The true meaning of "Europe"

The true meaning of "EUROPE"

Most of us were taught as children the old Greek legend of Europe, the daughter of Phoenician king Agenor, king of Tyr; how the pagan god Zeus fell in love with her, took the appearance of a bull, abducted her, and disappeared into the sea with her.

At first sight, the word "Europe" with its beginning in "Eu -" looks Greek, like "eureka" or "Eugenia". However, "Europe" cannot be traced back to any Greek root. The meaning of other geographical Greek words is plain. Anatolia is the place in the East from where the sun rises ("anatello", I rise); Philadelphia means love the brother; Thyatira, though linked to the word "daughter", sounds like "sacrificing constellation". Yet, "Europe" does not mean anything in Greek. It is a fake Greek word.

But, according to the legend, "Europe" was born in present Lebanon. It is then reasonable to investigate, whether "Europe" could mean something in a Phoenician context. We do not know a lot about the Phoenician language. But by judging on the face of the words, which we know, it was very close to Hebrew. Arguably, Phoenicians and Hebrews would have been able to understand each other like Swedes and Norwegians are able to nowadays.

The situation was of course very different for the Greeks whose Indo-European language did not allow for easy intercommunication with people speaking Semitic languages. However, the Phoenicians and the Greeks had something in common. They were sailors and traders. After having settled down from the mainland into the Aegean and Ionian islands, the Greeks would eventually sail eastwards and come alongside the Lebanese coast. There they would have tried to sell their goods and to buy commodities that the Phoenicians would sell. It was not an easy task without a common language but merchants do not need to know a lot of words to make good business. The Phoenicians would surely have asked them where they come from. And the Greek would have pointed at the West, where the sun sets. We do not know how the Phoenicians called the West but the Arabic word is עarb. This word is basically the same as the one meaning "evening" in Hebrew " עereb". And in fact, the link is clear, the sun sets in the evening in the West. 

Arguably, when the Greeks would point out at the West, the Phoenicians would have said some word like " עereb" and the Greeks would have believed that it was their country's name in Phoenician.

The first letter " ע" is a laryngeal that hardly any Greek would have been able to pronounce. It sounds like a strange, fat "A" coming out of the deep throat. The Greeks might have reinterpreted it as the diphthong they were used to writing with the two letters epsilon and upsilon, "Eu -" which sounded approximately like "ave". "P" is simply a voiceless "B". That the Phoenician "B" would have become a Greek "P" could be explained by the fact that the Greek pronunciation of "B" was very weak, like in Spanish. Most words containing a "B" in Old Greek are pronounced "V" in Modern Greek. The more energetic pronunciation of "P" in Greek could therefore explain that " עereb" had become "Europê" in Greek.

Then the old legend begins to make sense. Lady Europe disappeared into the sea just like the sun seems to dive into the Mediterranean sea each evening towards the West, seen from the Lebanese coast.

The name of our continent means thus simply "West" or "Evening" and we have inherited it from a language closely related to Hebrew. 

"God shall enlarge Japheth and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem" (Genesis 9:27).