The term Hermeneutic comes from Hermes, a Greek god that has ministered as a messenger of the other gods and was a hero. Often the term is used in a broad sense to denote art or a theory of interpretation of the sacred inscriptions.
There is a certain tradition of reflecting upon the nature and the forms of interpretation. This tradition includes thinkers of the XIX century, like Friedrich Schleiermacher and Wilhelm Dilthey, and also thinker of the XX century – Martin Heidegger, Hans-Georg Gadamer, and Paul Ricœur. It is simultaneously a rich tradition and an immediate attitude towards some of the main problems of semiotics.
In its original definition hermeneutics is, according to the words of Gadamer, the art of clarifying through interpretation of that which people say (or write).
