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The text is ascribed to the second-century satirist Lucian of Samosata in all the manuscripts that carry it, but the ascription has been challenged for most of the last four hundred years of the text’s history. The authorship question is more than a matter of literary pigeon-holing; it is at the center of the text’s interpretation. Lucian sets up his literary persona as a provocateur, a foe of fraud and pretension; mythological burlesque and literary parody are two of his staples. If the text were his, it would be yet more demonstration of the versatility, verve, and wit we know were his – but would be a blow for those who wish to use the text in any sense as a historical source. Now, I believe that the text is genuinely Lucian’s (Lightfoot 2003: 184–208). It is quite easy to show that it lies within the range of his literary interests, and I detect affinities with his particular way of realizing the author and dialect that is being imitated here (below). The days of naïve and uncritical reading, when DDS (or Philo of Byblos) could be quarried without methodological angst as a religious-historical source, are long gone; on the other hand, it is also possible to err in the opposite direction, to be determined to find laughter where a more subtle effect is intended. The uncertainty of exactly where DDS is located in between these poles is why it remains a controversial and deeply interesting text.