Miscellaneous Myths: Zahak The Serpent King
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 1 ก.ค. 2021
- Sometimes you read a myth or folktale and it surprises you how different it is from the narrative conventions you're used to, and sometimes literally the exact opposite thing happens and it's incredible. So anyway here's an evil snake emperor overthrown by a charismatic rebel leader and a lost true heir chosen one prophecy hero written ONE THOUSAND YEARS AGO
PARTIAL TRACKLIST: Starfall, Black Blade, Winged Dragon of Ra theme, He Who Brings The Night, To Victory, A Hero's Return, False King, Star Sky
Elevator, Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
creativecommons.org/licenses/b...
Our content is intended for teenage audiences and up.
PATREON: / osp
PODCAST: overlysarcasticpodcast.transi...
DISCORD: / discord
MERCH LINKS: rdbl.co/osp
OUR WEBSITE: www.OverlySarcasticProduction...
Find us on Twitter / ospyoutube
Find us on Reddit / osp
Want this video in another language? Check out our guide to contributing translated captions: www.overlysarcasticproduction...
With an Amara account, you can translate this very video by following this link: amara.org/en/videos/USOAdm7r7...
“Sorry I killed sixteen of your sons, and to make it up to you I won’t kill your seventeenth.”
Zahak officially wins the “Not as big of a jerk as you could’ve been” award
I mean, he didn't think of himself as evil and killing 16 sons from a single family is alot. Intentionally killing the last son when the father begs you not to is definitely evil.
Remember kids, accidental villainy is still villainy.
Man just didn’t want snakes on his shoulders
@@jasonreed7522 and that's the problem with billionaires; more than likely they don't know or act upon a lot of bad stuff that goes on because of them, even bill gates, despite the fact he runs a giant charity organization.
nice reference
So basically, he's an early version of That Guy.
"Give me this movie Hollywood. You cowards" best quote ever
Agreed.
Unfortunately they would give it to Michael Bay or Zack Snyder and it would be terrible. (Of course, for different reasons for both those directors)
@@bludfyre So we write to Hollywood and demand they make this a movie on the conditions hat Michael Bay and Zack Snyder don't have anything to do with it?
@@agenttheater5 Hollywood: "Instructions unclear, made both Michael Bay and Zack Snyder the co-directors of the movie. Enjoy!"
They'll just ruin it
Keyumars: **Invents clothes**
Hushang: **Invents technology**
Tahmuras: **Straight up slaps a bunch of demons with magic and makes them tell him their secrets, oh and also weaving**
Ah yes the demonic art of weaving
@@arawn1061 Having had to undo rows on a loom, i can confirm that sometimes knots and loops feel demonic, so that checks out
Weaving is tied in several mythologies to magic.
what do kings have with summoning demons for secrets? like, both this dude and Solomon.
@@user-qy8kk8yx4q It's an Indo-European trope, with Solomon's legend being influenced by it (and, later, influencing Iranian legends). Even Georgian and Baltic legends have it that metalworking was learned from velni/demons. Dwarves/Svartalfr are another non-human, non-godly class that was concerned with arts and crafts. In Zoroastrianism itself, magic is a demonic art.
I love how the lineup of kings goes directly from stuff like "clad his people in tiger skins" and "discovered firestarting" to "ENSLAVED DEMONS WITH MAGIC" with nothing in between lol
Ey, once you've beaten up tigers with rocks and your swinging dick, then invented fire AND iron weapons, as well as farming, things start to snowball REAL freakin' fast!
I mean, you skipped ironworking. Once you have fire and you have chains... enslaving fire creatures seems like a reasonable next step to try?
I mean that’s kinda how it works in real life too, with that whole longer to go from bronze swords to steel swords then steel swords to nukes idea
It wasn't that fast. The content of The story is fairly summarized in this video
once your civilization finds fire its all just uphill from there, demons and magic are just childsplay at that point.
Gf tries to kiss my shoulders:
" Thou shalt not have me foul temptress!"
"I knew you were the embodiment of evil this whole time! No making me into an evil king!"
Verily hath I learnt well the lessons of the ancient and noble tale of Johnny Snake Shoulders.
Why is Donald Trump pretty and I am not? But why does he only have a wife but I have TWO HANDSOME GIRLFRIENDS who I show off in my masterpiece YT videos? Do you know the answer, dear j
Me: "Sure, what's the worst that can happen?"
Zahak: "Lemme tell you..."
I love how the comments have more likes then the vid
I jut trealized "clothed his people in tiger skins" is more than just hunting for clothing - its a statement that the kings people were no longer bound by fear of the man eating tigers that prowled the region
Not only that, it means taking their place as the apex predator and flexing on the big cats that tiger is the one on the menu now. It's all very surreal when you read between the lines :3
Heck yes
Because of the punctuation, I thought there was a Man who had been eating tigers, not just man-eating tigers.
@@Undomaranel 🎵Read it right between the lines🎵
🎵Read it right between the lines🎵
It’s also probably why in Journey to the West, one of the first things Monkey does to display his power to Tripitaka is to absolutely *destroy* a prowling tiger and then turn his pelt into clothing.
"Have you looked at our king lately?"
"Hmm? What? No. Maybe, a little."
"He's got snakes growing out of his shoulders."
"What?"
"Have you noticed, that our king, has little human-brain-eating snakes growing out of his shoulders?"
"I... don't see..."
"Cyrus... are we the baddies?"
"I mean, I really can't think of anything worse to come out of our king's shoulders than a pair of snakes!"
"Um... rats... anuses?"
"Yeah, and if we were fighting a king with a pair of rats anuses coming out of his shoulders, I'd probably be a lot less worried!"
@@NDOhioan the worse thing to sprout out of your king's shoulders is definitely hippos
@@ashtasheran6970 baby clown heads for me
@@NDOhioan I understood that reference
@@ashtasheran6970
How about sworms of liches
I think the part that gets to me the most about this story (besides the name "Johnny Snake-shoulders") is that Zahak doesn't just want to believe that he's a good king, he's so insecure about it that he wants people to *sign paperwork* notarizing that he's a good king. That is hilariously desperate.
