The Snake is a venomous and poisonous rattlesnake.
Background[]
The poisonous snake was resting on the path leading up into the Great Mountains to the east of the Sovereignty of Serenia. It is quite a dangerous 'poisonous snake' as Cedric is sure to point out.
The snake considered the path leading up into the mountains to be its own, and refused to budge. It warned anyone who attempted to pass it, telling them to stay away.
The snake is afraid of rattlesnakes and has such poor eyesight that he can easily be fooled by a man making the right noise.[1] Graham, used a tambourine to scare the snake off, so that he could reach the mountains.
Personality and traits[]
He is a wimpy snake who is afraid of rattlers. The sound of a tambourine makes him slither off in fear.
Titles and nicknames[]
- The Snake
- Poisonous Snake
Behind the scenes[]
"Poisonous snakes" are not uncommon in fairy tales and classic literature from which King's Quest is inspired. Be it from 'poisoning' via venom or snakes being poisonous to eat. See Mohammed with the Magic Finger, The Story of Zoulvisia, or The Snake Prince: in Andrew Lang's Fairy Books. See also Oleg: the Prince Who Was Killed by His Favorite Horse and Charlegmagne and the Snake. The Twelve Brothers in Grimm's Fairy Tales. Sinbad had to deal with poisonous snakes as well.[2], and the story of Riki Tiki Tavi. The use of 'poisonous' to describe snakes and other creatures with venom appears commonly in Gothic literature as well; In The Adventure of the Speckled Band the titular band is a 'poisonous snake', which Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson discover as the weapon in a crime..[3] In Bram Stoker's The Lair of the White Worm the worm in question is yet another 'poisonous snake' (not even a beneficial white snake), venomous only appears once but more as a description of malevolence (rather than literal venom). Even the King James Bible uses poisonous/poison when referring to various kinds of poisonous snakes (only uses 'venom' once in one context as synonym of poison). Poisonous Snake is also a common DND creature as well (a 'tiny beast').[4] Notably speaking during middle ages, medieval, dark ages, and early renaissance, poison and venom were interchangeable terms, and venom even came from the Latin word for poison: 'venenum' (both largely having link to 'potions' and 'imbibing'). So the usage of the 'literary' "poisonous" seems rather fitting (its not a zoology or veterinary textbook, its a 'high fantasy/fairy tale game').
The KQ5 Hintbook, lists this character as the 'POISONOUS SNAKE'/'poisonous snake'. In KQ5 it is often known as the 'poisonous snake' or 'venomous snake', and 'The Snake' in the credits.
- A common misconception is that Cedric words are often misspelled or written partially in caps to indicate stress, such as the erroneously spelled, "A POIsonous snake!" in the script. In fact according to the script, he just says, "a poisonous snake!" (as mentioned in the KQ5 Hintbook as well).
- Incidentally, Cedric pronounces the word "poisonous" with stress on the first syllable in the CD-rom version. However, writing out "POI" is not a proper way to designate accent stress on a word, one proper linguistic method is to use acute accent (´) or apostrophe (’) indicating the stress: ’poisonous or possibly even póisonous (the latter even indicates a longer vowel sound which Cedric seems to stress).
But these markings are generally only shown for linguistic descriptions rather than actual usage within text.
While it is treated more or less as a mindless animal in the original version of KQ5, its a verified voiced character in the CD version of the game.
In the floppy version, there is a warning if you try to touch the snake
In the CD-Rom version the snake talks and there is a close-up graphic of the snake, if you attempt to "touch the snake" using the hand icon.
In the NES version the snake is a cobra rather than a rattlesnake (it uses the same graphic used for the Mordack duel at the end of the game).
The snake was added to the game to prevent players from going into the mountains and getting stuck before having all the needed items (in this case all the events needed to unlock the tambourine).[5]
See also poison, venom, toxin and bane for some of the similarities and differences between terminology. This article is not the place to discuss pedantic online debates on terminology.
Quote[]
The Snake: "Ssstay Away! Thisss isss my path!"
Narrator: "That wasn't wise, Graham. He who speaks with forked tongue should never be trusted."
References[]
- ↑ TOBOKQ, 157
- ↑ https://books.google.com/books?id=FBasDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT242&lpg=PT242&dq=saint+brendan+poisonous+snake&source=bl&ots=Z9GWihWJKC&sig=ACfU3U1Or1cdu0Z0ffX30orWHz_GRQxtdQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiDx9ilzKnyAhWSZ80KHbqoB84Q6AF6BAgLEAM#v=onepage&q=saint%20brendan%20poisonous%20snake&f=false
- ↑ https://www.owleyes.org/text/adventure-speckled/read/the-advantage-of-the-speckled-band#root-218571-247 The idea of using a form of poison which could not possibly be discovered by any chemical test was just such a one as would occur to a clever and ruthless man who had had an Eastern training. The rapidity with which such a poison would take effect would also, from his point of view, be an advantage. It would be a sharp-eyed coroner, indeed, who could distinguish the two little dark punctures which would show where the poison fangs had done their work. Then I thought of the whistle. Of course he must recall the snake before the morning light revealed it to the victim.
- ↑ https://roll20.net/compendium/dnd5e/Poisonous%20Snake#content
- ↑ The Official Book of King's Quest (Second Edition), pg