Caduceus
Hermes' herald's staff, first described as a rod wrapped with fillets or ribbons and only later twined with serpents; it charmed mortals and spirits and led the souls of the dead to the underworld. In the Homeric Hymn to Hermes the god trades it for his newly invented lyre, and in later art it appears winged and entwined with two snakes. Through the Romans it became the sign of peace, commerce, and the herald's craft, and it survives today as a symbol of commerce and of the medical profession, though the rod of Asclepius is the older emblem of healing.