The ultimate "nice Guy"/incel.
"Why didn't you like me people, i've been good with you, i promise i'll change".
Then After 15 minutes be like
"You uselless dumbass, i don't care about what you think i want my brain soda right now and i order you to make me one"
this has the same energy as Sun Wukong insisting he be called the Great Sage equal to Heaven
It's because he's good at heart, but got deceived and lied to by Ahriman. He's right to think of himself as a victim, but he still had no right to demand recognition for his hidden away goodness from ppl he has terrorized and victimized himself.
That blacksmith really said “Screw this I’ll find the prophecy child myself”
your missing out the best part:
Blacksmith: "Don't kill my last kid"
S king: "Sure. on a completely unrelated note: would you sign my "I'm a good guy" petition? "
Blacksmith: “Screw this I’ll find the prophecy child myself”
Let's be honest: The blacksmith is the true MVP of this story
Kavah is the best, man
That moment when you could totally be the protagonist except there's a prophecy so you get to play lancer/instigator instead and gotta go find the Chosen One to finish your epic revenge story. Also, his poor wife! That's A LOT of kids to push out just to have them turned into snake food!
@@j.jnerdamy320 The real prophesied hero was the community we built along the way. Perhaps we in the modern day should learn from this, and stop waiting for heroes to come save us.
No, no, she has a point
We need this movie
I second this
Exactly. Those men in suits need to give a movie with good story for once. And less CGI. And Red should be the narrator
@@cgt3704 can we have red narrate the presently occurring events of the movie that require explanation like the prophecy and transitions from one city to the next but blue do the narration of the kings leading up to the guy who proclaimed himself god?
@@donanthebarbarian5177 Perfection. But i would love that both Blue and Simon to narrate the kings part
There's sorta kinda an animated movie based on this tale. It's called The Last Fiction
That blacksmith guy sounds like he’s either cool as hell or just the most productive Karen of all time with no in between
The double-humour of this is that yes: Kaveh is that cool of a guy and that there was an Iranian dynasty called 'Karen' (or the Karenids, depends on the source)
Hey, does a man need a reason to protect his son?
His name was Kaveh, but actually, yeah, his son was called Qaren (Karen).
Well, he did have a legitimate complaint
@@andrewpenn1145 i saw that reference mate
On second watch through, something stands out to me about the general population in this story: they're proactive!
The king has declared himself a god? Call the neighbors in to overthrow him!
New king also bad? Form an army and go find the prophecy child!
You don't typically see that in these types of stories.
Probably a reflection of history. There's a lot of evidence of populations being proactive about their rulers in Iranian/East Roman history.
@@thomassaxon8254 Cool!
Look at Iran now.
You know what they say: if something sucks, make it not suck.
@@kamiabghorbanpour2291They're still proactive. The U.S. has regime changed them, what, at least twice since the 50s, and they're STILL not privatizing their oil.
What the hell, that Blacksmith deserves to be king, I’ve never heard of a bigger power move
Yesssss!!!!
He doesn't have time to be king, he's got more sons to make
Without fitting heritage you dont get to be rightful king. Still badass of the century.
@@18Krieger I mean usually the way it works is you take over, then you invent your lineage, but yeah, the kid has a prophecy so he's gonna be accepted easier.
Or a better dad. Usually fathers are sources of traumatic backstory or are a mouthpiece for the status quo that a rebel good guy has to overcome. A father motivated by love is kinda rare.
I so especially love how Zahak doesn't just up and fall to evil over nothing and Ahriman has to go through utterly ridiculous lengths to corrupt him, and even then it doesn't fully make Zahak an uncaring bastard, just someone whose sunk too deep with very bad advice from someone actively trying to make him the bad guy.
And that is the point, no one is an actual villain.
@@monarchistheadcrab8819 well besides Ahriman, tho I'm not that well versed on Zoroastiannism so idk but given that its a dualistic religion I can probably guess that Ahriman is basicallyy the embodiment of all bad suff and therefore technically a villain since he is objectively against the meta good
@@rickpervez322 God of Disorder, whereas Ahura Mazda is the God of Order.
@@rickpervez322 well you're right about Ahriman being the ultimate bad guy, but just note that unlike what everybody thinks, zoroastrianism is a monotheistic religion.
@@monarchistheadcrab8819 Depends who you ask.
Early Zorastrianism? It was pretty much Indo-European paganism flavoured with thr Mestopomian beliefs. So it was clearly polytheistic.
Then you get more down the line and it focuses on two EQUAL powers. That one will eventually win in the end. But they are EQUAL on their own. At this point they stop focusing a lot on other gods, but the idea of Lesser Gods (Sepandar Mazda) or Lesser Demon Lords(Diw-ha-yeh Kameleh) does stay around. And the Lesser Gods do get praised in the Zorastrian prayers.
So again not monotheistic.
There is only a certain branch of zorastrianism that is monothestic called Zurvanism that arrived around the Sassanid era, which was heavily influenced by Christianity. Zurvan is Ahura and Ahriman's father, Zurvan in Avestan simply means "time", and old interpretion is it simply means Ahura and Ahrim were borned from time not that a God of Time fathered them. But Zurvanists claim that Zurvan is infact used as a name here and there is an entity, a god of time named Zurvan and they see him as the chief diety not Ahura. And even in Zurvanism, Ahura and Ahriman, Lesser Gods and Lesser Demon Lords are still present.
So to believe Zoarstrianism is purely monotheistic is utterly wrong.
"Can i see if this noble is trustworthy?"
"Role for insight."
*rattle, rolling*
"... Nat 1"
*sigh* this dude seems legit, wise, and honest.
"Cool. What do you need from me?
"I need you to kill your own father. Make a wisdom saving throw."
Isn't this cook the same guy I just threw out?
