Syria (region)

{{main|Name of Syria}}

Several sources indicate that the name Syria itself is derived from Luwian term "Sura/i", and the derivative ancient Greek name: {{lang|el|Σύριοι}}, {{transliteration|grc|Sýrioi}}, or {{lang|el|Σύροι}}, {{transliteration|grc|Sýroi}}, both of which originally derived from Aššūrāyu (Assyria) in northern Mesopotamia, modern-day Iraq and greater Syria{{Cite book |last=Herodotus |url=https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/History_of_Herodotus/Book_7 |title=The History of Herodotus (Rawlinson)}}{{cite web |last=Joseph |first=John |year=2008 |title=Assyria and Syria: Synonyms? |url=http://www.jaas.org/edocs/v11n2/JohnJoseph.pdf}} For Herodotus in the 5th century BC, Syria extended as far north as the Halys (the modern Kızılırmak River) and as far south as Arabia and Egypt. For Pliny the Elder and Pomponius Mela, Syria covered the entire Fertile Crescent.

In Late Antiquity, "Syria" meant a region located to the east of the Mediterranean Sea, west of the Euphrates River, north of the Arabian Desert and south of the Taurus Mountains,{{cite book |author=Taylor & Francis Group |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pP315Mw3S9EC&pg=PA1015 |title=The Middle East and North Africa 2004 |publisher=Psychology Press |year=2003 |isbn=978-1-85743-184-1 |page=1015}} thereby including modern Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, Palestine, and parts of Southern Turkey, namely the Hatay Province and the western half of the Southeastern Anatolia Region. This late definition is equivalent to the region known in Classical Arabic by the name {{lang|ar-Latn|ash-Shām}} ({{langx|ar|ٱَلشَّام}} {{IPA|/ʔaʃ-ʃaːm/}},Article "AL-SHĀM" by C.E. Bosworth, Encyclopaedia of Islam, Volume 9 (1997), page 261. which means the north [country] (from the root {{lang|ar-Latn|šʔm}} {{langx|ar|شَأْم}} "left, north")). After the Arab conquest of Byzantine Syria in the 7th century CE, the name Syria fell out of primary use in the region itself, being superseded by the Arabic equivalent Shām, but survived in its original sense in Byzantine and Western European usage, and in Syriac Christian literature. In the 19th century, the name Syria was revived in its modern Arabic form to denote the whole of Bilad al-Sham, either as Suriyah or the modern form Suriyya, which eventually replaced the Arabic name of Bilad al-Sham. After World War I, the name Syria was applied to the French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon and the contemporaneous but short-lived Arab Kingdom of Syria.

{{Further|Canaan|Levant}}

File:J-m-dent-and-sons atlas-of-ancient-and-classical-geography 1912 syria-mesopotamia-assyria-etc-northern-middle-east 3296 2114 600.jpg to the Sinai Peninsula to the Euphrates, but not including Upper Mesopotamia]]

In the most common historical sense, 'Syria' refers to the entire northern Levant, including Alexandretta and the Ancient City of Antioch or in an extended sense the entire Levant as far south as Roman Egypt, including Mesopotamia. The area of "Greater Syria" ({{langx|ar|سُوْرِيَّة ٱلْكُبْرَىٰ|link=no}}, {{transliteration|ar|Sūrīyah al-Kubrā}}); also called "Natural Syria" ({{langx|ar|سُوْرِيَّة ٱلطَّبِيْعِيَّة|link=no}}, {{transliteration|ar|Sūrīyah aṭ-Ṭabīʿīyah}}) or "Northern Land" ({{langx|ar|بِلَاد ٱلشَّام|link=no}}, {{transliteration|ar|Bilād ash-Shām}}),{{cite news |author=Mustafa Abu Sway |title=The Holy Land, Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa Mosque in the Qur'an, Sunnah and other Islamic Literary Source |publisher=Central Conference of American Rabbis |url=http://www.wcfia.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/Abusway_0.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110728001911/http://www.wcfia.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/Abusway_0.pdf |archive-date=28 July 2011 }} extends roughly over the Bilad al-Sham province of the medieval Arab caliphates, encompassing the Eastern Mediterranean (or Levant) and Western Mesopotamia. The Muslim conquest of the Levant in the seventh century gave rise to this province, which encompassed much of the region of Syria, and came to largely overlap with this concept. Other sources indicate that the term Greater Syria was coined during Ottoman rule, after 1516, to designate the approximate area included in present-day Israel, Palestine, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon.Thomas Collelo, ed. [http://countrystudies.us/lebanon/15.htm Lebanon: A Country Study] Washington, Library of Congress, 1987.

