are about 7 thousand representatives of this profession there), this art, according to researchers, originated in Egypt. Sheikh Moussa from Luxor is considered one of the most skilled snake charmers. His skill was unsurpassed. Before the start of the performance, he allowed himself to be undressed and searched; the snakes he conjured were untrained. By pronouncing spells and chanting, Moussa lured them out of their holes and called them to him. If the cobra tried to attack, Moussa carefully threw it away with a stick and, without stopping singing, slowly approached the snake, put his hand on the ground, and the cobra lowered Moussa’s head into his palm. The caster also demonstrated another incredible trick: he placed freshly caught cobras in a circle drawn with a stick in the sand, in which they remained until Moussa allowed them to leave.
However, even excellent knowledge of snake habits does not always protect casters from accidents. Dr Hamilton Fairley followed the lives of 25 snake charmers over a 15-year period. It turned out that during this time 19 of them died from snake venom. So this profession is not only mysterious, but also very dangerous.
While we strive to teach our children to count by age three and read by age five, Veda parents living in Sri Lanka teach their children how to handle... poisonous snakes!
Anthropologists classify the Veda as a Negrito - a black Australoid race. Negritos once inhabited most of Southeast Asia. But later they were pushed aside by the happier modern inhabitants of these places for inconvenience. The Vedas live practically in the Stone Age. No radio, no other achievements of civilization, not even money. Unless, of course, you count the small coins attached to the bracelets of their women as decoration as money. They feed on everything they can catch. Monitor lizards, of which there are a huge number in Sri Lanka, are often eaten. There they replace our cats - they rummage through garbage dumps. Naturally, Vedas do not receive any education, in the European sense of the word. But you still have to live. This is where the ancient art of handling snakes, including poisonous ones that are deadly to humans, comes to the rescue. That’s why they start teaching children this craft right after they start walking. Our compatriot visited the Veda village. His goal was to look at children's learning. According to him, at the initial stage of training, the poisonous teeth of snakes are removed, just in case. The teacher, whose name was Kahlua, sat several kids in a circle and began to show them how to handle the snake: under no circumstances grab the tail, do not wave your hands in front of its head. There is a lot of wisdom in this science; the entire “course” takes more than one month. Children three to four years old can handle adult cobras. Veda's pythons are completely tame and, if you feed them in time, are generally indifferent to what is done to them. They just need a kilogram of mice a week! One cute little girl, getting excited, picked up a huge cobra by the tail and began swinging it, bursting into laughter.
The bespectacled queen of the jungle could not tolerate such mockery and, dodging, made a throw. In the blink of an eye, the girl released the snake and quickly jumped away. She hissed and went into the basket.
This is how another of our compatriots describes the performances of snake tamers:
“They don’t write posters for their performances and don’t sell tickets. It all starts very simply...
Fakirs can be found everywhere. For a small fee they offer their performance. Having received your consent, the fakirs position themselves directly on the ground, open the lids of the baskets, and the performance begins...
From a large basket, feeling the fresh air, a snake 2-2.5 meters long sluggishly raises its head, which is immediately grabbed by the neck. This is, so to speak, an overture.
Then you are shown other snakes of different colors and lengths - thin and long, medium and very small.
And finally, to the sound of a pipe, the most terrible snakes rise from the baskets - “king” cobras; in India, thousands of people die from their bites every year. The cobra is called the "plague of India." But now this “plague” obediently listens to the melody that the tamers extract from their pipes.
This ends the first part of the performance.
The heroes of the second section are a poisonous snake and a mongoose, between whom a mortal battle immediately begins. The mongoose, very dexterous, fast and cunning, tries to grab the enemy by the neck. And the snake, for its part, tries to defeat the mongoose with its bite.
A ten-minute struggle in most cases ends in victory for the mongoose.
A dead snake, the victim of an interesting performance, will still be useful to the owner. Her skin is worth more than paying for a show with eight to ten people in attendance.”
In total, 98 species of snakes live in Sri Lanka; the most dangerous species is the “king” cobra.
