serpent's tongue
Reptile's sensory organ
Serpent's tongue refers to the forked tongue of a snake, which flicks to sense its environment.
Figuratively, it describes deceitful or venomous speech—someone with a serpent's tongue speaks with cunning malice: She had a serpent's tongue, spreading lies wherever she went.
The image draws on the biblical serpent who deceived Eve.
- Jacobson's organChemical-sensing nasal structure
- sense organStructure detecting environmental stimuli
- snakeLimbless scaled reptile
- guileSly, strategic dishonesty
- ouroborosSelf-consuming serpent emblem
cunning · venom · temptation · Garden of Eden · malice · rhetoric · duplicity · treachery · eloquence · basilisk · Eden · Medusa · persuasion · deception · viper · hissing · split · scales
serpent's tonguestraight talk
Honest, direct communication
candor · honesty · truthfulness · sincerity · forthrightness
serpent's tonguekind words
silver tongue · blessing · benediction · encouragement · honeyed words
serpent's tonguelamb's ear
Soft-leaved ground cover
angel's trumpet · elephant ear · mother-in-law's tongue · Venus flytrap