Roll for perception
2
No he isn't
@coolgreenbug7551 should I trust this dude who says I need to feed my shoulder snakes brains?
Roll a wisdom check
3
Nah he's trustworthy
@lewismartin3430 Secret Secondary Curse: every time Zahak listens to Ahriman, he loses two points of his wisdom score.
@@gus-vanover ...He had any points in it?
"what do you want for dinner?"
"child brains!"
"No!"
"two child's brains!"
"NO!"
Three child brains and a small salad?
“fine then! we won’t eat two child’s brains!”
“thank you! now what do you actually want to eat?”
“SIXTEEN child’s brains!!”
“THAT IS EXPONENTIALLY WORSE”
@@wren_. what if I add a small salad in the head of one of the children who's brains I'm eating?
@@nyotamwuaji6484 "The problem's not the brains, it's the kids!"
Snakes:...Can I have adult brains?
@@anonguy772 but the salad makes everything ok. Right?
I love how Zahak went from “gee wilikers” to “I hope they still think I’m a good king even though I’ve killed 16 of their kids :(“
i do almost feel kinda bad for the guy :( its not like he wanted the snake shoulders
Ah the ol' Anakin problem. No kid has ever had a shifty old man telling them what to do and it ending out fine XD
@@CelestiaLily It worked out great for Luke until the sequels.
@@CelestiaLily true XD
@@ScaleneTR I hear ya. He was a fine guy until snake shoulders and mostly evil influence. Honestly he just want the snake shoulders gone.
"You guys would tell me if I was a bad person, right?"
Now I'm just imagining Zahak and his snake shoulders having heart to hearts, movie nights, a spa day (the snakes have little cucumbers over their eyes)...
I've always wondered if he named the snakes lol
The snakes are eating human brains and
Zahak is eating some meat then Zahak says "Wait a minute, I've been feeding you guys human brains for over a decade yet you haven't disappeared, did that mysterious physician lie? Am I a bad person?"
Zahak wasn't entirely evil, but he sure was pushed into being evil, alongside him being so gullible, it's no wonder he ended up in the situation he was in.
Now if the story wasn't him being pushed into this role of villainy, just imagining him having introspective conversations with his snakes is both very sweet and saddening.... Has he never tried feeding them nice before? That's what I'm wondering
@@janaterbio8010 you mean rice?
@@defensivekobra3873 I meant mice
Funnily enough, I was watching this with a snake draped over my shoulders.
I didn’t go on a murder spree, but the resemblance did make me uncomfortable enough that I moved him to my arm 😁
Did your snake reassure you?
Make sure to feed him his daily amount of brains!
That is adorable.
Aw what kind of snake?
The image I saw when I read this was Voldemort with Nagini draped on his shoulders.
Snakes, also known as Danger Noodles, sometimes called Nope Ropes
But they are adorable;-; why would anyone call them that
Not me with 2 pet sneks hearing this myth
AKA sneks or boop noodles
Or Murder Spagurders
Am I the only one in this guys replies who knows what he is refering to?
Soldier 1: Have you looked at our king lately?
Soldier 2: Yeah.
Soldier 1: He's got Snakes coming out of his shoulders!
Soldier 2: So?
Soldier 1: Are we the Baddies?
😂🤣😂
Soldier 2: "No, we are not. Don't be ridiculous. Now help me drag this innocent person to be sacrific- Oh... Yea I see it."
Soldier 2: Well, depends on your perspective. I heard about this thing from the future call fascism, where literally everybody but yourself is bad.
Soldier 1: Jeez, sounds like something only those white Norsemen will think of. So are we good or bad?
Soldier 2: Let's wait and see what kind of play that Jews prisoner we have on the basement writes before we decide.
"Just because he's part snake doesn't mean that he's a bad guy. Look at King Erichthonius."
to be fair, assuming red didn't leave anything out here, the snake shoulders literally had nothing to do with his quality as a king. The only reason he got them was he hired a new cook who fed him some meat and asked to kiss his shoulders. If anything, the snakes would be a sign of his QUALITY as a king, since, y'know, if my cook asked to kiss my shoulders I don't think my first reaction would be "oh yeah sure go ahead!".
Love how Ahriman had to do a whole bunch of stuff to make Zahak evil despite being empowered and Ahura Mazda had to do ONE THING and let the domino effect take care of the rest
That kind of remind me Palpatine and Anakin for reason
Tolkien would be proud
Honestly, zahak was symbolically one of the best villains I've read about,
he killed his father not because he was evil because he thought his father was an obstacle in his way to glory and power.
The way that evil came to him was from delicious food, too delicious actually, you could say gluttony or maybe just too much dedication to worldly desires,
The serpents only calm down when fed with the brain of young men, the story knows that youngsters are the future of any nation, they have the nature of rebelliousness, and when they are killed the whole nation is killed,
In the end Zahak is not killed because as told his blood is too foul that being drawn would only bring more evil to the earth and he is bound in Damavand the tallest mountain of Iran and will remain alive till as is told he will rise again in the end of times as monster of evil (it wasn't told in the video but in the final battle he actually transforms into a three headed dragon(
so, he becomes Shah Ghidorah
"Nobody good has ever held the title of 'Serpent King'"
So did you guys know that in slavic folklore, snakes and serpents were considered protectors of the household and the hearth and the serpent king was a benevolent entity that rewarded people for treating his subjects with respect and only retaliated in self-defence?
this sounds like a cool i need more
The Nairs of Kerala worship snakes called Nagas especially cobras as protective deities too. More info in wikipedia.
Yeah cus snakes eat mice
Less mice = less disease
Same reason why the British Isles like Barn owls.
@@JP-sm4cs Also same reason ancient Egypt and many other cultures deified cats.
So he dropkicks anyone in self-defense huh? Nice
Another thing that Red didn't mention that makes Kaveh even more baller: Zahak had summoned the great men and elders of every country and all of them had cowed and signed the document when Kaveh busts in. He proceeds to tell them all off while ripping up that document.
