Orient from Late Middle English:
Since the Middle Ages the countries of the East have been referred to as the Orient—the first recorded use of the term appears in Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. The name goes back to Latin oriri ‘to rise’, also the source of original (Late Middle English) and refers to the rising of the sun. The opposite is Occident, a name for the countries of the West which comes from Latin occidere ‘to go down, set’, and refers to the setting of the sun. The English football club Orient (later known as Clapton Orient, and now as Leyton Orient) was founded in 1881. The name was suggested by a player who worked for the Orient shipping line, and was appropriate, as the club is based in the East End of London. Disorient (mid 17th century) was originally ‘to turn from the east’.
日本有Land of the Rising Sun（旭日之国）的别称，而亚洲，特别是远东，则一向被欧美人称为the Orient（东方）。orient一词源于拉丁语sol oriens（旭日），其中oriens作rising（正在升起的）解，也可以说orient就是来自oriens。在作形容词用时，orient除了表示“东方的”之外，至今仍然保留了“升起的”这一原义。orient和east的区别在于，前者属诗歌语言。
对古罗马占卜者来说，东预示吉祥。他们以观察鸟的飞向来预卜吉凶。神鸟从笼子里放出，若朝东飞则为吉兆。基督教徒也接受了这种迷信看法。基督教堂常以位于东端的圣坛定其朝向。若神鸟朝西飞则为凶兆，因为昔日教士总是将西与死亡及毁灭相联系。与orient相对的occident其词源就反映丁这层含义。occident源于拉丁语occidens‘setting’（落下的）。因为日落于西，所以occident后被转义表示“西方”或“西方的”，而且常与死亡相联系。英语成语go west也含有“死”或“完蛋”之意。