Sinai looks like nothing so much as the surface of the moon. So the theory says that the name Sinai derived from the lunar deity Sin. Early inhabitants, worshipping the Trinity: Sin (Moon), Shamash (Sun) and Ishtar (Venus) named the peninsular after the moon-god Sin.

The Sinai Peninsula consists of an area of some 61,000 square kilometers. Geographical Sinai belongs to Egypt cut from its motherland by the Suez Canal. The natural barriers are the Gulf of Suez to the west, separating the African continent from Arab Asia and the Gulf of Aqaba to the east. The north east boundary, a 200 kilometer stretch of Mediterranean coastline is also known as the ancient Via Maris, a route used by conquerors, traders and travelers.

Some twenty million years ago Sinai was connected with Egypt and the Saudi Arabian Peninsula as part of the same land formation. Thermal currents in the earth’s mantle created huge cracks, which lifted and spread the land. Sinai is part of the Great Rift Valley, the great fracture in the earth’s crust, that begins in East Africa continues through the Red Sea into the Gulf of Aqaba through the Jordan Valley (Dead Sea, Sea of Galilee) widening each year about 5mm moving the Saudi Arabian Peninsula northwards. Geologically Sinai can be roughly divided into three areas. The northern region consists of sand dunes and fossil beaches formed by the changing levels of the Mediterranean Sea during the glacial periods two million years ago. The landscape is flat and uniform, interrupted only by some vast sand- and limestone hills.
The scarcely inhabited Al Tih Plateau is the central geological area with limestone dating from the Tertiary Period. The highlands extend towards the south until it goes over into the third area consisting of granite and volcanic rock. Limestone and sandstone sediments are replaced by granite and basalt. Both rocks are produced by volcanic activity on the bottom of the ocean from the Precambrium.