So a working class heroe stay truth to the cause while intelectuals and politians signed with the tyrant? This is some marxist fanfict shit!
@@ShinigamiInuyasha777 to be fair, those officials were afraid as fuk (mostly, some probably didn't give a fuk, only interested in keeping their prestige)
HOLY SHIT!!! Where did we go wrong with dealing with rulers, THIS is how it's DONE!
@@liam3284 Yeah but still counys
@@ShinigamiInuyasha777 there was a neo-hippie Marxist communist vegetarian religious sect around Persia through the 5th century, which was large enough that one shah even converted to the religion to gain their support in knocking his nobles down a peg.
Ancient history is confusing but amazing.
My favorite part is the mom handling the prophecy in a way that actually makes sense. Keeping the chosen one safe while you can, but not lying about parts of the prophecy, and minimizing stress by having him wait for the proper timing. I wish all prophecies got handled like this, less people would die.
(edit: I need you to know that when I had to look for this today for one scene I told a friend about, I called it 'Johny Snakeshoulders' in my head)
"We don't kink-shame in this palace." Their next t-shirt slogan.
"We do however have snake-shoulders" must be written on the back, it's just gotta be.
Surely it needs to be an off-shoulder top, rather than a Tee?
Blacksmith : do you know programming?
Zahak : only python ....
LMAO
Everyone who likes is smarter than avrage
Booooo! I love it XD
*Ba-dum-tsh!*
Ha
Fun fact: from an evolutionary perspective snakes are goddamn horrifying, they look a lot like tree branches which made our ancestor hyper vigilant to them and also made them much better at recognising snakes.
Ophidiophobia
The hyperawareness towards snakes is probably the reason they're used so much in mythologies and stories.
Also, a lot of them are venomous and hence disproportionately dangerous for how hard they are to see. Add in how creepy reptiles seem to mammals in a mammal's world and how weird these legless slithery things among walkers are, and you've got a perfect storm for a memorable (and scary) animal.
It may even be one of the reasons why dragons are everywhere, when we evolved there where a couple of creatures to be hardwired to not vibe with which often happen to be the basis voor many dragons: mainly snakes and birds of prey, but also big cats and beasts with horns/hard headware
They’re also why we have tri color vision!
Zahak (Or Zahhak) is also known as 'ضحاک ماردوش', which literally translates to 'Zahhak the Snake Shoulder', so Johnny Snake-shoulders is probably a fairly reasonable name. Also he was known for being 'he who has ten thousand horses' which is probably why his name is used in homest-
Cease.
I KNEW I wasn't the only one who recognized the name from that lol
My dumb self at first, “His name is used in homesteading?”
I feel real dumb but what is Homest
@@Sarah12471 Homestuck
I wish Red went into more detail about how Zahhāk wasn't originally a regular dude with snakes growing out of his shoulders and that was all basically a parody made by Ferdowsi so he didn't get super murdered for heresy.
It's actually a lot more kickass in the original texts from the Avesta.
See, in the Avesta, Johnny Snake Shoulders wasn't just Johnny Snake Shoulders. He was _JOHNATHAN, THREE-HEADED DRAGON ANTICHRIST_ also known as "Aži Dahāka," and that's not a lie. Aži Dahāka is the Persian equivalent of a dragon, known as an Azdahā.
Anyway, it was also stated that when Fereydun struck Aži with his mace, vermin such as rats and snakes spilled from the wound instead of blood, and that the angel told Fereydun not to kill Aži because doing so would overwhelm the world in such vermin.
It's also stated that Aži Dahāka will break free of his prison at the end of the world and devour a third of all humans and livestock before being finally struck down by the ancient Persian hero Kirsāsp.
Ahh!! a man of culture I see
Snakes: *Exist*
Mythology: _I'LL TAKE YOUR ENTIRE STOCK_
Egypt specifically be like
@Shasvin Puvanesvaran depends if you're a Chinese/Japanese/Korean/Vietnamese dragon
@@shanedoesyoutube8001 or Nordic. Because Jörmungandr wasn't all that bad, like 90% neutral
@@brexthompson Egypt was first in line, but the snake myth-sellers weren't taking credit and Egypt only had so much cash actually on hand.
Aztec mythology: How does "God of life and wisdom" sound?
"He wants to kill the evil king *now* but his mom says it's too dangerous to go alone"
Thanks Mom for sparing him from hubris!
Nameless mom mvp
Mom: "It's dangerous to go alone."
Rebel Army: *Appears*
Mom: "...Take this."
For once a Hero's parent who is Not only alive, but also responsible.
and that's how good kings are made
@@anyathepanther7977 Athenian Gasp! She’s Sally Jackson!
“A little slithery, kind of hard to read, broadly inoffensive” a pretty good summary of snake’s honesty
Perhaps Zahhak's rule would have lasted longer if he proposed to Fereydun the option to "Join the Serpent KEEEHNG as FAMILIIIEEEEE!"
TOGETHAAAA WELLL DEVOUR THE VERY GAAAAHHSS
When I ran into him in Elden Ring, I could not stop thinking about this video.
Zahak constantly interacting with the serpents on his shoulders really makes me want to see Red do art of Medusa, she'd be constantly interacting with her hair and it'd be adorable.
Zahak x Medusa crack ship
Does OSP have an Instagram or any other art account where they post all their illustrations of different historical and mythological figures?
@@sidewinder1209 red has designs on Redbubble
@@clutchedbyanangel I actually LOLed, and I don't usually!
@@clutchedbyanangel I ship it
Honestly the part I was most surprised about was the mom actually coming back to pick up the kid from the magical cow. Usually the parents either die or peace out from the story after dropping off the kid
Yep same. I was expecting the mom to die or something
She didn't have the ponytail over the shoulder, so of course she was going to stay in the story.
Not Persian parents😂
They always come back...we even have a hero who was named zal and his dad abounded him on the foot of the mountains because he was born with white hair and he thought the child was not human.
