Levant Etymology
Etymology
See also: Names of the Levant
French medal commemorating the Franco-Turkish War in Cilicia, c. 1920
The term Levant appears in English in 1497, and originally meant 'the East' or 'Mediterranean lands east of Italy'.[23]
It is borrowed from the French levant 'rising', referring to the rising of the sun in the east,[23] or the point where the sun rises.[24]
The phrase is ultimately from the Latin word levare, meaning 'lift, raise'.
Similar etymologies are found in Greek Ἀνατολή Anatolē (cf. Anatolia 'the direction of sunrise'),
in Germanic Morgenland (lit.'morning land'),
in Italian (as in Riviera di Levante, the portion of the Liguria coast east of Genoa),
in Hungarian Kelet ('east'),
in Spanish and Catalan Levante and Llevant, ('the place of rising'),
and in Hebrew מִזְרָח mizraḥ ('east').
Most notably, "Orient" and its Latin source oriens meaning 'east', is literally "rising", deriving from Latin orior 'rise'.[25]
The notion of the Levant has undergone a dynamic process of historical evolution in usage, meaning, and understanding.
While the term "Levantine" originally referred to the European residents of the eastern Mediterranean region, it later came to refer to regional "native" and "minority" groups.[26]
The term became current in English in the 16th century, along with the first English merchant adventurers in the region; English ships appeared in the Mediterranean in the 1570s, and the English merchant company signed its agreement ("capitulations") with the Ottoman Sultan in 1579.[27]
The English Levant Company was founded in 1581 to trade with the Ottoman Empire, and in 1670 the French Compagnie du Levant was founded for the same purpose.
At this time, the Far East was known as the "Upper Levant".[3]
In early 19th-century travel writing, the term sometimes incorporated certain Mediterranean provinces of the Ottoman Empire, as well as independent Greece (and especially the Greek islands).
In 19th-century archaeology, it referred to overlapping cultures in this region during and after prehistoric times, intending to reference the place instead of any one culture.
The French mandate of Syria and Lebanon (1920–1946) was called the Levant states.[3][2]