Divine names in the Derveni papyrus and Mesopotamian hermeneutics

Abstract

The author of the Derveni papyrus makes wide use of etymologies of divine names to interpret an Orphic theogony. With the help of these etymologies, he links episodes of the Orphic theogony with a philosophical model of the evolution of the cosmos. In this article, I argue that the techniqu es used by the Derveni author for the analysis of divine names are related to Meso potamian hermeneutical and theological traditions that go back to the end of the second millennium BCE, but were still alive in the fourth century BCE when the text of the papyrus was presumably composed. I compare the interpretative strategies of the Derveni author with those of Assyrian and Babylonian scholars as found in Tablets VI and VII of Enūma eliš, in certain Akkadian commentaries, and cuneiform god-lists to show that there is a similar system of beliefs in the text compared.