A game designer that I've been having a conversation with mentioned that in his upcoming game he was thinking of avoiding the term 'Ancient Palestine', and using 'Levant' instead.
By way of clarification, the game takes place more than a thousand years before the Philistines showed up on the coast of modern-day Israel, so any use of the word 'Palestine' (derived from the Latinized 'Philistine') would be anachronistic.
I did much of my early reading on this kind of thing in the UK and around Brits, and being a French speaker the term 'Levant' (the French equivalent of the Latin 'Oriens', the place where the sun goes up) makes perfect sense to me, especially since I used to work on a Levantine desk and almost ended up living in Beirut.
So if someone from the UK or Ireland were to encounter the word as geographical term, they would probably know what it means.
But would anyone else?
I've used the word around Americans a few times and usually get a lot of blank stares, though that could have been a function of the audience. I've also gotten delighted reactions of recognition from people a generation or so older than I am. But people like that don't usually buy computer games.
So if my friend uses the word Levant, are people likely to get it without typing it into Google?
[If anyone cares, in Arabic the sun comes up in the Mashreq and goes down in the Magreb. Orient/Levant/Mashreq and Occident/Magreb are a lot easier to explain to someone than Oultremer].
Quote from: Philippe on July 10, 2017, 02:32:38 PM
A game designer that I've been having a conversation with mentioned that in his upcoming game he was thinking of avoiding the term 'Ancient Palestine', and using 'Levant' instead.
By way of clarification, the game takes place more than a thousand years before the Philistines showed up on the coast of modern-day Israel, so any use of the word 'Palestine' (derived from the Latinized 'Philistine') would be anachronistic.
I did much of my early reading on this kind of thing in the UK and around Brits, and being a French speaker the term 'Levant' (the French equivalent of the Latin 'Oriens', the place where the sun goes up) makes perfect sense to me, especially since I used to work on a Levantine desk and almost ended up living in Beirut.
So if someone from the UK or Ireland were to encounter the word as geographical term, they would probably know what it means.
But would anyone else?
I've used the word around Americans a few times and usually get a lot of blank stares, though that could have been a function of the audience. I've also gotten delighted reactions of recognition from people a generation or so older than I am. But people like that don't usually buy computer games.
So if my friend uses the word Levant, are people likely to get it without typing it into Google?
[If anyone cares, in Arabic the sun comes up in the Mashreq and goes down in the Magreb. Orient/Levant/Mashreq and Occident/Magreb are a lot easier to explain to someone than Oultremer].
I think most people won't get the word, but most people interested in a game in that era probably would.
Personally, I would really approve of using that term as a way of at least slightly de-linking the game from all the modern politics that get evoked from the word "Palestine." Of course, as far as I know, your friend might have an exact opposite point of view, but in any case I think it's got at least as good a claim as "Palestine," if not better, as a way of delineating that part of the world in that time period.
Aside from the etymology here, I would be super-interested in the right kind of strat or management game from that time and place. Sooper dooper. (Has to be a good game, of course.)
As Glen says above, most here would know what Levant means. But is that good enough?
If it's any kind of historical simulation I think Levant it the the right term to attract the audience for that type of game. The general public that doesn't know much history won't get it at all... so it really depends on what the target is.
Like Gus said most of here are history buffs of one kind or another and very well read to boot, so it's right in our wheel house... but if you post the same question in the general section of BGG you'd get a lot more blank stares.
Levant is alright. ISIS / ISIL made the term famous now.
Quote from: jomni on July 10, 2017, 05:38:46 PM
Levant is alright. ISIS / ISIL made the term famous now.
Technically, its Barack Obama who made the term famous (or infamous) by refusing to use the former (ISIS) and insisting on using the later (ISIL).
The game takes place in Egypt during the third millenium B.C. and you get to build pyramids.
Here's a link to the about-to-be-retired Steam Greenlight:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=926628823
Quote from: Philippe on July 10, 2017, 07:04:43 PM
The game takes place in Egypt during the third millenium B.C. and you get to build pyramids.
Here's a link to the about-to-be-retired Steam Greenlight:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=926628823
Looks like it has elements from the Pharaoh/Cleopatra city-builders plus Pre-Dynastic Egypt (http://store.steampowered.com/app/461620/Predynastic_Egypt/). I had fun with both of those. I'm intrigued.
Not quite sure what kind of game it is from looking at that steam link. I like the part about taking the role of a royal vizier and governing the state, but all the actions it lists are economic. I hope there's at least a little bit about the role of sharp pieces of metal in ancient dynastic politics.
1.) I'm fine with Levant (also know what it means, kudos for avoiding the anachronistic Palestine), although since the game is set in Egypt maybe an Egyptian term for that area would be better?
2.) Glad to see the game greenlit! Looking forward to it later this year.
3.) If there's some way to paste a copied steam address into the Steam interface within the Steam engine itself, I sure don't know what it is. Relatedly, it can be hard to find Greenlight games from within the Steam interface. (Something I hope will be fixed in their new whatever-the-replace-Greenlight-with.) But I don't like signing into Steam from a browser. Another reason I'm glad to see the game is already greenlit. ;)
Egypt Old Kingdom (https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=926628823) looks a LOT like Pre-Dynastic Egypt (http://store.steampowered.com/app/461620/Predynastic_Egypt/) to me.
