Snake Wars – Ararat Plain

This incident occurred not so long ago. Eyewitnesses have been talking about a big battle of snakes near the city of Vedi in Goravan State Sanctuary in Armenia. Huge hordes of snakes have been interwoven in a mortal battle so fiercely that the endless rumble of the action could have been heard throughout the whole sanctuary.

Interestingly, that was not the first case of such encounters taking place in the region. Similar striking story occurred at the beginning of the last century around 1905 in the Ararat valley.

For about a week various kinds of snakes from all around Armenia slithered through cities, villages, mountains and rivers towards Iran.

There was an enormous number of snakes. Their glide was almost impossible to stop, although a huge amount was crushed on the roads and killed by people and livestock.

Dead snakes were lying everywhere, but to inhabitants’ surprise the movement of this stream continued along its determined path, stopping neither during the day nor at night.

The uncharacteristic thing was that there hadn’t been a single case of an attack on anyone, although people along with the stock had often found themselves inside the stream, searching for a way out. It seemed that the snakes were keeping their strength and venom for another purpose.

This lasted for about a week. Then the reverse process began, but no one remembered when. The snakes took their way back to Armenia.

They crawled in small batches, beaten, covered in deep wounds. Spectators concluded that snakes of Armenia had been at war with snakes of Iran. Despite the fact that many of them had died, it looked like they returned home as winners.

Snake has always lived in each Armenian house, never touching its household members. On the contrary, it protected them from various dangers. That’s why Armenians treat snakes with great respect.