כנען

See also: כּנען

Hebrew

Etymology

Uncertain. Suggested to be from a West Semitic root from the base verb *kanaʕ- (“to be low, humble, subjugated”), Hebrew כָּנַע (kānaʕ), Aramaic כְּנַע (kənaʕ, “to bend, to kneel”), Arabic قَنَعَ (qanaʕa, “to beg”), Ge'ez አቅንዐ (ʾäḳnəʿä, “to arrange”), which could have been used in contrast with אֲרַם (“Aram”) with the latter derived from a word for highlands. Compare Phoenician 𐤊𐤍𐤏𐤍 (knʿn), Arabic كَنْعَانُ (kanʕānu).

Pronunciation

• (Modern Israeli Hebrew) IPA^(key): /k(e).ˈna.ʔan/
• (Tiberian Hebrew) IPA^(key): /kă.ˈna.ʕan/

Proper noun

כְּנַעַן • (k'ná'an) m

1. (biblical) Canaan, a son of Ham and a grandson of Noah.
2. (biblical) Canaan, the land inhabited by Canaan: the Land of Canaan.
3. (Medieval Hebrew) the Slavs; Slavic lands

Derived terms

• כְּנַעֲנִי

Further reading

• H3667 in Strong, James (1979) Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance to the Bible
• Katz, Dovid (2014). Knaanic in the Medieval and Modern Scholarly Imagination
• Leslau, Wolf (1979) Etymological Dictionary of Gurage, volume 3, Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, →ISBN, page 485
• “knˁ”, in The Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon Project, Cincinnati: Hebrew Union College, 1986–