I would expect it to be called something appropriate to the period portrayed. Since it starts before the invasions, and the Bronze Dark Age, the Palestine moniker shouldn't be used.
Actually, I hope anyone who doesn't know what the "Levant" means would be inclined to investigate. When I was a pre- and early-teen kid, gorging on tabletop wargames, I learned quite a lot of geography and history through gaming. More so than I was being taught in school at the time, and my need to know pushed me to look further. When it came to geography, history, and terminology later being taught in class, I often already knew portions of it before it ever came up. :nerd:
So it's win-win using Levant. :bd:
Quote from: Greybriar on July 10, 2017, 08:26:17 PM
Egypt Old Kingdom (https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=926628823) looks a LOT like Pre-Dynastic Egypt (http://store.steampowered.com/app/461620/Predynastic_Egypt/) to me.
Same developer, based on what the Steam page for Egypt Old Kingdom states at the bottom of the description.
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As JasonPratt mentions, why not use an Egyptian name?
The designer is trying to avoid the use of "Palestine" because it would be anachronistic, but suggests using a medieval Italian (eventually French and English) term instead. That seems odd.
Furthermore, he would be using Levant in the modern/narrow meaning, whereas the term in its broader meaning originally encompassed numerous lands in the Eastern Mediterranean including Egypt.
Man, I'm having trouble coming up with an Egyptian name for the area. Canaan won't work, because that's a term for "trader" based on the Syro-Phoenician port established at... Joppa, I think? That sure wasn't there in ancient Egypt.
(Although strictly speaking I suppose we shouldn't press verisimilitude too far, since "Egypt" is a Latinism, right?)
Levant is a good term, though it refers to more than the whole Israel/Palestine thing, and includes Lebanon, Jordan, parts of Syria and more, so these terms are not really interchangeable.
Canaan could be a good term for that region for really really ancient times.
Or you could go Greek and use Pheonicia.
And as JP said, you could just look up the Egyptian term for the region, although they might not have an equivalent term.
The generic word for the region was Retjenu, further broken down into Djahy (the southern part roughly equivalent to Canaan), Lebanon (roughly equivalent to Phoenicia), and Amurru (as in Amorites -- Syria and the Hatay).
There is a strong internal preference for Levant, but some of the other terms might make an appearence in the appropriate place.
In the last game there was a debate as to whether to use jackal or wolf to translate a certain Egyptian word (and we aren't talking about Anubis). A slight majority of egyptologists prefer jackal, but the game's advisory group at the Russian Academy of Sciences happened to be in the wolf camp, so the wolves had it. I was in the jackal camp, but in retrospect wolf probably works better. The egyptologists that I used to hang out with at the Met would probably have gone with canid, but normal people don't usually know that word until you explain where it comes from.
Well, canid is (messed up) Greek after all. ;)
Incidentally, the Greek terms for 'dog' and 'puppy' and the Hebrew terms for '(Phoenician) trader' and 'zealot', all swarm together into an interesting multi-pun situation in the Gospel accounts of Jesus healing the Syro-Phoenician woman's daughter, and kind of explain along with the socio-political situation (still relevant in modern area politics today!) why Jesus seems like He doesn't intend to grant the mother's request for help.
I'd go with Levant.
I prefer whatever the historical name is. I would generally research it if I did not know about it already anyways.
To me, Levant was some sort of holiday or bread. :P But I certainly know a fair bit about the Rebellions against the Romans. I believe most people skip over or ignore this part of history whenever discussing middle eastern politics. Don't know why as it's where the diaspora comes from. People seem to go straight from old testament times and then end up missing the roman era and straight into modern history like when the UN left Israel... it's funny because when you think about it, the Roman part of middle eastern history is where Christianity came from. Perhaps because there is such a focus is on Christian events of that era is why other Jewish events of the Roman era are generally forgotten by most.
That's a different game altogether. Abraham wasn't even a gleam in Terah's eye until several centuries after the game ends, and the proto-Romans were probably still living somewhere in the Balkans.
Forgive me, but how do you get a realistic game 1000 years before the Philistines?
How do you get one in any time period? A setting in the third millenium per se shouldn't make any difference. Because it's about Old Kingdom Egypt, you're dealing in something relatively well documented. The trouble would start if the game were focused on Mesopotamia or the Levant: you might get Uruk, Sumer, and Akkad right, but were Ebla and Mari the only civilizations in that neighborhood? If you just have to worry about getting Egypt right, you can design for effect and reduce everybody else to an abstraction. The first two dynasties will be a little sketchy, but by third you should be on terra firma.
Levant is very used in french so easy for me to know what we are talking about.
Quote from: Philippe on July 13, 2017, 06:17:20 AM
How do you get one in any time period? A setting in the third millenium per se shouldn't make any difference. Because it's about Old Kingdom Egypt, you're dealing in something relatively well documented. The trouble would start if the game were focused on Mesopotamia or the Levant: you might get Uruk, Sumer, and Akkad right, but were Ebla and Mari the only civilizations in that neighborhood? If you just have to worry about getting Egypt right, you can design for effect and reduce everybody else to an abstraction. The first two dynasties will be a little sketchy, but by third you should be on terra firma.
For most time periods that we wargame their is a lot more information than there is for this period. Nothing is perfect. But where the subject matter almost requires you to fill in the gaps in a substantial manner then I would question being able to call it historical. Like you said above the only faction's army we have good information on is Egypts? Who knows if we have any information on the tactics, formations and training.