On the Name 'Karpokrates'

I know the way scholars work - because the Church Fathers say there was someone named 'Carpocrates' there must have been 'Carpocratians.' I am not so sure. The most obvious explanation for the name 'Carpocrates' is that it is a corruption of Harpocrates which is an Egyptian name which means Horus-the-Christ (Har-pa-khered).

Yet if Carpocrates was a corruption of Harpocrates then there never actually as a person with this name nor a sect derived from this non-existent person.

Now I am not at all surprised that the Church Fathers could have made up a heretic to explain a sect or vice versa. But before I am willing to consider that possibility I want to exhaust every other possibility.

So I am trying to see whether Carpocrates could be a Greek name of an individual. There were lots of people named καρποϛ (fruit). The suffix -krates is also very common and means 'rule' or 'power.' But could someone have been named 'fruit-power'?

It sounds like more like a modern gay rights slogan than the name of a person.

I don't think 'Karpokrates' could have actually been a real name of a person. This is another way of calling into question whether there actually was a sect called 'the Carpocratians.'

Why did Clement and Irenaeus ACT as if there were Carpocratians? Well, here's what I am thinking.

Well I have already noted that it seems that the term 'Carpocratian' denoted an Alexandrian Christian abroad. But as of yet I haven't been able to explain why Alexandrian ex-patriots should be so called.

Yet finally I found something which might explain it.

There is a text from Chalcis in Syria from the third century which demonstrates that Greek speaking people outside of Alexandria seemed to have identified Harpocrates as 'Karpokrates.' First the text:

I am Karpokrates, son of Serapis and Isis … of Demeter and Kore and Dionysos and Iacchos … brother of Sleep and Echo. I am every season and take thought for all seasons, the inventor of … I created … I was the first to make adyta and sanctuaries for the gods; I devised measures and numbers … I produced the sistrum for Isis; I devised the ways to hunt all kinds of animals. … I established rulers for cities at all times; I preside over the upbringing of children; I established hymns … and dances of men and women, the Muses aiding me; I invented the mixing of wine and water; … of flutes and pipes; I am always at the side of litigants in order that nothing unjust may be done; I always share the thiasoi of Bakkhoi and Bakkhai; I caused … to spring up; I cleansed the whole earth; mountain-dwelling, sea-dwelling, river-dwelling, divining by throne, divining by stars … horn-shaped, Agyieus, Bassarios, of the heights, Indian-slaying, thyrsos-shaking, Assyrian hunter, wandering in dreams, giver of sleep …; approving … vengeful against those who are unjust in love. I hate the accursed … all the science of drugs … Titanian, Epidaurian. Hail Chalcis, my mother and nurse …. Ligyris inscribed this. [The Karpokrates Aretalogy from Chalcis [trans. by A. D. Nock Gnomon XXI.221 circa 250-300 CE]

I found this reference here and the author even tried to wrestle with the meaning of the name:

Some more interesting things include the fact that the author gives the deity's name as Karpokrates instead of the more usual Harpokrates. The translator claims that this was a careless mistake on the part of the author - but I wonder if it might signify something deeper. Karpos means "fruit", "vegetation", "crops" - and krates means "strength", "might" - certainly an appropriate name for the child of Isis, the inventor of grain and agriculture! (In fact, Isis even took over the epiklesis Karpophoros from Demeter in a couple of her Hellenistic hymns.) Further proof that the author wasn't ignorant and had a poor grasp of Greek comes in the references to the seasons (something apparently missed by the translator). In Greek these are Horai and other Greek authors connect the name Horos with the Horai. (A natural enough connection when we remember that Horus is a solar deity.) So clearly our author knew that the god's actual name was Horus the Child, but chose this poetic epiklesis for effect. But even more interesting is the line about dreams - almost no Greek author mentions Horus in connection with dreams, but in some Egyptian texts - going as far back as the Coffin Texts - Horus is visited by his deceased father Osiris in a dream. However modified the cult of Harpokrates may have been in Hellenistic Chalcis there was still a vibrant core of Egyptian tradition to it.

Could it be that Greeks were identifying Harpocrates as Karpokrates in a much earlier period? What does this mean for our understanding of the 'Carpocratians'? For the moment, I am not sure. I have to do some research. But I am sure it is significant ...