( Aden ) (i) town, (ii) British crown colony, (iii) British protectorate in S.W. Arabia.
(1) Town and seaport on the South coast of Arabia, in British possession since 1839, with a mixed population of ca 35,000. ʿAdan (cf. akkad. edinu "steppe"), more precisely ʿAdan Abyan (by way of distinction from ʿAdan Lāʿa, and al-ʿAdan in a verse of Ufnūn al-Tag̲h̲libī; cf. Yāḳūt, iii, 622 f., Kay, 232, AM, ii, 17, 284), or t̲h̲ag̲h̲r ʿAdan from its being strongly fortified, is the Athene of Pliny, ’Αθήνη of Philostorgius, ’Εύδαίμων ’Αραβία of the Periplus, ’Αραβία ἐμπόριον of Ptolemy (…