Historical (in)accuracy and linguistic archaism in Daniel 5

Abstract

Daniel 5 contains a number of historical inaccuracies, most glaringly the identification of Nebuchadnezzar as Belshazzar’s father. This article argues that all mentions of Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel 5 may be secondary, suggesting that the oldest version of the text could have been written soon after the Neo-Babylonian period. The queen’s speech in vv. 10-12 contains a number of archaic linguistic features which may support such an early dating. These are the use of a morphologically distinct jussive, the use of two perfects in the expression 'she spoke, saying', and the use of infinitives without a preceding preposition.