Well our equivalent of Phoenix comes and gets the child to feed to her children but ends up raising him,when he turns 10-12 his dad crushed by guilt comes back and cries over what a horrible parent he was and the bird brings him down and tells him :"don't screw up again."
@@kaspiansea3997 damn.
Persian mythological parents are WAY better than those most other mythos
@@d73w80 yeah... The whole mythology is different to be honest. Like our father vs son story is the only one that the father wins and kills his son.other nations all have the son win and bring in a new era but not ours. He doesn't know him of course and when he finds out he does everything he can to save him although not with success. And the fun part is he tricks his son so he can win. He is old and he can't physically beat him so he cheats.
the "family" and "tradition" are the two most important things in our mythos and that's why no parents ever just give up on their off springs.
I heard a slightly different version of the myth where Zahak was willingly choosing to do bad shit, but the version of just an idiot boy whoopsiedoodles his way into unleashing evil onto humanity and being completely oblivious the whole time is HILARIOUS
I like how the prophecy stated that the king would die to the chosen one, when in reality the people got so impatient that they sped up the prophecy part by recruiting him already
Imagine being so badass that you rip a contract in front of a king with snakes on his shoulders
Zahak: What the hell man, where are my guards? What do I even pay you for?
Guard: You don't pay us
Zahak: What do I let you LIVE for?
I guess the most even-tempered can be set off after 16 funerals...
that smith gave zero fucks XD Eat one of my children? Shame on you, Eat two of- Eat th- ...Aight yea fuck this guy im doing it myself.
@@weldonwin huh I had no idea frieza from DBZ was that old lol
@@shadowking1380 It was that or a TTS reference about Ahriman and murdering stars
“Johnny snake shoulders”
Nothing else, just
“Johnny snake shoulders.”
his name particularly funny since الضحاك means "he who laughs a lot". It's such a strikingly non-threatening name for a demonic king
If that isn't the must 20th century name ever, I don't know what is. It sounds like a good name for a sidekick for Lobo; just picture it: "Dc's Lobo and Johnny Snakeshoulders" That title alone is already a bestseller.
IKR?! 💛💛💛
went to the comment section just for johnny snake shoulders
@@tesso.6193 i mean its less funny when he laughs while eating your brains
"No-one good has ever held the title of Serpent King," Now I just want to write a story of a Serpent King, but he's like the king of hognoses so actually he's a totally chill guy and his subjects are cute timid sausage bois.
So.. Duce Gorgon?
Nagraj from hinduism
This was probably the best retelling of the story I've ever heard, there is just one problem, not to nitpick, but Fereydun's mom is canonically named actually. The 695th verse of the book (if I have counted correctly), says her name and it's repeated several times afterward as well:
فرانك بدش نام و فرخنده بود (first half of the verse)
It pretty much translates to:
Her name was Faranak and she was blessed
So... yeah, her name's canonically Faranak
“Johnny Snake Shoulders”
That’s gotta be a euphemism
For having snakes grow out of your shoulders
Isn't the player character from The Darkness games this?
@@juliakovacs4885 YES omg
Aaaaand now I'm thinking about how uteruses and fallopian tubes look exactly like that, thank you, i hate it.
It's better than Johnny Dicklegs.
"Innocent, guileless, other nice euphemisms for dumb"
I snorted.
Me too 😂
so, basically, a himbo?
I checked out and am now reading the Persian Book of Kings because of this video, and it's amazing.
My favorite detail that Red left out: they held onto the blacksmith's apron as a flag, and every king after that for hundreds of years added more jewels and decorations to it s.t. you couldn't even tell that it was an apron anymore.
Also, I really hope that she eventually gets to Zal and Rudabeh. It's a surprisingly sweet love story given the cultural context in which it was written, and one of the better takes on the starcrossed lovers plot out there.
My favorite part is the battle of Rostam and Esfandyar
Fun fact about the story : the damavand mountain in which they imprisoned the serpent king is actually a real mountain in iran, and it used to be a dormant volcano, so whenever the locals would sense some vibrations or strange sounds coming from the mountain, they would just assume its the serpent king swearing revenge on humankind. Nowadays its just considered a normal mountain that people casually go and climb for fun.
Zahak: "My muscles ache. Send me a veterinarian."
Servant: "Don't you mean a doctor? Why send a vet?"
Zahak: "Because THESE PYTHONS ARE SIIIICK!"
BOYS! BOYS! BOYS!
🤣
The blacksmith had some brass balls to insult Johnny Snake Shoulders to his faces and start building the rebel army right after. Damn dude!
I'm seriously impressed he was able to just walk out with no consequences lol
Seriously, one of the rawest things I've ever heard.
It only toon him 16 sons
@@FrisbeeGorbeh another source I saw said that the blacksmith basically roasted him enough that Zahak started realizing how much a jerk he was, and the blacksmith left while Zahak was all 😲
@@mutantmaster1
Oh that would be beautiful as a way to throw him off and lead to a 3rd act breakdown
Something i need to add
Zahak name actually comes from the word Azhi dahaka which is name of a creature equivalent to Dragon, which in Persian mythology are considered evil and it's not Zahak real name but actually a title given to him after the snakes grew on his shoulders. There is no actual name mentioned for Zahak in Persian mythology but there is another title for when he was still a prince which is beivarasb because he really like horses and had tamed hundreds of them.
Also in myths, Zahak can turn into a three headed dragon
I’m Iranian and I’ve read an english copy of shahnameh and I can confirm that this is how it went, this is a pretty good summary and while it’s kinda dumbed down it’s got all the important parts, also THANK YOU FOR ACKNOWLEDGING THAT THIS NEEDS A MOVIE because it just does, I’ve seen like a million Bollywood movies that are pretty good but I’ve not once even heard Iran or Persia mentioned on TV unless it’s in the same sentence as the word terrorist. So I respect you for making this video, acknowledging that Persian culture exists and not making us sound like the villain in every marvel movie ever. PS you’ve got my sub for this video, and just all your videos in general I’ve seen a lot and they’re awesome.