The uncertainty in the definition of the extent of "Syria" is aggravated by the etymological confusion of the similar-sounding names Syria and Assyria. The question of the etymological identity of the two names remains open today. Regardless of etymology, both were thought of as interchangeable around the time of Herodotus. However, by the time of the Roman Empire, 'Syria' and 'Assyria' began to refer to two separate entities, Roman Syria and Roman Assyria.

Killebrew and Steiner, treating the Levant as the Syrian region, gave the boundaries of the region as such: the Mediterranean Sea to the west, the Arabian Desert to the south, Mesopotamia to the east, and the Taurus Mountains of Anatolia to the north. The Muslim geographer Muhammad al-Idrisi visited the region in 1150 and assigned the northern regions of Bilad al-Sham as the following:

In the Levantine sea are two islands: Rhodes and Cyprus; and in Levantine lands: Antarsus, Laodice, Antioch, Mopsuhestia, Adana, Anazarbus, Tarsus, Circesium, Ḥamrtash, Antalya, al-Batira, al-Mira, Macri, Astroboli; and in the interior lands: Apamea, Salamiya, Qinnasrin, al-Castel, Aleppo, Resafa, Raqqa, Rafeqa, al-Jisr, Manbij, Mar'ash, Saruj, Ḥarran, Edessa, Al-Ḥadath, Samosata, Malatiya, Ḥusn Mansur, Zabatra, Jersoon, al-Leen, al-Bedandour, Cirra and Touleb.

For Pliny the Elder and Pomponius Mela, Syria covered the entire Fertile Crescent. In Late Antiquity, "Syria" meant a region located to the east of the Mediterranean Sea, west of the Euphrates River, north of the Arabian Desert, and south of the Taurus Mountains, thereby including modern Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, the State of Palestine, and the Hatay Province and the western half of the Southeastern Anatolia Region of southern Turkey. This late definition is equivalent to the region known in Classical Arabic by the name {{lang|ar-Latn|ash-Shām}} ({{lang|ar|ٱلشَّام}} {{IPA|/ʔaʃ-ʃaːm/}}), which means the north [country] (from the root {{lang|ar-Latn|šʔm}} {{lang|ar|شَأْم}} "left, north"). After the Islamic conquest of Byzantine Syria in the seventh century, the name Syria fell out of primary use in the region itself, being superseded by the Arabic equivalent Bilād ash-Shām ("Northern Land'"), but survived in its original sense in Byzantine and Western European usage, and in Syriac Christian literature. In the 19th century, the name Syria was revived in its modern Arabic form to denote the whole of Bilad al-Sham, either as Suriyah or the modern form Suriyya, which eventually replaced the Arabic name of Bilad al-Sham.{{cite book |first=Kamal S. |last=Salibi |author-link=Kamal Salibi |title=A House of Many Mansions: The History of Lebanon Reconsidered |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=t_amYLJq4SQC |year=2003 |publisher=I.B.Tauris |isbn=978-1-86064-912-7 |pages=61–62 |quote=To the Arabs, this same territory, which the Roman Empire considered Arabian, formed part of what they called Bilad al-Sham, which was their own name for Syria. From the classical perspective, however, Syria, including Palestine, formed no more than the western fringes of what was reckoned to be Arabia between the first line of cities and the coast. Since there is no clear dividing line between what is called today the Syrian and Arabian deserts, which actually form one stretch of arid tableland, the classical concept of what actually constituted Syria had more to its credit geographically than the vaguer Arab concept of Syria as Bilad al-Sham. Under the Romans, there was actually a province of Syria, with its capital at Antioch, which carried the name of the territory. Otherwise, down the centuries, Syria, like Arabia and Mesopotamia, was no more than a geographic expression. In Islamic times, the Arab geographers used the name arabicized as Suriyah, to denote one special region of Bilad al-Sham, which was the middle section of the valley of the Orontes River, in the vicinity of the towns of Homs and Hama. They also noted that it was an old name for the whole of Bilad al-Sham which had gone out of use. As a geographic expression, however, the name Syria survived in its original classical sense in Byzantine and Western European usage, and also in the Syriac literature of some of the Eastern Christian churches, from which it occasionally found its way into Christian Arabic usage. It was only in the nineteenth century that the use of the name was revived in its modern Arabic form, frequently as Suriyya rather than the older Suriyah, to denote the whole of Bilad al-Sham: first of all in the Christian Arabic literature of the period, and under the influence of Western Europe. By the end of that century it had already replaced the name of Bilad al-Sham even in Muslim Arabic usage.}} After World War I, the name 'Syria' was applied to the French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon, and the contemporaneous but short-lived Arab Kingdom of Syria.

