FETHIYE, Turkey - Got a headache? You could take a painkiller or, if you happen
to be in the Black Sea town of Kirkpinar between early May and mid June, you
could put a snake on your head.
Every country has its share of snake myths. In the United States, some people
believe that a woman's birth pains are reduced if she ingests a drink made from
the powdered rattle of a rattlesnake. In Thailand, a married couple isn't
supposed to see a snake together or the wife will miscarry. And an old English
treatment for neck injuries was to draw a live snake across the affected area
three times and then bury the snake alive in a bottle.
In Kirkpinar, snakes treat every sort of ailment but are apparently
especially successful at treating skin conditions such as eczema and psoriasis.
Kirkpinar is a small village near the larger town of Bayburt and some of its
female inhabitants make a significant part of their yearly income by hunting
and gathering baby snakes as they hatch in mid-May from underground eggs. These
snakes are of the natrix (grass snake) genus which live in grasslands
near water and are neither aggressive nor venomous.
The snakelets are kept in earth-lined boxes and reared on cow's milk for two
months. During this period, sufferers seeking "snake treatments" arrive from
all over Turkey. Ten sessions are deemed necessary for a cure and treatment
takes place in the grass fields around the village where the afflicted lie down
in the sun, fully clothed, and wait.
The charge for a session with a snake is a very reasonable 5 lira (US$4). The
reptile is placed onto the affected area and left to its own devices. When
(after an average time of 10 minutes) it slithers off the patient, the
treatment is deemed to have been completed and the snake is recovered by its
keeper before it can escape.
The practice has become so popular there is a festival-like air in town for
these six weeks of snake therapy.
Gulfidan Battal is one of the formidable village matrons who goes out snake
gathering with their children. Her claims about the healing powers of snakes is
vast: "They can treat headaches, neck aches, backaches and stomach aches. I
have patients come from all over Turkey, Istanbul, Antalya, Bursa. One of my
Istanbul patients has been coming for three years and we healed his foot
problem."
These visitors from far-flung regions are put up in the village guesthouse
courtesy of the Muhtar (village headman). Of course not everyone can
work the snake magic and there are only four snake doctors in the village.
Although in previous years the numbers of snake women has been higher, the
snake catching needs dedication.
"We wake up before dawn and go out into the hills to catch the snakes before
they are too lively," said Gulfidan. "There are not that many snakes and we
know where they hatch but we are very careful to return them to this area when
their work is done in June."
Levent Kaya is one of the thousands who have arrived in the village over the
last month seeking treatment. He has been suffering from headaches and stomach
aches for over a year. After just one snake session, he said, "My pain has
already lessened."
Haci Canda is the head teacher of the local primary school and has been
treating people with snakes for 10 years. "Most people who come to the village
feel the benefits of the therapy, there are some who come year on year," said
Haci. "Some of these people have never found a doctor who can relieve their
pain but after their snake session they tell us they feel better."
Halil Batmaz, 11, helps his mother Gulfiye administer treatment and earns up to
50 lira per day. He says he is happy to be helping the sick.
Osman Bulunmaz, a middle-aged local man explained that in the middle of June
the snakes are always released back into the wild. "There are 70 and 80-year
olds living in our village and they remember snake treatments taking place when
they were children," he said. "No one is really sure how long this has been
going on."
There is, however, a local legend that accounts for the snakes' unique
properties. In the area where Kirkpinar's springs start there was a mill, and
the owner of the mill was a wonderful man. Villagers who bought their wheat to
be milled would sit outside and have picnics while they waited for their flour.
One day, one of the villagers bought a basket of eggs for everybody to share
and he hung the basket on a tree. The next day a young girl came to the mill
and wanted an egg. She climbed up the tree so she could reach the basket but,
when she inched along the branch and looked inside, the basket was full of
snakes. So great was her surprise and fear that she fell from the branch and
broke her leg. The miller who had seen all this called forth a curse on the
snakes that he had been hand feeding and said: "You must cure the injured or
else you will die out." The snakes descended on the little girl and cured her
broken leg. And they have been healing the sick ever since.
