Talk:levant
Add topicLatest comment: 9 years ago by 89.139.53.113 in topic Origin of Levant
Origin of Levant
[edit]Oxford dictionary is wrong: French "faire voile en Levant" doesn't mean "set sail for the Levant". That would be written "faire voile pour le Levant".
French "faire voile en Levant" means “to sail eastward”, (or figuratively: to flee eastward), literally: set the sail with the Levant wind (see wikipedia), an easterly wind that blows in the western Mediterranean Sea and southern France. Ref from 1616 "faire voile en Levant = to sayle eastward": https://books.google.com/books?hl=fr&id=TlsqAQAAIAAJ&focus=searchwithinvolume&q=to+sayle+eastward 89.139.53.113 14:04, 8 August 2015 (UTC)