An arginine esterase was purified from the venom of Vipera lebetina by gel filtration on Sephadex G-100 and by affinity and DEAE-cellulose chromatography. The enzyme has a mol. wt of 52,500 and pI approximately 3. It is a glycoprotein containing 23% of neutral sugars, and has extremely high thermostability. The esterase activity is inhibited by diisopropylfluorophosphate (DFP) and phenylmethylsulfonyl fluoride (PMSF). The Km and kcat values are for alpha-N-benzoyl-L-arginine ethyl ester (BAEE) 7.7 x 10(-5) M and 43.8 sec-1, for p-tosyl-L-arginine methyl ester (TAME) 3.6 x 10(-4) M and 39.8 sec-1 (pH 8.5, 25 degrees C, and for alpha-N-benzoyl-DL-arginine-4-nitroanilide (BAPNA) 1.8 x 10(-4) M and 0.94 sec-1 (pH 8.3, 25 degrees C), respectively. Lysine esters are not hydrolyzed. The enzyme has weak caseinolytic activity and hydrolyzes glucagon at the sites Lys12-Tyr13, Arg17-Arg18 and Arg18-Ala19. In fibrinogen it cleaves B beta-chain first and later also the A alpha-chain.