Imagine being those demons forced to teach that guy how to write. Like "[sigh] Ok, do you want a more symbolic system, one based more on representing syllables, or - hey you know you might want to get a seat, I figure this'll take like a few weeks at least, and, wait do you even know what you need to write WITH? Ugh, ok, get some wood..."
Can you imagine his frustration if he chooses a system that like doesn't fit the language at all.
This is more relatable if you have information about Iranian ancient writing systems
@@quadeevans6484 If I was a demon forced to teach some guy writing, I would absolutely pick the least convenient system possible just to fuck with them.
@@monarchistheadcrab8819 well if you have the info share with the class
@@darksuperganon What's that? Cursive? Okay yeah, you'll definitely want to go the chisel-on-hard-surface route with that one.
"No one good has had the title 'Serpent King'."
And now a hundred viewers have rushed off to write a D&D campaign to resolve that deficiency.
Yo you didnt have to call me out like that.....like what I ever do to you
Or a book
Serpents are a revered medical symbol, we can abuse that for our good serpent king.
Also, people fear doctors wearing masks, we can abuse that, too. Plaugedoctors but snakemasks!
Hey, I'm still on the mountain hermit who talks to the snake shoulders, to be enlighted!
_Good_ we’ll get a wave of good snakey media in a few years
Ahriman: I'm gonna sneak in over decades and repeatedly coax a good boy into a force of absolute EVIIIL!
Ahura Mazda: BAM; prophesy.
Under the rules of this loose description it seems if one side is winning for too long, the other gets a freebie to try to balance things out.
I wonder if that was where Sergei Lukyanenko got that idea in the "Night Watch" books. (He's definitely familiar with the Shahnameh; Rostam shows up as a major character in one of the stories.)
Join the Serpent King as family!
Together we shall devour the very gods!
Zahak, the Basilisk, Apophis, Jormundgander, and Vasuki are ready to receive with open... er... coils.
"My snakes were making the rumblies--"
"Zaaaahhak!"
"That only human brains would satisfy"
"WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?!"
"Oh, I killed my dad and used my authority as king to feed my snake bois some human brains, so that's two things."
This comment needs more flesh dragons
@@kazemizu what.
@@kaboomgaming4255 they said it needed more flesh dragons
@@fantasyshadows3207 what're flesh dragons tho.
"Let's overthrow the tyrant and put this new kid on the throne! He can't be any worse than the last guy."
Said every revolution in history.
"Sure he's got brain eating snakes for shoulders, but how bad can he be?"
@@merrittanimation7721 “Let’s not judge his snake shoulders too harshly. No ones perfect!”
Here comes the new dictator, same as the old dictator.
Actually this trope is dismantled in A Song of Ice and Fire that is why it is one of the best book series
Narrator: He was worse than the last guy.
4:01
YOU'VE ONLY NOTICED JUST *NOW?!?!?*
And now I know where The Darkness games/comics got this weirdly specific Evil Snake Shoulders concept. Granted, those snake shoulders eat human hearts instead of human brains, but other than that they're remarkably identical to the mythological counterpart.
Holy shit youre absolutely right
Snakes in mythology: destructive, scary and world-ending
Snakes in reality: haha my tongue go brrrr
Ever been to Australia?
Do you know Brazil??
Honestly snakes are no more "evil" than any other form of life. They are simply living creatures trying to survive.
Not evil, just highly deadly
mmm slithery lil bois
I'm certain the "give me this movie Hollywood, you cowards" and the ending line are gonna end up in several osp out of context videos
The first one deserves to be on a t-shirt.
Bro. As an Iranian I couldn’t believe my eyes when I read the title of the video. It’s amazing seeing an animated video essay about such a prominent piece of literature in my culture. I literally read the Shahname’s stories as a child. So glad you used your platform to introduce this myth to so many new people. Also I was smiling like an idiot reading all the comments, everyone was so invested in the story 😂. This was beyond excellent to watch!
In a weird way, I kinda feel bad for Zahak. I mean, he was just an innocent kid with his whole life ahead of him, and I feel like he might've had an incredible epic of his own had he not fallen to the literal essence of evil and gone all bloodthirsty. And now he can't even redeem himself and has to stay chained up under a lonely mountain for all eternity with no one but his snakes to keep him company. Fereydun and Kaveh are badasses, but I might've loved seeing Zahak redeemed too.
Yeah, I was like "it's not his fault!"
Yeah, but that's kind of the moral of the story (or one of them at least): you are responsible for your actions, including for not letting yourself get seduced by evil. The moment he was asked to kill his father a giant alarm bell should have gone off in his moral center and he should have hit the brakes.
@@austenhead5303 you do make a good point. It was more than likely a cautionary tale back then.
@@kyrab7914he killed his own father at the beginning!!
Red: “And so ends the tale of Johnny Snakeshoulders.”
Zahak, within his prison: “THAT’S NOT MY NAME!!!”
"It is now. Shut up, Johnny Snakeshoulders."
Zahak: >(
@@redwitch12 “Tonight on CNN, we’re live in the Middle East as an elderly man is tearing through the Taliban, Israeli, and United States like tissue paper, screaming-“
Zahak: “JOHNNY SNAKESHOULDERS ISN’T MY NAME!!!!”
Reporter: “Well, that.”
And thus begins the apocalypse.
@@jayedgerle Reporter 1: "Experts are baffled as to the root cause of this issue."
Reporter 2: "... experts on what?"
Reporter 1: "Just, y'know, experts."
@@redwitch12 Damn, now I gotta write up an CNN interview with Zahak explaining himself, all culminating with a music video rendition of the Ting Tings song (feel free to correct if that’s wrong) “That’s Not My Name”.
@@jayedgerle HEH!
