Good point. I really don't have any biblical examples of the root NGBI had forgotten about "darom". This may be the basic term, although HALOT's only evidence is from languages derived from Hebrew. But then "negev" could also be the basic term. I don't see enough evidence to tell one way or the other.
meaning "wiped". But Hebrew already has two words for "south" - "darom",
which seems to be the basic term, and "yamin", which means "right" (as in
"right hand"), and came to mean "south" to people for whom east was "qedem",
west was "axor" and north was "semol". These terms are also known from
cognate languages. So why another word? Perhaps "Negev" was FIRST a proper
noun, which then came to mean "south" (anologous to "yam" meaning "west"
even if you're in the Sinai, south of the Great Sea), and only came to mean
"wiped" in later Hebrew.
Yigal
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