A culebra (Spanish for “snake”) is more a way of presenting cigars than a single cigar. Three long, thin panatela-style cigars are twisted around each other while the leaf is still moist, and then tied so they hold the braided shape. You untie them and smoke them one at a time. They have a wavy shape, which is intended.
The usual story is that the shape comes from the cigars that nineteenth-century Cuban rollers were allowed to take home each day, twisted together so they could be told apart from the factory’s stock. This is a traditional story rather than a confirmed fact. Sizes vary by maker: Habanos lists its Partagás Culebras at 146 mm (about 5¾ inches) with a 39 ring gauge, and New World culebras are usually similarly thin and of medium length.
The twisted shape does not change the tobacco. Each cigar still needs a clean cut of the cap and an even light. It is an unusual size (vitola), but it is not a figurado in the sense of a tapered cigar.