Today, the largest metropolitan areas in the region are Amman, Tel Aviv, Damascus, Beirut, Aleppo and Gaza City.

{{main|Name of Syria}}

Several sources indicate that the name Syria itself is derived from Luwian term "Sura/i", and the derivative ancient Greek name: {{lang|el|Σύριοι}}, {{transliteration|grc|Sýrioi}}, or {{lang|el|Σύροι}}, {{transliteration|grc|Sýroi}}, both of which originally derived from Aššūrāyu (Assyria) in northern Mesopotamia, modern-day Iraq However, during the Seleucid Empire, this term was also applied to The Levant, and henceforth the Greeks applied the term without distinction between the Assyrians of Mesopotamia and Arameans of the Levant.

The oldest attestation of the name 'Syria' is from the 8th century BC in a bilingual inscription in Hieroglyphic Luwian and Phoenician. In this inscription, the Luwian word Sura/i was translated to Phoenician ʔšr "Assyria." For Herodotus in the 5th century BC, Syria extended as far north as the Halys (the modern Kızılırmak River) and as far south as Arabia and Egypt.

The name 'Syria' derives from the ancient Greek name for Assyrians, {{langx|el|Σύριοι}} {{transliteration|grc|Syrioi}}, which the Greeks applied without distinction to various Near Eastern peoples living under the rule of Assyria. Modern scholarship confirms the Greek word traces back to the cognate {{langx|el|Ἀσσυρία}}, {{transliteration|grc|Assyria}}.First proposed by Theodor Nöldeke in 1881; cf. {{cite web|last=Harper|first=Douglas|url=http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=Syria|title=Syria|work=Online Etymology Dictionary|date=November 2001|access-date=22 January 2013}}.

The classical Arabic pronunciation of Syria is {{lang|ar-Latn|Sūriya}} (as opposed to the Modern Standard Arabic pronunciation {{lang|ar-Latn|Sūrya}}). That name was not widely used among Muslims before about 1870, but it had been used by Christians earlier. According to the Syriac Orthodox Church, "Syrian" meant "Christian" in early Christianity.{{citation needed|date=April 2018}} In English, "Syrian" historically meant a Syrian Christian such as Ephrem the Syrian. Following the declaration of Syria in 1936, the term "Syrian" came to designate citizens of that state, regardless of ethnicity. The adjective "Syriac" ({{lang|ar-Latn|suryāni}} {{lang|ar|سُرْيَانِي}}) has come into common use since as an ethnonym to avoid the ambiguity of "Syrian".

Currently, the Arabic term {{lang|ar-Latn|Sūriya}} usually refers to the modern state of Syria, as opposed to the historical region of Syria.

