In Greek mythology, the Rod of Asclepius known as the Staff of Aesculapius and as the asklepian, is a serpent-entwined rod wielded by the Greek god Asclepius, a deity associated with healing and medicine. The symbol has continued to be used in modern times, where it is associated with medicine and health care, yet confused with the staff of the god Hermes, the caduceus. Theories have been proposed about the Greek origin of its implications; the Rod of Asclepius takes its name from the Greek god Asclepius, a deity associated with healing and medicinal arts in Greek mythology. Asclepius' attributes, the snake and the staff, sometimes depicted separately in antiquity, are combined in this symbol; the most famous temple of Asclepius was at Epidaurus in north-eastern Peloponnese. Another famous healing temple was located on the island of Kos, where Hippocrates, the legendary "father of medicine", may have begun his career. Other asclepieia were situated in Trikala and Pergamum in Asia. In honor of Asclepius, a particular type of non-venomous snake was used in healing rituals, these snakes – the Aesculapian snakes – crawled around on the floor in dormitories where the sick and injured slept.

These snakes were introduced at the founding of each new temple of Asclepius throughout the classical world. From about 300 BCE onwards, the cult of Asclepius grew popular and pilgrims flocked to his healing temples to be cured of their ills. Ritual purification would be followed by offerings or sacrifices to the god, the supplicant would spend the night in the holiest part of the sanctuary – the abaton. Any dreams or visions would be reported to a priest who would prescribe the appropriate therapy by a process of interpretation; some healing temples used sacred dogs to lick the wounds of sick petitioners. The original Hippocratic Oath began with the invocation "I swear by Apollo the Physician and by Asclepius and by Hygieia and Panacea and by all the gods..."The serpent and the staff appear to have been separate symbols that were combined at some point in the development of the Asclepian cult. The significance of the serpent has been interpreted in many ways; the ambiguity of the serpent as a symbol, the contradictions it is thought to represent, reflect the ambiguity of the use of drugs, which can help or harm, as reflected in the meaning of the term pharmakon, which meant "drug", "medicine", "poison" in ancient Greek.

Products deriving from the bodies of snakes were known to have medicinal properties in ancient times, in ancient Greece, at least some were aware that snake venom that might be fatal if it entered the bloodstream could be imbibed. Snake venom appears to have been'prescribed' in some cases as a form of therapy; the staff has been variously interpreted. One view is that it, like the serpent, "conveyed notions of resurrection and healing", while another is that the staff was a walking stick associated with itinerant physicians. Cornutus, a Greek philosopher active in the first century CE, in the Theologiae Graecae Compendium offers a view of the significance of both snake and staff: Asclepius derived his name from healing soothingly and from deferring the withering that comes with death. For this reason, they give him a serpent as an attribute, indicating that those who avail themselves of medical science undergo a process similar to the serpent in that they, as it were, grow young again after illnesses and slough off old age.

The staff seems to be a symbol of some similar thing. For by means of this it is set before our minds that unless we are supported by such inventions as these, in so far as falling continually into sickness is concerned, stumbling along we would fall sooner than necessary. In any case, the two symbols merged in antiquity as representations of the snake coiled about the staff are common, it has been claimed that the snake wrapped around the staff was a species of rat snake, Elaphe longissima, the Aesculapian snake. Some commentators have interpreted the symbol as a direct representation of traditional treatment of dracunculiasis, the Guinea worm disease; the worm emerges from painful ulcerous blisters. The blisters burn, causing the patient to immerse the affected area in water to soothe it; the worm senses the temperature discharges its larvae into the water. The traditional treatment was to pull the worm out of the wound over a period of hours to weeks and wind it around a stick; the modern treatment may replace the stick with a piece of sterile gauze, but is otherwise identical.

Additionally, in the biblical Book of Numbers, the Nehushtan was a bronze serpent on a pole which God told Moses to erect in order to protect the Israelites who saw it from dying from the bites of the "fiery serpents", which God had sent to punish them for speaking against Him and Moses. King Hezekiah instituted a religious iconoclastic reform and destroyed "the brazen serpent that Moses had made. Many bible students have made the connection between the Rod of Asclepius and the Nehustan, where th

Events from the year 1778 in Great Britain. Monarch – George III Prime Minister – Frederick North, Lord North Parliament – 14th 18 January – the third Pacific expedition of James Cook, with ships HMS Resolution and HMS Discovery, first views Oahu Kauai in the Hawaiian Islands, which he names the "Sandwich Islands". 6 February – American Revolutionary War: Britain declares war on France for aiding the Americans. 23 April – American Revolutionary War: John Paul Jones in USS Ranger raids Whitehaven, with limited effect. 24 April – American Revolutionary War: North Channel Naval Duel – John Paul Jones in USS Ranger captures HMS Drake in the North Channel. May – HMS Victory is commissioned and remains in active service for the following 32 years, most notably at the Battle of Trafalgar. 28 May–11 November – American Revolutionary War: In response to the threat of invasion from France, major militia camps are set up at Coxheath Common in Kent and Warley Common near Brentwood, Essex. 16 June – American Revolutionary War: Spain declares war on Britain.

