Serpensortia

[coriolan_cmc2001]

No: HPFGUIDX 35487

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., "jklb66" <jklb66 at y...> wrote:
> 

Excellent essay

> Last question, how did Snape know that Draco could 
> do "serpensortia"?  Maybe it was always one of Lucius's favorites!  
> Although I like the ideas that it is a Slytherin favorite, or that 
> Snape taught it to Draco just as much.

Maybe it's an old Biblical incantation? Just as I've previously noted 
that Eve was the first Parseltongue, perhaps Serpensortia comes from 
Exodus:

Exodus 4

Signs for Moses 

1 Moses answered, "What if they do not believe me or listen to me and 
say, 'The Lord did not appear to you'?" 
2 Then the Lord said to him, "What is that in your hand?" 
"A staff," he replied. 
3 The Lord said, "Throw it on the ground." 
Moses threw it on the ground and it became a snake, and he ran from 
it. 4 Then the Lord said to him, "Reach out your hand and take it by 
the tail." So Moses reached out and took hold of the snake and it 
turned back into a staff in his hand. 5 "This," said the Lord , "is 
so that they may believe that the Lord , the God of their fathers-the 
God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob-has appeared to 
you."

Exodus 7 Aaron's Staff Becomes a Snake 
8 The Lord said to Moses and Aaron, 9 "When Pharaoh says to 
you, 'Perform a miracle,' then say to Aaron, 'Take your staff and 
throw it down before Pharaoh,' and it will become a snake." 
10 So Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh and did just as the Lord 
commanded. Aaron threw his staff down in front of Pharaoh and his 
officials, and it became a snake. 11 Pharaoh then summoned wise men 
and sorcerers, and the Egyptian magicians also did the same things by 
their secret arts: 12 Each one threw down his staff and it became a 
snake. But Aaron's staff swallowed up their staffs. 13 Yet Pharaoh's 
heart became hard and he would not listen to them, just as the Lord 
had said.

  - CMC