Before 1918, the term 'Syria' described the geographical region of Bilad Ash-Shām. With the introduction of the Mandate System and the emergence of the modern state Syria, the term 'Greater Syria' emerged to distinguish between Bilad Ash-Shām and Syria.{{Cite book |last=Schayegh |first=Cyrus |title=The Middle East and the Making of the Modern World |date=2018 |publisher=Harvard University Press |pages=1}}

Greater Syria has been widely known as Ash-Shām. The term etymologically in Arabic means "the left-hand side" or "the north", as someone in the Hejaz facing east, oriented to the sunrise, will find the north to the left. This is contrasted with the name of Yemen ({{lang|ar|اَلْيَمَن}} {{transliteration|ar|al-Yaman}}), correspondingly meaning "the right-hand side" or "the south". The variation {{lang|ar|ش ء م}} ({{transliteration|ar|š-ʾ-m}}), of the more typical {{lang|ar|ش م ل}} ({{transliteration|ar|š-m-l}}), is also attested in Old South Arabian, {{lang|srb|𐩦𐩱𐩣}} ({{transliteration|srb|s²ʾm}}), with the same semantic development.{{cite book | last = Younger| first = K. Lawson Jr.| title = A Political History of the Arameans: From Their Origins to the End of Their Polities (Archaeology and Biblical Studies)| publisher = SBL Press| date = 7 October 2016| location = Atlanta, GA| pages = 551| language = en| isbn =978-1589831285}}

The root of Shaam, {{lang|ar|ش ء م}} ({{transliteration|ar|š-ʾ-m}}) also has connotations of unluckiness, which is traditionally associated with the left-hand and with the colder north-winds. Again this is in contrast with Yemen, with felicity and success, and the positively-viewed warm-moist southerly wind; a theory for the etymology of Arabia Felix denoting Yemen, by translation of that sense.{{Citation needed|date=June 2020|reason=Unsourced etymology}}

The Shaam region is sometimes defined as the area dominated by Damascus, long an important regional center.{{citation needed|date=March 2018}} Ash-Sām on its own can refer to the city of Damascus.{{cite news |author=Tardif, P. |title='I won't give up': Syrian woman creates doll to help kids raised in conflict |publisher=CBC News |url=http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/syrian-refugee-sherbrooke-dolls-fundraiser-1.4289512 |date=17 September 2017 |access-date=6 March 2018}} Continuing with the similar contrasting theme, Damascus was the commercial destination and representative of the region in the same way Sanaa held for the south.

Quran 106:2 alludes to this practice of caravans traveling to Syria in the summer to avoid the colder weather and to likewise sell commodities in Yemen in the winter.{{cite book | last = Ali| first = Maulana Muhammad| author-link = Muhammad Ali (writer) | title = The Holy Quran Arabic Text with English Translation, Commentary and comprehensive Introduction| publisher = The Ahmadiyyah Anjuman Ish'at Islam| date = 2002| pages = 1247 | language = en, ar |isbn = 978-0913321058}}{{Cite Quran|106|2|t=s|tn=s|q=Their protection during their trading caravans in the winter and the summer.}}

{{see also|Demographics of the Middle East}}

{{Historical populations

|title=Historical population of the region of Syria

|align=right

|14|4300000|164|4800000|500|4127000|900|3120000|1200|2700000|1500|1500000|1700|2028000|1897|3231874|1914|3448356|1922|3198951|footnote = Source:{{cite web|last=Mutlu|first=Servet|title=Late Ottoman population and its ethnic distribution|url=https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/download/article-file/213586|pages=29–31}} Corrected population M8.Frier, Bruce W. "Demography", in Alan K. Bowman, Peter Garnsey, and Dominic Rathbone, eds., The Cambridge Ancient History XI: The High Empire, A.D. 70–192, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 827–54.{{Setton-A History of the Crusades|last=Russell|first=Josiah C.|chapter=The Population of the Crusader States|pages=295–314|volume=5}}{{cite web |title=Syria Population - Our World in Data |url=https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/population?time=0..latest&country=~SYR |website=www.ourworldindata.org |language=en}}

}}

In Greater Syria a variety of ethnic and religious groups coexist throughout history, influenced by the regions geographical conditions.{{Cite book |last=Schayegh |first=Cyrus |title=The Middle East and the Making of the Modern World |date=2018 |publisher=Harvard University Press |pages=4}} The largest religious group in the Levant are Muslims and the largest ethnic group are Arabs. Levantines predominantly speak Levantine Arabic, who derive their ancestry from the many ancient Semitic-speaking peoples who inhabited the ancient Near East during the Bronze and Iron Ages.{{cite journal |title=A Genetic History of the Near East from an aDNA Time Course Sampling Eight Points in the Past 4,000 Years |journal=American Journal of Human Genetics |year=2020 |doi=10.1016/j.ajhg.2020.05.008|last1=Haber |first1=Marc |last2=Nassar |first2=Joyce |last3=Almarri |first3=Mohamed A. |last4=Saupe |first4=Tina |last5=Saag |first5=Lehti |last6=Griffith |first6=Samuel J. |last7=Doumet-Serhal |first7=Claude |last8=Chanteau |first8=Julien |last9=Saghieh-Beydoun |first9=Muntaha |last10=Xue |first10=Yali |last11=Scheib |first11=Christiana L. |last12=Tyler-Smith |first12=Chris |volume=107 |issue=1 |pages=149–157 |pmid=32470374 |pmc=7332655 }} Others such as Bedouin Arabs inhabit the Syrian Desert and Naqab, and speak a dialect known as Bedouin Arabic that originated in Arabian Peninsula. Other minor ethnic groups in the Levant include Circassians, Chechens, Turks, Turkmens, Assyrians, Kurds, Nawars and Armenians.

Islam became the predominant religion in the region after the Muslim conquest of the Levant in the 7th century.{{cite book |last=Kennedy |first=Hugh N. |author-link=Hugh N. Kennedy |date=2007 |title=The Great Arab Conquests: How the Spread of Islam Changed the World We Live In |url=https://archive.org/details/greatarabconques00kenn_0 |url-access=registration |publisher=Da Capo Press |page=[https://archive.org/details/greatarabconques00kenn_0/page/376 376] |isbn=978-0-306-81728-1}}{{cite book |last=Lapidus |first=Ira M. |author-link=Ira M. Lapidus |date=13 October 2014 |orig-year=1988 |title=A History of Islamic Societies |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kFJNBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA70 |edition=3rd |publisher=Cambridge University Press |page=70 |isbn=978-0-521-51430-9}} The majority of Levantine Muslims are Sunni with Alawite and Shia (Twelver and Nizari Ismaili) minorities. Alawites and Ismaili Shiites mainly inhabit Hatay and the Syrian Coastal Mountain Range, while Twelver Shiites are mainly concentrated in parts of Lebanon.

Levantine Christian groups are plenty and include Greek Orthodox (Antiochian Greek), Syriac Orthodox, Eastern Catholic (Syriac Catholic, Melkite and Maronite), Roman Catholic (Latin), Nestorian, and Protestant. Armenians mostly belong to the Armenian Apostolic Church. There are also Levantines or Franco-Levantines who adhere to Roman Catholicism. There are also Assyrians belonging to the Assyrian Church of the East and the Chaldean Catholic Church.{{cite web |title=Christian Population of Middle East in 2014 |date=2017 |publisher=The Gulf/2000 Project, School of International and Public Affairs of Columbia University |url=http://gulf2000.columbia.edu/images/maps/Christians_Middle_East_2014_lg.png |access-date=2018-08-31}}

Other religious groups in the Levant include Jews, Samaritans, Yazidis and Druze.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SPBfnT_E1mgC&pg=PA16 |title=Ethnic Groups of Africa and the Middle East: An Encyclopedia|access-date=26 May 2014|isbn=978-1-59884-362-0|last1=Shoup|first1=John A|date=2011-10-31|publisher=Abc-Clio }}

{{History of Syria}}

{{Further|Syro-Hittite states|History of the ancient Levant}}

File:Apamea 02.jpg was an important trading center, and a prosperous city in Hellenistic and Roman times]]

