Negev

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A large arid desert region occupying the southern part of Israel, stretching toward the Red Sea and the Sinai border
2. The dry, sparsely populated desert covering much of southern Israel, known for its rugged landscape and mountains
3. An expansive semi-desert area in the south of Israel, lying between the Judean hills and the Gulf of Aqaba

Etymology: The Negev is a proper noun, and its name is simply the Hebrew word for "south." In Hebrew, "négev" (נֶגֶב) is the standard word for the southern direction, so the desert takes its name from where it sits relative to the people who named it: the region lying south of the core of ancient Israel. The same root gives the Hebrew term for the south of the land and appears in ordinary speech about compass directions. The name reflects a way of orienting oneself that is common across the Semitic languages, in which the east is faced and the south is the direction on one's right hand. A desert named for a direction thus records a view of the land from its centre rather than any feature of the terrain itself. In English the name has been adopted unchanged from Hebrew, so it carries its original meaning without translation.