INTRODUCTION: THE DEBATE OVER THE RELIGIOUS CONTEXT OF THE LEAVES

When the first of the gold leaves, that of Petelia, was published in 1836, the studies on the history of religion considered the existence of Orphism a well-established fact, which led that leaf to be interpreted as Orphic, just as happened with the other gold leaves which appeared in subsequent years.

The hypercritical skeptical reaction started by Wilamowitz questioned the Orphic character of these documents, and the authority of the illustrious German philologist meant that the issue was left aside for many years. However, not even in the most skeptical times have the leaves been convincingly assigned to another known religious movement, and it has become usual to call them “Orphic” with resigned inverted commas.

There has been one attempt, by Pugliese Carratelli, to distinguish two types of leaves which would come from two different religious contexts:

1. (a) Those in which Mnemosyne gives instructions based on memory and the recognition formula “I am a son of Earth and starry Heaven.” In those leaves there are no allusions to the divine status of the deceased, nor are Persephone, Eucles, Eubuleus and the other immortal gods mentioned, but only the “king of the Underworld”. The aim of the mystai is to go through “the sacred way over which the other mystai and bakkhoi go forward in glory.” Pugliese Carratelli calls these leaves “Mnemosynial” and thinks they are Pythagorean.

2. […]