Herodotus uses {{langx|grc|Συρία}} to refer to the stretch of land from the Halys river, including Cappadocia (The Histories, I.6) in today's Turkey to the Mount Casius (The Histories II.158), which Herodotus says is located just south of Lake Serbonis (The Histories III.5). According to Herodotus various remarks in different locations, he describes Syria to include the entire stretch of Phoenician coastal line as well as cities such Cadytis (Jerusalem) (The Histories III.159).{{cite web |author-link=Herodotus |author=Herodotus |title=Herodotus VII.63 |url=http://www.fordham.edu/Halsall/ancient/greek-babylon.html |publisher=Fordham University |quote=VII.63: The Assyrians went to war with helmets upon their heads made of brass, and plaited in a strange fashion which is not easy to describe. They carried shields, lances, and daggers very like the Egyptian; but in addition they had wooden clubs knotted with iron, and linen corselets. This people, whom the Hellenes call Syrians, are called Assyrians by the barbarians. The Chaldeans served in their ranks, and they had for commander Otaspes, the son of Artachaeus. |access-date=28 May 2013 |archive-date=20 February 1999 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/19990220150108/http://www.fordham.edu/Halsall/ancient/greek-babylon.html |url-status=dead }}

In Greek usage, Syria and Assyria 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 "those parts of the Empire situated between Asia Minor and Egypt", i.e. the western Levant, while "Assyria" was part of the Persian Empire, and only very briefly came under Roman control (116–118 AD, marking the historical peak of Roman expansion).

{{Further|Roman Syria|Assyria (Roman province)|Coele-Syria}}

File:A28 Sergiopolis-Martirion 562.jpg]]

In the Roman era, the term Syria is used to comprise the entire northern Levant and has an uncertain border to the northeast that Pliny the Elder describes as including, from west to east, the Kingdom of Commagene, Sophene, and Adiabene, "formerly known as Assyria".{{cite book |author=Pliny (AD 77) |author-link=Pliny the Elder |url=https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Pliny_the_Elder/5*.html |title=Natural History |chapter=Book 5 Section 66 |date=March 1998 |publisher=University of Chicago |isbn=84-249-1901-7}}

File:The Scene of the Theater in Palmyra.JPG, one of ancient Syria's wealthiest cities]]

Various writers used the term to describe the entire Levant region during this period; the New Testament used the name in this sense on numerous occasions.[https://archive.org/stream/commentarybible00peakuoft#page/n51/mode/1up A commentary on the Bible], quote "In the time of the Greek predominance it came into use. as it is employed to-day, as the name of the whole western borderland of the Mediterranean, and in the NT it is used several times in that sense (Mt. 4:24, Lk. 2:2, Ac. 15:23,41, 18:18, 21:3, Gal. 1:21)".

In 64 BC, Syria became a province of the Roman Empire, following the conquest by Pompey. Roman Syria bordered Judea to the south, Anatolian Greek domains to the north, Phoenicia to the West, and was in constant struggle with Parthians to the East. In 135 AD, Syria-Palaestina became to incorporate the entire Levant and Western Mesopotamia. In 193, the province was divided into Syria proper (Coele-Syria) and Phoenice. Sometime between 330 and 350 (likely c. 341), the province of Euphratensis was created out of the territory of Syria Coele and the former realm of Commagene, with Hierapolis as its capital.{{cite book | editor-first = Alexander | editor-last = Kazhdan | title = Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium | publisher = Oxford University Press | year = 1991 | isbn = 978-0-19-504652-6 | page=748}}

After c. 415 Syria Coele was further subdivided into Syria I, with the capital remaining at Antioch, and Syria II or Salutaris, with capital at Apamea on the Orontes River. In 528, Justinian I carved out the small coastal province Theodorias out of territory from both provinces.{{cite book | editor-first = Alexander | editor-last = Kazhdan | title = Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium | publisher = Oxford University Press | year = 1991 | isbn = 978-0-19-504652-6 | page=1999}}

