Animistic snake worship was known in India long before the advent of the Aryans. As in present time, the early inhabitants had to face continuous encounters with deadly snakes infesting forests and marshy grounds. They were overwhelmed with the incomprehensible terror of sudden death and could think of no better way to relieve themselves from that fear than appeasement and veneration. On the other hand, snakes seeking shelter from the rains in houses and stables indicated the beginning of the monsoons and thus of the fertile season and fertility in general, hence they were worshipped mainly by women. Their habit to live under the earth related them to the underworld ancestors who were accordingly venerated in the form of snakes.
Snake worship in a kind of combined animistic-Hindu form is alive to the present day almost everywhere in India, and is particularly pronounced in South India. Votive steles with snake images are often erected below trees because people believe that the dwellings of the snakes are situated underneath the roots. The Naga (skt. naga – snake) is usually not the snake in general but the cobra, raised to the rank of a divine being.
In Tamil Nadu, a peculiar custom, called naga-pratishta, is known for barren women. A stone image of a snake is first submersed in a spring or pond for a certain time to be impregnated with the mysterious power of the snakes living there. Then the barren woman circumambulates the Ashvatta tree (ficus religiosa) and has the snake stone established under the tree, or it is lined up with others in the precincts of a temple. From: Waltraud Ganguly, “Snake earrings of India”
Women with those snake earrings are displayed in my gallery: Pambadam - Snake earrings in Tamil Nadu https://pbase.com/neuenhofer/pambadam_snake_earrings_in_tamil_nadu Have a full preview of my book (120 pages) in English: and in German: