I never knew this before, a name often in news lately. From Brewer:
Punjab [five rivers]. They are the Jelum, Chenab, Ravee, Beas, and Sutlej; called by the Greeks pente-potamia.

>Punjab [five rivers]. They are the Jelum, Chenab, Ravee, Beas, and Sutlej

Something I knew before I was five, courtesy of the many recitations of the list made by my father. My father used to count to ten for me in Urdu, and when I learned to do the same in Punjabi, it turned out there was almost no difference, apar from a couple of minor vowel shifts.

Dear sjm: I am suffering painful frustration. Please take pity on me and tell me:
Does "pun-" mean five,, and "jab" mean river?

Edit: dear sjm: After difficult search, I found a site that said "panch-" meant five
and "-abi" was Arabic for "water". Oh joy. Penta,pump-, fünf,five.

Punjab [five rivers]...called by the Greeks pente-potamia.

Then is messo- (as in Messopotamia) "halfway between", as in meso- or mezzo-, thus giving "between rivers," maybe the Tigris and the Euphrates?

Mesopotamia
Gr mesopotamia (chbra), lit., (land) between rivers < mesos, MID1 + potamos, river, orig., rapids < IE base *pet3, to fall, rush at > FEATHER6 ancient country in SW Asia, between the upper Tigris & Euphrates rivers: a part of modern Iraq

adj., n.

>After difficult search, I found a site that said "panch-" meant five

Yes. That was one of those vowel shifts I mentioned. When my Dad spelled "five" in Urdu, he transliterated it "panch". My Punjabi friends transliterated the word as "punj". I gave up my efforts to learn Punjabi when I learned that it has two alphabets, one of which even many native speakers have trouble mastering the use of. Given that Urdu uses the Arabic alphabet, I really should learn that instead - at least it is a more friendly language for the sinistral to write.