Why do I get an incorrect error "ORA-01775: looping chain of synonyms", when the base table does not existing?

I use Informatica for managing some ETL process that load data into an Oracle 9i Data-warehouse. Today I got the below error in the Informatica session logs: Message: Database driver error... CMN_1022 [DELETE FROM SOME_TABLE WHERE PERIOD_NAME = 'OCT-12' ORA-01775: looping chain of synonyms Database driver error... Function Name : executeDirect SQL Stmt : DELETE FROM SOME_TABLE WHERE PERIOD_NAME = 'OCT-12' Oracle Fatal Error Database driver error... Function Name : ExecuteDirect Oracle Fatal Error ] Now it was a typographical error, the table name was misspelt. The Oracle error obviously sent us in the wrong direction... So just wanted to understand why this error was show when there was no issue with synonyms.