28 June – American Revolutionary War: the Battle of Monmouth takes place in Monmouth, New Jersey. 3 July – American Revolutionary War: the Wyoming Valley battle and massacre takes place near Wilkes-Barre, ending in a defeat of the local colonists. 10 July – American Revolutionary War: Louis XVI of France declares war on Great Britain. 27 July – American Revolutionary War: First Battle of Ushant – British and French fleets fight to a standoff. September – first St. Leger Stakes horse race held under this name and at its continuing location, Town Moor, Doncaster; the winner is Hollandoise. 7 September – American Revolutionary War: French invasion of Dominica captures the British fort there before the latter is aware that France has entered the war in the Franco-American alliance. 26 November – in the Hawaiian Islands, James Cook becomes the first European to discover Maui. American Revolutionary War 1775–1783 First Anglo-Maratha War 1777–1783 Papists Act is the first to provide a measure of Catholic Relief.

Lord Mansfield decides the landmark case of Da Costa v Jones in English contract law, in relation to the presumption of good faith. Joseph Bramah invents a type of flush toilet. Flint & Clark, the predecessors of Debenhams, begin trading as drapers in London. Fanny Burney's novel Evelina published. Thomas West's A Guide to the Lakes published. 19 March – Edward Pakenham, general 10 April – William Hazlitt, essayist 6 May – Henry Phillpotts, Bishop of Exeter 18 May Charles William Vane, 3rd Marquess of Londonderry, politician Andrew Ure and writer 7 June – Beau Brummell, arbiter of fashion 19 September – Henry Peter Brougham, Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain 25 November Joseph Lancaster, Quaker educationist Mary Anne Schimmelpenninck, Christian writer 17 December – Humphry Davy, chemist 18 December – Joseph Grimaldi, clown 5 March – Thomas Augustine Arne, composer 22 April – James Hargreaves, weaver and inventor 11 May – William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom 16 May – Robert Darcy, 4th Earl of Holderness and politician 12 August – Peregrine Bertie, 3rd Duke of Ancaster and Kesteven and politician Annual Register...1778, London: J. Dodsley, 1786

Stephen Giles is a Canadian sprint canoeist who competed from the early 1990s to the mid 2000s. Competing in four Summer Olympics, he won the bronze in the C-1 1000 m event at Sydney in 2000. Giles was born in New Brunswick, he began canoeing at age eight at the Orenda Racing Canoe Club in Nova Scotia. He was a member of the Canadian national team for fifteen years, including eleven senior world championships, he was inducted into the Nova Scotia Sport Hall of Fame in 2012. He was adept at both 1000 m early in his career, his best races came in the C-1 1000 m event in his career, earning the world championship gold medal in 1998 at Szeged, Hungary. In the same event, he won a bronze medal at the 2000 Summer Olympics, a bronze medal at the 2002 World Championships in Seville, Spain, he won a bronze medal at the 1993 world championships in Copenhagen, Denmark, in the men's C-1 500 m event, at the 1989 Junior World Championships in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. Notable contemporaries in the C-1 included Andreas Dittmer, Martin Doktor, Maxim Opalev.

Giles is part of a long line of successful Canadian paddlers in the C-1 discipline including Frank Amyot, John Wood, Larry Cain. Since Giles' retirement in 2004, the tradition has been taken up by fellow Nova Scotian Richard Dalton, Thomas Hall, Mark Oldershaw. Giles holds Bachelor of Science and Bachelor of Engineering degrees from Dalhousie University, as well as an honorary Doctor of Laws, he completed his Master of Business Administration degree at Saint Mary's University in 2011. He works at EastLink in Halifax, Nova Scotia, he was married in 1997. He and wife Angela have a daughter, a son, Duncan. In 2018 he was named one of the greatest 15 athletes in Nova Scotia's history. In the 2004 Summer Olympics, Giles competed in the C-1 1000 m event, he finished second in his initial heat, advancing to the semifinal with a time of 3:52.451. Giles won his semifinal with a time of 3:51.720. There, he placed fifth at 3:51.457. For the 2009 ICF Canoe Sprint World Championships in neighboring Dartmouth, Giles served as Chair of Competition.

Committee chairs of the 2009 ICF Canoe Sprint World Championships in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, Canada featuring Giles. - accessed January 4, 2009. ICF medalists for Olympic and World Championships – Part 1: flatwater: 1936–2007 at WebCite. Additional archives: Wayback Machine. ICF medalists for Olympic and World Championships – Part 2: rest of flatwater and remaining canoeing disciplines: 1936–2007 at WebCite Sports-reference.com profile Steve Giles, inductee in Nova Scotia Sport Hall of Fame