The books now known as the Corpus Hermeticum are part of a renaissance of syncretistic and intellectualized pagan thought that took place around the second century.
Other examples of this cultural moment include Neoplatonist philosophy, the Chaldaean Oracles, late Orphic and Pythagorean literature, as well as much of Gnosticism.
The corpus of Hermetica, the category of popular Late Antique literature purporting to contain secret wisdom, and generally attributed to Hermes Trismegistus, "thrice-great Hermes", a syncretism of the Greek god Hermes and the Egyptian Thoth, is by 300 essentially complete.
The hieroglyphic-based cursive script of Egyptian Demotic gives way around the same time to Coptic, written in an alphabet based on Greek and comprising many dialects.
