The word Levantine originated from the Italian word for sunrise

Evidence

The word levantine comes from Italian—Levante is the sunrise; people who come from the east are politely called ‘people from the sunrise’ levantini. Those who came from the west were sometimes called ponentini, people from the sunset. Levantine came to be something of a term of abuse; it came to mean people who are European but not really European; who have a veneer and a smattering of European ways and education but are really local; and yet who don’t possess the real local culture. The Turks called the Levantines tatlısu frengi, sweet-water Franks, as opposed to the genuine article, who are salt-water Franks. — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, 171

Categorization

• DEFINE: Etymology of ‘Levantine’ from Italian Levante (sunrise), plus the Turkish insult ‘sweet-water Franks’ vs ‘salt-water Franks’ for inauthentic Europeans.
• SHARE: A friend interested in Ottoman history or Mediterranean contact zones would savor the sweet-water/salt-water Franks joke.