Sorry to possibly revive a dead-post ... but I saw this and got a good kick out of it.

But in my opinion, this has to be of rumor, JK Rowling had no knowledge of snakes and probably didn't care. But more importantly then that the original quote starting this rumor could not have even come from jk herself.

http://thechive.com/2011/11/16/daily...ump-dar-36-14/

^^ see up in the original post, jk says that Nagini is the original snake from the first book which she calls "the philosophers stone"
... I'm no Harry Potter nerd but ... isn't the first book "the sorcerer's stone?

if JK Rowling is messing up the titles to her own books ... well ...