WOOO FINALLY MIDDLE EASTERN MYTH
Is the star sign video not middle eastern
YES, I'VE BEEN WAITING FOR OH SO LONG
@@themannerchannel784 let's be honest we will die before they finish the series
@@Doctor2706i yes all kinds of Asian myths but not too many about West Asia and particularly Arabia the big sandpit peninsula
@@themannerchannel784 that's chinese, which is east asian, not middle eastern ^^
I'm creating a mythology for a story I'm writing and honestly this entire channel has been a godsend for figuring out common themes in mythology to use
"You.... Join the serpent king, as family... and we will devour the very Gods!!!"
And we will devour children's brain TOGETHA
Red: "In real life, snakes are honestly fine."
Australia: "I'm sorry, I didn't catch that. I was too busy dying from this dugite bite."
Hehe... Dugite bite... That rhymes...
Snakes are honestly fine in Australia, too. They're dangerous, sure, but provided you avoid them when you see them and don't go stomping about through the bush, they'll leave you alone.
Ah Australia...
If it can poison, maim, or kill you, you'll find it there.
Yeah but no matter how big the spider or how venomous the snake we don't hate them, we like having them around because they keep the worse things away, the fact that nobody knows what those worse things are only goes to show that they're not here and therefore it's working. So if there was an Australian guy with snakes on his shoulders I reckon we'd vote him in, to keep the worse things away.
There's a children's show called Pepa Pig. It's made in the UK where the spiders are mostly not that dangerous and they did an episode about how spiders aren't that dangerous and you shouldn't be scared of them.
This episode was banned in Australia because Australian spiders are REALLY FUCKING DANGEROUS and airing that episode would have gotten a lot of children killed.
Then again, literally everything in Australia is dangerous, so the snakes have a bit of a case there.
Red: "If there's one title that screams evil, it's 'Serpent King.' Nobody good has ever held the title Serpent King."
Ananta Sesha: *cosmic sad Nagaraja noises*
Also Link, from good mythical morning.
See, now I want to write a story that has a good Serpent King. Sadly... not one of my strong suits. ;-]
@@AskMia411 “You can do it serpent king.”
A lost Persia Tale!?!
There's Jim Morrison, the Lizard King, close cousin to the Serpent King. I'm just putting this out there, it is up to you creative folk to piece the fanfiction together.
You...
Join the Serpent King as family
Together, we will devour the very gods
The tall tale of Zahak of the Mountain doesn't end here; Having shed their skin and become indistinguishable from the common man, Mark Zahaccerberg went on to conquer the world with the ploy of invading the hearts of every man and woman with two opposable thumbs via his magical tablets.
As a Persian man, I used to read these stories in children's storybooks when I was a child. There are many amazing stories like this one in Ferdowsi's Shahnameh. I wish someone would make movies on those someday.
As a lifelong mythology nerd, I'd watch all of them.
That is a dream that I wish would come true one day but until then I will wait
I agree, it would make a fantastic series of movies!
Yes, but you also don't want Hollywood butchering them.
If they're as epic as this story of the Serpent King, they absolutely deserve to be made into movies.
"...and he starts to worry that he might be a bad king.
No. Whaaat? No-o!"
This is why I love this channel 😂
That was an overly sarcastic response
Yeah I chuckle at that a bit too😂
I am sad I've never heard of this kickass myth before. And Zahak fell victim to one of the classic blunders. The most famous of which is never start a land war in Asia, but only slightly less known is don't try to kill the prophecy child.
Hmm, the name Zahak is interesting because in Bionicle, there is a character named *Zaktan* who's nickname is literally "The Snake". It's too similar to be a coincidence, Zahak has to have been the inspiration.
This story is full of metaphors, for one: eating people's "brains" to stay in power, is for denying people the ability to think.
You're a smart one, aren'tcha?
Did they even know the brain was the center of thought back then?
@@tonyhakston536 Yes.
Where have I heard that one before...
@@tonyhakston536 i mean, it's the place we seem to "be" (behind the eyes)
Humanity: Sakes are evil and tempt people.
Also Humanity: Snek nose go boop
Evolution: Nearly 130 million years of evolution perfected this highly efficient predator
Humanity: Boop Noodles
You'll find that those are two different parts of humanity. We are a diverse and varied people.
If FromSoftware ever explored eastern-themes again I'd LOVE to see them do a Dark Persian fantasy title. "The Serpent King" itself sounds like a boss lol
"Does He Know? 😏"
fun fact, iam persian and have read the story of zahak in farsi. red pretty much nails this video. just one thing though, the J in Jamshid is not pronounced like the J in jarl, but rather like the J in job. also a fun fact, lots of these names(not all, but most of them) are still common persian names, like Jamshid, Kaveh, Fereydon. and ....
Serpent King sounds like a nightmare for a certain nutcracker character
There's always a bigger fish.
@Anna Fuerst A collection of rats tied together by their tails?
@@goodpol5022 not the real life rat king
@@josephmitchell6077 We weren’t expecting special forces.
@@corrat4866 I don’t see how that quote fits
That blacksmith is badass-
He literally started a whole rebellion-
(after letting 16 of his children have their brains eaten.) On that note, wasn't the brain thing supposed to get rid of the snakes? I feel like if a witch doctor told you to drink lemonade to fix your broken leg, you would stop doing it and realize it was a lie after chugging a gallon a day for the past several years.
@@robonator2945
Honestly if no other options would work I would keep drinking lemonade.
@@ItsHimBro which also didn't work... like, observably, no effect.
I agree with red that we need a movie lol
@@robonator2945 it wasn't supposed to make them disappear, just calm them down so they would leave him alone. Otherwise snake bites 24/7
Red: "So end the tumultuous tale of johnny snakeshoulders"
Me: "If you make johnny snakeshoulders a t-shirt i would buy it"
but only if it had holes for the snakes
Hell yeah
Definitely needs the holes as Comrade Windowsill said, or little 2d snake 'streamers' on the shoulders lol
I love that the main hero to get thing moving again is just some random blacksmith. If this was a D&D session, it feels like the PCs didn't want to do anything to advance the plot, so he made a random NPC move the plot for them. I kind of love it though! We need more stories where the regular people in the background get to do cool shit and help out.
