Ireland is famous for many things: green hills, rainy days, and the story of St. Patrick. One of the best-known tales says that Patrick drove every snake off the island. And it's true that you won't find a wild snake in an Irish field today. So did the saint really do it?
The honest answer is no, because there were never any snakes to banish. Snakes simply never made it to Ireland. After the last Ice Age, Ireland was cut off from Britain and mainland Europe by rising seas before snakes moved back north. Without a land route, they couldn't get there.
The Ice Age Explanation
During the last Ice Age, much of northern Europe was far too cold for reptiles like snakes. As the ice melted, plants and animals slowly spread north again. But melting ice also raised sea levels.
Ireland has been isolated from the European mainland by rising seas since about 14,000 BC. It lost its land connection to Britain before snakes had worked their way back north. By the time they might have arrived, there was water in the way.
That isolation shows up in other animals too. Only 27 kinds of land mammals, counting bats, are native to Ireland. Even reptiles in general are scarce. The country has just one native land reptile, the viviparous lizard, which is commonly seen in places like the Wicklow Mountains.
No Snakes in the Fossils, Either
Scientists have checked. Nigel Monaghan, keeper of natural history at the National Museum of Ireland in Dublin, searched extensively through Irish fossil collections and records. His conclusion: "At no time has there ever been any suggestion of snakes in Ireland, so there was nothing for St. Patrick to banish."
People noticed the lack of snakes long before Patrick's legend took shape. As early as the third century, a Roman writer named Gaius Julius Solinus noted that Ireland was a land without snakes.
How the Legend Grew
So where did the St. Patrick story come from? Interestingly, the oldest tale of an Irish saint banishing snakes isn't about Patrick at all. It appears in a life of Saint Columba written in the late 600s or early 700s.
The earliest writing about Patrick doing it comes from Jocelyn of Furness in the late 12th century. He wrote that Patrick chased the snakes into the sea after they attacked him while he was fasting on a mountain. Not long after, the writer Gerald of Wales repeated the story, though he doubted it was true.
Ireland's Other Cold-Blooded Locals
Ireland isn't completely without scaly or slimy creatures. Slowworms, which look a lot like snakes but are actually legless lizards, live in parts of the Burren in County Clare. They aren't native, though, and were probably brought in during the 1970s. Elsewhere in Europe, where they are native, these harmless creatures go by colorful nicknames like blindworm and deaf adder, which hasn't helped their snake-like reputation one bit.
The island also has three amphibians: a frog, the smooth newt, and the natterjack toad. Out at sea, five kinds of sea turtles regularly visit the west coast, though they very rarely come ashore.
So this St. Patrick's Day, feel free to enjoy the legend. Just know that the real hero of the story is the Irish Sea, which quietly kept the snakes away for thousands of years.
