Talk:Bilad al-Sham

Separate article?
Why is this article a redirect to Greater Syria and not a separate article? --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 14:34, 29 June 2010 (UTC)


 * See past discussions at Talk:Bilad_al-Sham/Archive_1 and below... AnonMoos (talk) 16:46, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

Bilad al-Sham
Don't want to be excessively troublesome, but it seems to me that article would be the best place to discuss the technical etymology of the Arabic word "Sham"... AnonMoos (talk) 17:48, 3 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Hi AnonMoos, my rationale is that this article is supposed to be about the region during a particular period of time (the Caliphate), whereas Syria (region) is supposed to be about the region named Syria or Sham over history - an umbrella article so to speak. Happy to leave it in both, but to my mind it is better place on the umbrella article. Oncenawhile (talk) 08:27, 5 June 2013 (UTC)

I agree with AnonMoos that this is a more adequate place to discuss the etymology of bilad al-sham. On that note, a reference is needed for the following claim: "There is no connection with the name of Shem son of Noah (which appears in Arabic as sam سام, with a different initial consonant, and without any internal glottal stop consonant), as is sometimes assumed." --says who? According to the famous Arabic dictionary al-Qamus al-Muhit the connection with the name of Shem son of Noah is not ruled out: الشَّأمُ: بِلادٌ عن مَشْأمَةِ القِبْلَةِ، وسُمِّيَتْ لذلك، أو لأَنَّ قَوْماً من بني كَنْعانَ تَشاءَموا إليها، أتَياسَروا، أو سُمِّيَ بِسامِ بنِ نُوحٍ، فإِنَّهُ بالشينِ بالسُّرْيانِيَّةِ، أو لأَنَّ أرْضَها شاماتٌ بيضٌ وحُمْرٌ وسودٌ، وعلى هذا لا تُهْمَزُ، وقد تُذَكَّرُ، Rustumpasha (talk) 19:18, 28 May 2014 (UTC)


 * I don't know about that dictionary, but if it's the same one mentioned in article Fairuzabadi, then it would appear to be medieval, and therefore not necessarily the most authoritative in this particular area. In any case, the Shem-son-of-Noah etymology is quite incompatible with the ش ء م unlucky-left-north etymology, so if one is right, the other is wrong... AnonMoos (talk) 21:16, 28 May 2014 (UTC)

Of course you don't know about it AnonMoos because you don't even speak Arabic. al-Qamus al-Muhit is one of the oldest dictionaries of the Arabic language and one of the most authoritative. This conversation just proves how incompetent Widipedia editors are. What a pity and good luck propagating myths. Rustumpasha (talk) 14:41, 18 June 2014 (UTC)

Several issues
First of all, the phrase "Bilad al-Sham" or "Barr al-Sham" is just a colloquial phrase that was until the 19th century used as a name of Greater Syria. The phrases "Bilad al-Sham" and "Barr al-Sham" were not used by the Rashidun, Umayyads, Abbasids, etc. In the older Arabic literature one finds only "Al-Sham" الشام.

Second, the Arabic "Al-Sham" was not a province in "Syria." The word "Al-Sham" is simply the Arabic equivalent of the Greek "Syria." The Islamic province "Al-Sham" was identical to Byzantine Syria.

There are other issues with this article. It should be deleted all together.--HD86 (talk) 16:59, 22 April 2015 (UTC)


 * Totally agree, it should be deleted, it is confused and confusing and full of ignorance Rustumpasha (talk) 18:56, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Can you try doing something more useful than randomly calling people "ignorant"? Wikipedia is full of mistakes, and it is our gruelling task to fix them. Yes, sometimes the ignorance is astounding. At other times, the petty posturing is almost worse.
 * added a split notice. --dab (𒁳) 09:55, 26 October 2016 (UTC)


 * Comment Whichever name the Caliphates referred the region to (I'm not going to comment on that); what is sure is that this article is designed to represent that region. Just as Syria (Roman province) refers to its area of control, and Ottoman Syria refers to its. Syria (region) is the parent article, and these are the sub articles. This discussion has been done before: and they came to a consensus. –DA1 (talk) 03:50, 13 June 2017 (UTC)