Levant

Meaning

Proper Noun

• The countries bordering the eastern Mediterranean Sea, namely Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, Jordan and Cyprus (and sometimes, especially in a historical context, also including Turkey and Egypt, then part of the Ottoman Empire).
• An easterly wind, generally in the western Mediterranean Sea

Origin

• Borrowed from French levant ("rising, sun's point of rising"), form of lever, from Latin levō ("to rise") (cf. also the present participle levāns), from levis.