The name Syria is latinized from the. Herodotus used it loosely to refer toCappadocia. In Greek usage, Συρία Suría and Ασσυρία Assuría were used almost interchangeably, but in the Roman Empire, Syria and Assyria came to be used as distinct geographical terms. "Syria" in the Roman Empire period referred to the region of Syria, while Asōristān was part of the Sasanian Empire and only very briefly came under Roman control. Etymologically, the name Syria is connected to Assyria, ultimately from the Akkadian Aššur. Theodor Nöldeke in 1881 was the first to give philological support to the assumption that Syria and Assyria have the same etymology, a suggestion going back to John Selden. Current academic opinion favours the connection. Modern Syria inherits its name from the Ottoman Syria Vilayet, established in 1865. The choice of the ancient Latin name for the Ottoman province reflects a growing historical consciousness among the local intellectuals at the time. The ClassicalArabic name for the region is بلاد اَلشَّأم bilād aš-ša'm from شأم š'm "left hand; northern". In contrast, Baalshamin, was a Semitic sky-god in Canaan/Phoenicia and ancient Palmyra. Hence, Sham refers to.
Etymology
Majority mainstream scholarly opinion now strongly supports the already dominant position that 'Syrian' and Syriac indeed derived from 'Assyrian', and the 21st-century discovery of the Çineköy inscription seems to clearly confirm that Syria is ultimately derived from the Assyrian term Aššūrāyu. The question was addressed from the Early Classical period through to the Renaissance Era by the likes of Herodotus, Strabo, Justinus, Michael the Syrian and John Selden, with each of these stating that Syrian/Syriac was synonymous and derivative of Assyrian. Acknowledgments being made as early as the 5th century BC in the Hellenistic world that the Indo-European term Syrian was a derived from the much earlier Assyrian. Some 19th-century historians such as Ernest Renan had dismissed the etymological identity of the two toponyms. Various alternatives had been suggested, including derivation from Subartu, the Hurrian toponym Śu-ri, or Ṣūr. Syria is known as Ḫrw in the Amarna Period Egypt, and as אֲרָם, ʾĂrām in Biblical Hebrew. J. A. Tvedtnes had suggested that the Greek Suria is loaned from Coptic, and due to a regular Coptic development of Ḫrw to *Šuri. In this case, the name would derive directly from that of the language isolate-speaking Hurrians, and be unrelated to the name Aššur. Tvedtnes' explanation was rejected as highly unlikely by Frye in 1992. Various theories have been advanced as to the etymological connections between the two terms. Some scholars suggest that the term Assyria included a definite article, similar to the function of the Arabic language "Al-". Theodor Nöldeke in 1881 gave philological support to the assumption that Syria and Assyria have the same etymology, a suggestion going back to John Selden rooted in his own Hebrew tradition about the descent of Assyrians from Jokshan. Majority and mainstream current academic opinion strongly favours that Syria originates from Assyria. A hieroglyphic Luwian and Phoenician bilingual monumental inscription found in Çineköy, Turkey, belonging to Urikki, vassalking ofQue, dating to the eighth century BC, reference is made to the relationship between his kingdom and his Assyrian overlords. The Luwian inscription reads su-ra/i whereas the Phoenician translation reads ʾšr, i.e. ašur, which according to Rollinger "settles the problem once and for all". According to a different hypothesis, the name Syria might be derived from "", the name that the Phoenicians gave to Mount Hermon, firstly mentioned in an Ugaritic poem about Baal and Anath:
History
The Greek name appears to correspond to Phoenician ʾšr "Assur", ʾšrym "Assyrians", recorded in the 8th-century BC Çineköy inscription. Writing in the 5th century BC, Herodotus stated that those called Syrians by the Greeks were called Assyrians by themselves and in the East. In Greek usage, Syria and Assyria were used almost interchangeably in reference to Assyria, although Herodotus distinguished between the names Syria and Assyria, and for him, Syrians are the inhabitants of the Levant. Randolph Helm emphasised that Herodotus never applied the term Syria on the Mesopotamian region of Assyria which he always called "Assyria". In the Roman Empire, Syria and Assyria came to be used as distinct geographical terms. "Syria" in the Roman Empire period referred to those parts of the Empire situated between Asia Minor and Egypt, i.e. the western Levant, while "Assyria" in northern Iraq, southeast Turkey and northeast Syria was part of the Persian Empire as Athura, and only very briefly came under Roman control, where it was known as Assyria Provincia. In 1864, the Ottoman Vilayet Law was promulgated to form the Syria Vilayet. The new provincial law was implemented in Damascus in 1865, and the reformed province was named Suriyya/Suriye, reflecting a growing historical consciousness among the local intellectuals.
