Eli Smith (1801-1857) was an American Protestant Missionary and scholar, born at Northford, Connecticut. He graduated from Yale in 1821 and from Andover Theological Seminary in 1826. He worked in Malta until 1829, then traveled through Armenia and Georgia to Persia in the company of H. G. O. Dwight. They published their observations, Missionary Researches in Armenia in 1833 in two volumes. Eli Smith settled in Beirut in 1833. In 1838, along with Edward Robinson, he made two trips to the Holy Land, acting as an interpreter for Robinson in his quest to identify and record Biblical place names in Palestine. He is known for bringing the first printing press with Arabic type to Syria. He went on to pursue his life's work: translation of the Bible into Arabic. Although he died before completing the translation, the work was completed by C. V. Van Dyck of the Syrian Mission and published in 1860.