Levant

Levant, region along the eastern Mediterranean shores, roughly corresponding to modern-day Israel, the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and often Cyprus and Hatay il (province) of Turkey (Türkiye).

History and usage

Common use of the term—which comes from French lever, “to rise,” as in sunrise, meaning the east—is associated with Venetian and other European trading ventures and the establishment of commerce with cities such as Tyre and Sidon as a result of the Crusades. It was applied to the coastlands of Syria and Anatolia, sometimes extending from Greece to Egypt and as a synonym for the Ottoman Empire or the Middle East or Near East. Cyprus, which had been a part of the Ottoman Empire and was closely connected since the Bronze Age to the eastern Mediterranean coastlands by trade and cultural exchange, is sometimes included in broader definitions of the Levant.

The term has come to correspond closely with the Arabic term Al-Shām (الشام), which refers to the area frequently called Greater Syria (in modern history) or Syro-Palestine (in the study of ancient history). But while English Levant refers chiefly to the coastal area along the eastern Mediterranean Sea and contrasts with the West, Arabic Al-Shām was historically centered on Damascus in the interior of the region and contrasts with Al-Yaman (“the south” of Arabia; now the name of Yemen). Nevertheless, the Arabic- and English-language terms are used as near equivalents: For example, the variety of Arabic spoken along the eastern Mediterranean coast, as well as in cities in the interior such as Damascus and Amman, is called al-ʿarabiyyah al-shāmiyyah (“Al-Shām Arabic”) in Arabic but “Levantine Arabic” in English. In this regard, the English term Levant and the Arabic term Al-Shām refer to the same sociocultural region, one distinct from nearby Egypt, Iraq, and the Gulf Arab states, even if the geographic orientation of the terms (i.e., “eastern coast” and “northern interior,” respectively) differs etymologically.

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Nonetheless, “Levantine” as a descriptor flattens the diversity within the region—which includes, for example, Hebrew, Turkish, and Armenian speakers, as well as small differences in Levantine Arabic speech that vary by country, region, and village. The Levant is also religiously heterogeneous. While Sunni Islam is the population’s predominant religious tradition, the region includes the core population centers for the Alawite, Druze, Maronite, Melkite, and Jewish communities, alongside sizable communities of Twelver Shiʿis and Armenian Orthodox. Qualifiers indicating national, linguistic, or religious identity are generally favored over “Levantine” when referring to individuals and populations within the Levant and their cultural practices.

Geography

Although the Levant is not defined in geological terms, the region shares general geographic characteristics that archaeologists and anthropologists consider influential, though not determinative, for human movement and interaction. Narrow humid plains run along the length of the coast, albeit discontinuously, and have long served as a common corridor between trade networks to the north, west, and east; the Via Maris connecting Egypt with the Fertile Crescent passed through the southern coastal plains of the Levant. A short distance inland the terrain becomes hilly or mountainous, parallel to the Afro-Arabian Rift Valley system just to the east, with arid or semiarid climate east of the elevation. Human settlement is relatively sparse east of the rift, but oases, such as Damascus, and the uplands east of the Jordan River support urban settlements that are interdependent with those of the coastal plains. The Syrian Desert and the broader Arabian Desert separate the Levant from Mesopotamia and Arabia, respectively.

The Levant is often divided into subregions, with the steep Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon mountain ranges of the upper northern Levant forming a major topographic division between north and south. The twin mountain ranges are themselves separated by the Bekaa valley, the section of the Afro-Arabian Rift Valley that lies between them. The lower northern Levant, north and northeast of the Lebanon Mountains, generally follows the Orontes River and the Al-Anṣariyyah (Al-Nuṣayriyyah) mountains. It extends roughly from the ʿAmūq (Amik) plains in southern Turkey to the Akkar Plain to the southwest of Homs in Syria. The southern Levant, south of the Lebanon Mountains, runs along the Jordan River Valley. The valley is flanked by hill country to the west and the Transjordanian plateau region to the east.