Etymology
The village's name is Balata, the name of an ancient Arab village, which was preserved by local residents. Its pseudonymn, al-Balad (meaning "the village"), is used to distinguish it from the Palestinian refugee camp of Balata which lies to the east and was established in 1950.
The village's name is transcribed in the writings of Eusebius (d. circa 339) and Jerome (d. 420), as Balanus or Balata. In the Samartian chronicles, its Arabic names are transcribed as Balata ("a pavement of flat stone slabs") and Shejr al-Kheir ("tree of grace"). In the writings of Yaqut al-Hamawi (d. 1229), the Syrian geographer, its name is transcribed as al-Bulāṭa.
One theory holds that balata is a derivation of the Aramaic word Balut, meaning "acorn" (or, in Arabic, "oak"), while another theory holds that it is a derivation of the Byzantine-Roman era, from the Greek word platanos, meaning "terebinth", a type of tree that grew around the village spring.
Read more about this topic: Balata Al-Balad
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