A Strong Man With a Serpent’s Tail, on a Pale Horse

A muscular warrior riding a pale horse, the man’s lower body shifts into a serpent’s tail, coiling around the animal’s flank. He carries a sword, often depicted with a smaller, struggling humanoid figure beneath him—either trampled or tormented. The image is one of raw, aggressive power, half-human, half-reptilian, and entirely without pity. The pale horse suggests death or the underworld, while the serpent tail links the figure to chthonic and magical forces.

Position on the Tree of Life

This image corresponds to the 20th Path of the Tree of Life, the path that connects Yesod (The Foundation) to Malkuth (The Kingdom). Yesod is the sphere of the Moon, dreams, subconscious imagery, and the astral plane. The path from Yesod to Malkuth represents the final descent of astral force into physical reality, a passage often guarded by distorted, monstrous, or seemingly hostile images—the raw material of the unconscious before it is shaped into everyday experience. This “strong man with a serpent’s tail” is one such guardian figure, embodying the aggressive, untamed aspect of the astral light as it pours into matter.

Astrological and Planetary Correspondence

The image does not have a direct planetary or zodiacal assignment in the primary 777 schema for this row, but its affiliations can be inferred from the path. The 20th Path is governed by the Hebrew letter Kaph (Crown, Palm), and the astrological correspondence of Kaph is Jupiter. Yet the image here is martial and cruel, not beneficent—this is Jupiter’s “shadow” aspect when the power of expansion and kingship is expressed without mercy. The pale horse is the steed of death (the fourth horseman of the Apocalypse), and the serpent tail evokes the primal earth-force (the serpent of Genesis or the Kundalini) twisted into a weapon.

Historical Context

This precise description originates from the Ars Goetia, the first book of The Lesser Key of Solomon (17th century). There, the demon Bileth (also spelled Byleth or Bilet) is described as: “a terrible King and terrible, he rides upon a pale horse, preceded by trumpets and musicians playing all kinds of instruments. When he appears, men tremble. He carries a lance and a banner. He has a serpent’s tail.” The Goetia presents Bileth as a powerful infernal ruler, commanding legions of spirits, and his nature is one of fury and domination, said to incite love and lust in those who summon him (though the summoner must take great care to avoid his wrath).

Mediaeval grimoires such as the Munich Manual of Demonic Magic (15th century) and Johann Weyer’s Pseudomonarchia Daemonum (1563) contain similar entries: Byleth is a great king, preceded by musicians, who appears with a serpent’s tail and a terror-inspiring demeanor. Weyer notes that Solomon himself confined Byleth in a crystal vessel because of his dangerous power. The image thus carries layers of Solomonic tradition—the bound demon, the controlled fury—and also resonates with the pale horse of Revelation 6:8, whose rider is Death (or Hades).

In the Liber 777 schema, this image appears in a sequence of “magical images” for the Paths 15–29, many of which are drawn from the Goetia (Path 15: “Like Agares”; Path 19: “A knight with a lance and banner, with a serpent”). The present image has been stripped of the musicians and the banner, focusing only on the man, the serpent tail, and the pale horse—a more primal and less courtly version of the demon. This reduction emphasizes the essential terror of the figure: a fusion of human ferocity, chthonic reptile, and the steed of death.

In Liber 777

At the 20th step of Column CLIX (Magical Images of the Sephiroth), Liber 777 places this stark description: “A strong man with a serpent’s tail, on a pale horse.” It is one of the “demonic” or “Qliphoth” imagery associated with the path between Yesod and Malkuth. The figure stands as the archetype of the raw, unbalanced power of the astral plane—the “horror at the threshold” that appears to the initiate before the airy illusions of Yesod are refined into stable physical existence. He is a gatekeeper, half-human and half-monster, mounted on the color of famine and death, his serpent tail signifying the coiled life-force that must be confronted and mastered.