Homo Sapiens Serpens
(not to be confused with ”Snake people”)
Origin
According to oral tradition, Homo Sapiens Serpens come from the most remote valleys of the High Atlas. Their ancestors are said to have practised a special type of meditation to visualize the movements of snakes and casting of their skin. Over an unknown succession of generations, their upper bodies were said to have lengthened, the number of vertebrae increased and the suppleness of ligaments and tendons refined.
However, there are no scientifically verifiable records of these developments. The stories could therefore lie in the realm of myth.
Anatomical characteristics
There is evidence that Homo Sapiens Serpens have significantly longer torsi than ordinary Homo Sapiens and 41 vertebrae. The shape of the individual vertebrae, as well as the tendons and muscle structure, are apparently identical to those of humans with 33 vertebrae. But unlike these humans, they have 7 lumbar vertebrae and 15 thoracic vertebrae with the corresponding number of ribs. Of the 7 sacral vertebrae, 2 are not fused. The os ilium of the pelvis is generally more strongly developed in them, which contrasts with the delicate form of their overlong torsi.
We lack data on whether the bones of their arms are correspondingly longer.
The anatomical condition and lifestyles of humans with 33 vertebrae increasingly lead to curvatures of the spine in their early stages of development, known as scoliosis. Because scoliosis is often overlooked, it cannot be reversed in adulthood. In diagnostic images, these curvatures may look like frozen snapshots of wonderful dances, but in the lived reality of these humans, they are more likely to be experienced as inflexibility with painful echoes in other parts of the skeleton and musculature.
The higher number of vertebrae allows Homo Sapiens Serpens more dynamic and differentiated variations in spinal movements, including greater rotation and lateral inclination. In the few travel descriptions that we have found from the late 17th century onwards, their movements are described as wriggling or undulating, and the term accordion movement also appears. [1]
Here, too, we lack descriptions of how the arms move in relation to the long torsi.
Vocalization
Serpens people have also developed an unusual technique for uttering or singing sounds. Specific vowels and sequences of sounds seem to be assigned to individual vertebrae or groups of vertebrae, which also differ depending on the direction of movement. These sounds are at least quietly audible with the movements, also humming, at times whistling, but sometimes they are also very distinctly expressed. In addition, they are said to have practised a diaphragmatic breathing somewhat foreign to us.
Through the combination of targeted, subtle movements of individual vertebrae and specific sounds and breathing, the muscle strands of the corresponding vertebrae are activated in particular ways, which also seems to counteract the hyperacidity of the fasciae. It is conceivable that this specific vocalization originally arose from exercises to release physical blockages. [2]
These practices have apparently also affected the spectrum of their voices in terms of frequency, volume and dynamics; they seem to be deeper, clearer and wider than our voices.
Cultural practice
Perhaps we can best imagine this unusual combination of movement and voice as a "spinal alphabet" - or as a "spinal scale". It is clear that the combination of vertebrae and sounds was understood by these people as an "instrument" and that intensive learning and practising phases were - or are - necessary from an early age in order to master this "language", maybe similar to the traditions of classical ballet or piano playing among Homo Sapiens Sapiens.
As far as is known, Homo Sapiens Serpens dance in groups, but as individuals with their own rhythmic, wave-like movement patterns and individual vocal pitches, which can - or must have - increased to polyphonic vocalizations in the group.
This could be a practice of abstract "self expression". When interacting, this requires a high level of listening attention from each individual in order to achieve the harmonic-dynamic, highly musical interweaving of voices described in detail. [3] Whether they also practised collective decision-making while dancing and singing in this way remains an interesting speculation.
The thinking of Homo Sapiens Serpens is highly dynamic, which must also be influenced by their cultural practice and enormous mobility. Their changes of perspective in conversation were obviously breathtaking. However, they do not seem to have seen any need to write down their bodily experiences and their unusual, omni-directional knowledge or even to base ideologies on them. There is therefore very limited written evidence of their dance, breathing and singing practices and traditions.
It is left to our imagination as to what stages of development this human species went through between early (shamanistic?) visualization practices that led to the unusual number of vertebrae and the (later?) polyphonic-polymorphic dance celebrations we have read about. It is equally unclear whether collective dancing was practised exclusively at ritual ceremonies or whether it has always been a daily practice of thinking together.
The latter indicates a secular world view of the Homo Serpens.
According to oral history, they called - or call - themselves Pearl People (Arabic: alnaas alluwlu). We assume that they associated combinations of vertebrae and sounds with "pearls" of different shapes and colours. However, we do not know any more details.
Other characteristics
Their extremely high sensitivity to smell has been handed down in literature. They could locate odours spatially much more precisely than we can and in this they show certain similarities with the Homo Sapiens Radix. However, we do not yet know where this enhanced olfactory ability comes from and in which part of the body this development may have manifested itself. There is speculation that the so-called Jacobson's organ (in science this is referred to as the "vomeronasal organ") has reactivated, which has presumably regressed in common Homo Sapiens.
Homo Sapiens Serpens are also considered to be very sensitive to cold. Whether this stems from a negative aspect of their ability to associate - in this case specifically with cold-blooded snakes -, we do not know.
Further development
These Pearl people seem to have become wanderers in their later development. They probably became solitary on this path or they explicitly withdrew into obscurity.
As early as the early 18th century, travellers appeared in the Ottoman and Near Eastern regions such as Mary Wortley Montagu, whose appearances in the portraits we know of them bear striking similarities to the descriptions of the Pearl People. Whether these similarities remained visible as genetic traits due to the mixing of species or whether they were simply fashion trends at the time remains vague, like so much else.
It can be assumed that the cultural practices of Homo Serpens increasingly faded due to dispersal.
We suspect that Caspar David Friedrich was one of them who made this statement:
Close your bodily eye, that you may first see your image with your mind's eye. Then bring to light what you have seen in the dark, so that it may reflect on others from the outside in.
References
- ↑ René Caillié, the French explorer of Africa, crossed the Sahara from Timbuktu to Morocco in 1826. Along the way, he must have stopped off at settlements of Serpens people. Descriptions that suggest this can be found in his unpublished travel notes.
- ↑ Juliane Gabriel's voice research shows how specific sounds can release blockages and expand the voice. Unpublished studies, Juliane Gabriel, 2003, Berlin.
- ↑ Evliya Çelebi, the Ottoman historian, is said to have travelled from Cairo along the North African coast and into the Atlas Mountains during the last phase of his life around 1680. His "splinters of memory" contain descriptions of, among other things, the sound practices of the Homo Sapiens Serpens. But these descriptions may also be based on stories from other travellers. For he also writes: You don't have to have seen him yourself, those who are knowledgable and those without great gifts will also be enlightened when they look into his album. Everyone can enrich himself according to the degree of his knowledge.