Of course people have different reactions to the treatment, some improve and
some don't. As Osman Bulunmaz puts it, "The snakes are particularly effective
in treating disorders like erysipelas [an acute streptococcus bacterial
infection of the skin] and other skin conditions that have become infected. We
put the snakes on the part of the body that hurts and the torso of the snake
takes away the infectious microbes. Then we put the snakes into a natural
spring that we have in the village that runs with warm water for six months of
the year and cold water for the other six months and clean them."
Dr Koksal Alpay, a professor at the Black Sea Technical University was quick to
dismiss this alternative therapy as quackery: "People who believe they are
going to get better are psychologically more likely to do exactly that. It's
like giving placebos to people who think pills will help them. There's no
science behind the snakes just pyscho-suggestion."
But is the doctor's cynicism misplaced? There are other cultures that believe
tying a snakeskin around the waist of a woman in labor will ease childbirth and
that carrying a snakeskin is generally beneficial to health and effective
against headaches and in extracting thorns from the skin. In ancient Greek
mythology Aesculapius, the god of medicine, held the snake sacred and it was
the emblem of health and recovery. The caduceus, modelled after the
mythological staff of Hermes, has become an insignia used by the medical
profession and is also a symbol for homeopathic medicine. It is typically
depicted as a short staff entwined by two serpents in the form of a double
helix.
More recently, in Australia, they have identified a powerful anticoagulant that
could one day be used to treat potentially fatal coronary conditions. According
to Bryan Fry, deputy director of the Australian Venom Research Unit at the
University of Melbourne, "The natural pharmacology that exists within animal
venoms is a tremendous resource waiting to be tapped."
In India in August 2007 a team of scientists at the Drug Development Division
in the India Institute of Chemical Biology in Kolkata found that proteins
present in snake venom can be used to prepare anti-cancer drugs.
Contortrostatin, a component found in the venom of copperhead snakes, is being
used to attack breast cancer cells and to prevent cancer from spreading.
A Malayan pit viper has yielded a chemical that could treat strokes. Cobra
venom is being studied for its use in treating Parkinson's disease. Aggrastat
is a super aspirin that prevents blood clots, as some snakebite victims bleed
to death because the venom contains anti-clotting proteins. Researchers in
Philadelphia isolated one of those proteins from an African Saw-scaled viper.
They built the Aggrastat molecule to mimic the venom's anti-clotting effect and
the new medicine helps prevent heart attacks.
Closer to the experience in Kirkpinar is what scientists have proved about
"snake oil". Snake oil is a traditional Chinese medicine used to treat joint
pain. Chinese immigrants to the US introduced its use to the Wild West but, due
to grifters peddling fake versions, over time the term became a derogatory
nickname for all compounds offered as medicines that were fake and ineffective.
New studies by Dr Richard Kunin in 1989 showed that genuine Chinese snake oil
made from Chinese water snakes is very high in EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid) - a
known pain reliever. EPAs are absorbed through the skin and inhibit the
production of inflammatory prostaglandins. Snake oil is widely used in
traditional Chinese medicine for relief from arthritis and joint pain. Perhaps
the Kirkpinar snakes are also exuding some type of snake oil as they lie on
their patients.
Whatever the benefits that snakes bring to their patients, they have certainly
benefited the villagers. Not only do they earn a significant income from the
treatments, but just five years ago Kirkpinar was a relatively impoverished
quarry area where dynamite blasting had nearly wiped out the snake population.
Media attention on the unusual medical practices - along with pressure from
environmentalists - brought about the introduction of Law 2683 and the area is
now a protected region.
Both the snakes and the forty springs that give the village the name of
Kirkpinar are now under the jurisdiction of Bayburt's governor who is making
efforts to encourage tourism. Perhaps it is best not to be too sniffy and
modern about the snakes of Kirkpinar and their uses. After all, most of us in
this shiny, technological age are quite happy to take antioxidants and extract
of cactus as alternative medicine.
Fazile Zahir is of Turkish descent, born and brought up in London. She
moved to live in Turkey in 2005 and has been writing full time since then.
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