That fucking Blacksmith has my ultimate respect like holy crap he had so many powermoves in the span of a few minutes
They didn't mention, how that apron banner, got covered in jewels and became a sacred treasure of Persia
I love how Zahak has a "World's Best Shah" mug that he lets his snake shoulders drink out of.
Zahak is doing all this evil stuff and all I can remember is the fact that this was the kid who said gee wilikers
and got duped into killing his dad in like he first 5 minutes of meeting an evil deity.
Imagine Ahriman one day see young Zahak and say" I will make that boy evilest guy exist"
And we have another candidate for the "ancient king is imprisioned/ sleeps in a mountain, waiting fot his return" trope 😅
"Kiss the king's shoulders" sounds like a metaphor for topping the king
Thank you for adding this to my lexicon of kink metaphors.
Ha that king is getting pegged-
@@cherrybomb1130 no. Pegging is when a woman uses a str@p on. Red CLEARLY said the evil god took the form of a young man chef.
@@gibberishname
"Oh? Y-yeah? Being a chef is a womans job so the male chef actually is a FEMALE chef thus the pegging"
-Brought to you from the 1950's
@@gibberishname Theoretically speaking, couldn't a man use a strap-on too? It'd be redundant, sure, but could it not be done?
"In real life, snakes are honestly fine"
Me: "wait, is this some sort of worldly joke that I'm too brazilian to understand?"
Nature's rodent control sometimes bird control
@@JoiIsakYT uh... didn't... didn't cats already fulfilled that purpose? Or did Mother Nature just wanna be more creative in outsourcing?
Also as an Australian I strongly disagree with the statement, snakes are not fine and need to stay the heck away from me.
@@claremiller9979 hilariously, your snakes are super venomous but pretty chill, so just, you know, don't touch them. And their fangs are short, so trouser legs will foil their bite.
As a pinoy who lives next to a farm, this sentiment is hilariously stupid lol.
“Nobody good has ever held the title ‘Serpent King’”
Elden Ring community: *silent affirmation*
6:29 Because I'm guessing that murder would render this all pointless as it would still count as an evil action and would tip the world in favour of the evil guy who started the whole mess.
In zoroastrianism, death is viewed as one of those horrible thing created by Angra Mainyu.
Zoroastrianism: “Good things are GOOD. Bad things are BAD.”
I bet college students in ancient Persia took religion
That's probably technically correct.
Jamshid disagrees.
A big weakness of Zoroastrianism was actually that in the ancient times it wasn't highly codified in a unified text the same way as, say, the Bible or the Quran would be. This made it harder to spread to others to convert willingly, and even when they did there could be significant local differences in thought, and harder to defend and hold on to once it was no longer the ruling class' religion and the influential clergy was cast down.
Yeah. Contrast that to nowadays where everything is subjective and every statement is speculation until proven otherwise...
This is not entirely correct. While Zoroastrianism did indeed possess a wide variety of schools (Cashtag), the Sasanian State codified many of them and effectively created a Zoroastrian orthodoxy. The steady waning of Zoroastrianism had far less to do with a lack of codification and much more to do with thousands of years as a non-privileged religion often subjected to extreme persecution during the later Safavid, Qajar, Afsharid and indeed Pahlavi dynasties.
“GIVE ME THIS MOVIE HOLLYWOOD, YOU COWARDS!!”
Mood
It's better that they don't. They have a habit of butchering stories from various cultures to get more mass appeal and more importantly appeal to them specifically.
Hell no giving up our many hundred years old myth to them so they can ruin it?! Heck they gonna make Rostam black or Sohrab gay also they always talk shit about us in their movies
I'm a Brit so don't have much sin in this race, but I agree that Hollywood would likely ruin it - I don't want Gerald Bulter cast in this story! (no offence to the guy, but perfect example of the nonsensical white-wash casting that still happens far too much)
What we need is a Hollywood budget for a more Persian(/mixed International?) production.. I have to confess I've only seen a handful of Iranian films, and have no idea what they can do in terms fx/cgi, which is why I suggest it might need a bit of help from another country. I hope my ignorance isn't offensive - I don't want to imply a lack of ability, I just think of Iranian film being more akin to the British industry of my teens, which was all about period dramas and romcoms and couldn't compete with Hollywood on the big budget/action stuff
@@helenl3193 yeah Iranian movies suck I agree but not all of them are rom coms and dramas we have a bunch of good stuff like "separation of Nader and Simin" that won an Oscar and our good actors have so much unused potential if given a chance they will be as good as other Hollywood actors
@@helenl3193 and plus thanks to the regim of Iran the world hates us so that may never happen
As an Iranian, I like how you narrate this in a funny way. And I approve of calling him Johnny snakeshoulders, too!
5:06 I love the fact that Johnny Snakeshoulders has a mug that says world’s best Shah
“Nobody good has ever been called Serpent King” - pretty sure there are some “Nagarajas” in Hindu and Buddhist tradition that would like a word
Weren't they all corrupted later on...?
Vampire: the Masquerade fans everywhere: "Probably not the ones I’m thinking about..."
@@midnight8341 Nope. The Nagarajas are respected in literally every Hindu text and get an entire day dedicated to worshipping them. Kinda what happens when you live in a land of 20 ft cobras
Are you talking about 'Vishnu' (blue boy with a gazillion heads and protector of the earth) who sits in a sort of throne of 7 giant snakes?
@@hemant4906 Nope. Vishnu is on a completely different level
"Give me this movie, Hollywood, you COWARDS!"
Greatest quote ever.
3:17 That poor soul with the scissors is not getting paid enough for their job.
Every now and then, I gotta hear the tale of Johnny Snake Shoulders again.
"We don't kink shame in this palace"