{{main|Bilad al-Sham}}

The region was annexed to the Rashidun Caliphate after the Muslim victory over the Byzantine Empire at the Battle of Yarmouk, and became known as the province of Bilad al-Sham. During the Umayyad Caliphate, the Shām was divided into five junds or military districts. They were Jund Dimashq (for the area of Damascus), Jund Ḥimṣ (for the area of Homs), Jund Filasṭīn (for the area of Palestine) and Jund al-Urdunn (for the area of Jordan). Later Jund Qinnasrîn was created out of part of Jund Hims. The city of Damascus was the capital of the Islamic Caliphate, until the rise of the Abbasid Caliphate.{{cite book |title=Palestine Under the Moslems: A Description of Syria and the Holy Land from A.D. 650 to 1500 |url=https://archive.org/details/palestineundermo00lestuoft |author=Le Strange, G. |author-link=Guy Le Strange |publisher=Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund |location=London |year=1890 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/palestineundermo00lestuoft/page/30 30]–234 |oclc=1004386 }}{{cite book |last=Blankinship |first=Khalid Yahya |author-link=Khalid Yahya Blankinship |title=The End of the Jihâd State: The Reign of Hishām ibn ʻAbd al-Malik and the Collapse of the Umayyads |location=Albany, New York |publisher=State University of New York Press |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Jz0Yy053WS4C |pages=47–50 |isbn=0-7914-1827-8 |year=1994 }}{{cite book |title=White Banners: Contention in 'Abbāsid Syria, 750–880 |first=Paul M. |last=Cobb |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2C6KIBw4F9YC |location=Albany, NY |publisher=State University of New York Press |year=2001 |pages=12–182 |isbn=0-7914-4880-0 }}

{{main|Ottoman Syria|Damascus Eyalet|Syria Vilayet}}

In the later ages of the Ottoman times, it was divided into wilayahs or sub-provinces the borders of which and the choice of cities as seats of government within them varied over time. The vilayets or sub-provinces of Aleppo, Damascus, and Beirut, in addition to the two special districts of Mount Lebanon and Jerusalem. Aleppo consisted of northern modern-day Syria plus parts of southern Turkey, Damascus covered southern Syria and modern-day Jordan, Beirut covered Lebanon and the Syrian coast from the port-city of Latakia southward to the Galilee, while Jerusalem consisted of the land south of the Galilee and west of the Jordan River and the Wadi Arabah.

Although the region's population was dominated by Sunni Muslims, it also contained sizable populations of Shi'ite, Alawite and Ismaili Muslims, Syriac Orthodox, Maronite, Greek Orthodox, Roman Catholics and Melkite Christians, Jews and Druze.

Cedid Atlas (Syria) 1803.jpg|1803 Cedid Atlas, showing Ottoman Syria in yellow

Bowen, Frances. Turkey in Asia. 1810.jpg|An 1810 map of the Ottoman Empire in Asia, showing the region of Ottoman Syria

Maunsell's map, Pre-World War I British Ethnographical Map of eastern Turkey in Asia, Syria and western Persia 01.jpg|Ethnic groups in the Middle East shown in a pre-World War I British government map. The primary population of the region of Syria is described as "Arabs (settled)" and inland as "Arabs (nomadic)"

{{main|Occupied Enemy Territory Administration|Arab Kingdom of Syria|Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon}}

File:Book of the Independence of Syria (ذكرى استقلال سوريا).jpg, states the date of the Declaration of Independence on 8 March 1920]]

The Occupied Enemy Territory Administration (OETA) was a British, French and Arab military administration over areas of the former Ottoman Empire between 1917 and 1920, during and following World War I. The wave of Arab nationalism evolved towards the creation of the first modern Arab state to come into existence, the Hashemite Arab Kingdom of Syria on 8 March 1920. The kingdom claimed the entire region of Syria whilst exercising control over only the inland region known as OETA East. This led to the acceleration of the declaration of the French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon and British Mandate for Palestine at the 19–26 April 1920 San Remo conference, and subsequently the Franco-Syrian War, in July 1920, in which French armies defeated the newly proclaimed kingdom and captured Damascus, aborting the Arab state.Itamar Rabinovich, Symposium: The Greater-Syria Plan and the Palestine Problem in The Jerusalem Cathedra (1982), p. 262.

Thereafter, the French general Henri Gouraud, in breach of the conditions of the mandate, subdivided the French Mandate of Syria into six states. They were the states of Damascus (1920), Aleppo (1920), Alawite State (1920), Jabal Druze (1921), the autonomous Sanjak of Alexandretta (1921) (modern-day Hatay in Turkey), and Greater Lebanon (1920) which later became the modern country of Lebanon.

