of Aramaic kul, "all, the entire", identifying all of Syria. Palestine Palestine: (Palaistinē) - from ; or perhaps Greek παλαιστής (palaistēs, "wrestler"), in reference to Israel Hebrew Israeli (Palestina), or Israeli (Falastin) (Felestin) - same word as Philistia An early version of the name Palestine was first recorded by the ancient Egyptians as Peleset. Herodotus later called the whole area Syria Palaistinē in his Histories (c. 450 BC), and included the entire territory of ancient Israel and Judea (which he noted for the practice of circumcision), not specifically the coastal Philistine territory (whose people notably did not practice circumcision). The Romans applied the term Syria Palaestina to the southern part of the region—beginning in AD 135, following the Bar Kokhba revolt—to complete the disassociation with the former identity of Judaea. The name continued to be used for the province throughout later Byzantine and Islamic rule. †As a side note, Standard Hebrew has two names for Palestine, both of which are different from the Hebrew name for ancient Philistia. The first name Palestina was used by Hebrew speakers in the British Mandate of Palestine; it is spelled like the name for Philistia but with three more letters added to the end and a Latin pronunciation given. The second name Falastin is a direct loan from the Arabic form, and is used today specifically to refer to the modern Palestinians and to political aspirations for a Palestinian state. Philistia Philistia: Canaanite: 𐤐𐤋𐤔𐤕 (p.l.ʃ.t) Hebrew Israeli (Pleshet) Tiberian - from Greek Eber-Nari and Transeuphratia Eber-Nari was the name of a satrapy of the Achaemenid Empire which roughly corresponded with the southern Levant. It means "Beyond the River" or "Across the River" in both Akkadian and Aramaic (that is, the western side of the Euphrates from a Mesopotamian and Persian viewpoint). It is also sometimes referred to as Transeuphratia (French Transeuphratène) by modern scholars. Medieval and modern history Shaam The Arabic name for the region of Levant is Shaam () comes from the Arabic root meaning "left" or "north". After the Islamic conquest of the region, Shaam became the name of the Levant (Byzantine Syria). In ancient times, Baalshamin or Ba'al Šamem (), was a Semitic sky-god in Canaan/Phoenicia and ancient Palmyra. However, the syllable "sham" in Baalshamin has nothing to do with the name shaam but is just by chance the middle syllable of the word for "sky", comparable to Hebrew שָׁמַיִם (shamayim).