King James I of England, who reigned in the 1600s, once referred to Ophiuchus as "a mediciner, after made a god," because the serpent-bearer was often identified with Aesculapius, who, in Greek ...

Upon its discovery in 2018, it was nicknamed Apep, after the ancient Egyptian serpent god of chaos and destruction, as its writhing pattern of shed dust resembles a snake eating its own tail.