Cobras are most active from mid-April to June and from September to mid-November. In July, the female lays 9-19 eggs, from which juveniles emerge in late August - early September. Cobras feed on rodents, amphibians, and birds, but, like other adders, they readily eat snakes, including poisonous ones. Cobra 
poses an undoubted danger to humans and animals, but, unlike vipers, it always warns of its presence. Only in case of an immediate threat does the cobra make several lightning-fast attacks towards the enemy, one of which, as a rule, ends with a targeted bite. At the same time, unlike vipers, cobras do not bite instantly, but rather “chew”, moving their jaws several times before releasing the victim.
If you do not take an antidote, death will occur 2-3 hours after the bite.
Antidotes made from snake venom are purchased by the Veda from local healers. They don't trust modern medicine.
Snakes are known to have very poor hearing. But they react to high-pitched flute music. Certain vibrations in the air strike the scales of the snake's skin or the tips of the ribs.
Snake charmer is an unusual and dangerous profession. The art of snake charming originated in Egypt, so it is there that you can meet the most experienced hunters and charmers in the world. The art of snake charming appeared as a result of the worship of creeping reptiles. The most skilled snake charmers in Egypt are deeply religious people. Cobras, like tiaras, served in Ancient Egypt as a symbol of royal dignity. Cleopatra's snake was a cobra. And the wizards of the pharaohs could turn snakes into wands. This could be done by squeezing the snake’s head so much that its brain was affected, and the snake went into a stupor.
The most unrivaled snake charmer was Sheikh Moussa of Luxor. Sheikh Moussa's skill was unique. At his shows, he cast spells and sang, thereby luring snakes out of their holes. Without stopping these actions, he slowly approached the snake, put his hand on the ground, and the cobra lowered its head and laid it on the palm of the caster. Moussa also showed a trick by placing a wild, freshly caught cobra in a circle, which he outlined with a stick in the sand. The cobra remained in the circle until Moussa allowed it to leave it. Having caught 4-5 cobras, Moussa gathered them in a circle and began to conjure them all together. The spectacle for those around was unforgettable. How did he manage to do this?
Snakes are known to have very poor hearing. But they react to high-pitched flute music. Certain vibrations in the air strike the scales of the snake's skin or the tips of the ribs. Therefore, playing the flute excites the cobra rather than charms it. After all, the open hood of the snake is evidence of this. If you look closely at the movements of a snake charmer, their secret may become clear.
The trick is not in the flute. Snakes crawl out of the basket after a light, imperceptible blow to it by the caster. Swinging to the beat of the music, the cobra follows the movements of the human hand, but does not dance at all. Thoughtful movements of the caster's hand control the behavior of the snake. He approaches her slowly, trying not to alarm the reptile. The snake charmer always looks into the eyes of the animal in order to catch the moment when the reptile wants to grab his hand. If the snake becomes restless, the charmer places it back in the basket and selects another cobra.
Sometimes snake charmers, for the entertainment of the public, show on their hand two bites of a snake that supposedly bit them during the show. He applies a “snake stone” to them - a remedy for their poison. But these two holes were already there before the performance began. And healing with a stone is just a fairy tale. These are not all the tricks and tricks that you may not notice during the show.
Some cunning people manage to repaint completely harmless snakes in the natural colors of the most dangerous of their kind, like vipers. From a distance, such a fake is almost invisible, especially to the eye of a non-specialist. No snake charmer trains his pets from birth. For performances, already mature individuals are caught, since young animals are more aggressive, and adult snakes bite less often. There is no use in training snakes.
It happens that a snake charmer removes the poisonous teeth of the unfortunate reptile or sews up his mouth with ordinary thread and a needle. If the operation is performed skillfully, the thread remains covered with labial shields. In this case, the snake becomes harmless and helpless. She can hiss, stick out her tongue, rush at people, but, alas, she will not be able to bite in this state. Snakes do not live long after such manipulations. By the way, not all snakes participate in the performances. The snake charmer selects only those individuals that are able to hold a stance for a long time and rarely show the desire to rush and bite.
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