Although the Mandate System divided Greater Syria into new countries, cultural similarities and economic cooperation and trade remained strong between the countries. The integration into the global economy was an important aspect after the end of World War 1. Politically, besides the increasing importance of Zionism, the region saw growing nationalist movements. These occurred within the new countries as well as on a regional scale.{{Cite book |last=Schayegh |first=Cyrus |title=The Middle East and the Making of the Modern World |date=2018 |publisher=Harvard University Press |pages=132-133, 189-190}}

{{See also|Ba'athism|Neo-Ba'athism|Fertile Crescent Plan|Arab Kingdom of Syria}}

File:Greater_Syria_Map.png's SSNP map of a "Natural Syria", based on the etymological connection between the name "Syria" and "Assyria"]]

The boundaries of the region have changed throughout history, and were last defined in modern times by the proclamation of the short-lived Arab Kingdom of Syria and subsequent definition by French and British mandatory agreement. The area was passed to French and British Mandates following World War I and divided into Greater Lebanon, various Syrian-mandate states, Mandatory Palestine and the Emirate of Transjordan. The Syrian-mandate states were gradually unified as the State of Syria and finally became the independent Syria in 1946. Throughout this period, Antoun Saadeh and his party, the Syrian Social Nationalist Party, envisioned "Greater Syria" or "Natural Syria", based on the etymological connection between the name "Syria" and "Assyria", as encompassing the Sinai Peninsula, Cyprus, modern Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Jordan, Iraq, Israel, Kuwait, the Ahvaz region of Iran, and the Kilikian region of Turkey.{{cite book |last=Sa'adeh |first=Antoun |author-link=Antoun Saadeh |title=The Genesis of Nations |location=Beirut |year=2004}} Translated and Reprinted{{cite web |last=Ya'ari |first=Ehud |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1987/06/behind-the-terror/376326/ |title=Behind the Terror |website=The Atlantic|date=June 1987 }}

{{See also|Religious significance of Jerusalem}}

The region has sites that are significant to Abrahamic religions:{{cite web |author=World Heritage Committee |title=Convention concerning the protection of the world cultural and natural heritage |page=34 |url=https://whc.unesco.org/archive/2007/whc07-31com-8be.pdf |date=2 July 2007 |access-date=8 July 2008}}{{cite book |last=O'Connor |first=J. M. |author-link=Jerome Murphy-O'Connor |title=The Holy Land: An Oxford Archaeological Guide from Earliest Times to 1700 |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=1998 |page=369 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cSuErBFmykQC |isbn=978-0-1915-2867-5}}

{{div col|colwidth=22em}}

• Cradle of civilization
• Crusader states
• Mashriq
• Middle East
• Names of the Levant
• Southern Levant
• Wildlife of the Levant

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{{notelist}}

{{reflist}}

• Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic by Hans Wehr (4th edition, 1994).
• Michael Provence, "The Great Syrian Revolt and the Rise of Arab Nationalism", University of Texas Press, 2005.

• {{Cite book |last=Pipes |first=Daniel |author-link=Daniel Pipes |year=1990 |title=Greater Syria: the History of an Ambition |url=https://archive.org/details/greatersyriahist00pipe |url-access=limited |location=New York |publisher=Oxford University Press |number=viii |pages=[https://archive.org/details/greatersyriahist00pipe/page/n256 240] |isbn=978-0-19-506022-5}} pbk.; illustrated with b&w photos and maps; alternative ISBN on back cover: 0-19-506002-4

{{Middle East}}

{{Syria topics}}

{{Arab nationalism}}

Category:Levant

Category:Geography of Syria

Category:Geography of Jordan

Category:Geography of the Middle East

Category:Historical geography of Syria

Category:Historical geography of Palestine

Category:Historical geography of Israel

Category:History of Palestine (region)

Category:History of Lebanon

Category:History of Jordan

Category:History of Adana Province

Category:History of Kahramanmaraş Province

Category:History of Gaziantep Province

Category:History of Mersin Province

Category:History of Hatay Province

Category:History of the Levant

Category:Historical regions