Hamitic

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Hamitic

Hamitic is a historical term for the peoples supposedly descended from Noah's son Ham

Ham, son of Noah

Ham , according to the Table of Nations in the Book of Genesis, was a son of Noah and the father of Cush , Mizraim, Phut, and Canaan ....
, paralleling Semitic

Semitic

In linguistics and ethnology, Semitic was first used to refer to a language family of largely Middle Eastern origin, now called the Semitic languages....
and Japhetic

Japhetic

Japhetic is a term that refers to the supposed descendants of Japheth, one of the three sons of Noah in the Bible. It corresponds to Semitic and Hamitic ....
. It used to be used for grouping the non-Semitic Afro-Asiatic languages

Afro-Asiatic languages

The Afro-Asiatic languages constitute a language family with about 375 living languages and more than 300 million speakers spread throughout North Africa, the Horn of Africa, and Southwest Asia ....
(which for this reason were described as "Hamito-Semitic"), but since, unlike the Semitic branch, these have not been shown to form a phylogenetic unity, the term is obsolete in this sense.

In scientific racism

Scientific racism

Scientific racism denotes the use of scientific, or ostensibly scientific, findings and methods to support or validate Racism attitudes and worldviews....
, the "Hamitic race" was a sub-group of the Caucasian race

Caucasian race

The term Caucasian race has been used to denote the general physical type of some or all of the indigenous populations of Europe, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, West Asia, Central Asia and South Asia....
, alongside the Semitic race, grouping the populations native to North Africa

North Africa

North Africa or Northern Africa is the northernmost region of the African continent, separated by the Sahara from Sub-Saharan Africa.Geopolitically, the United Nations subregion of Northern Africa includes the following seven countries or territories:...
, the Horn of Africa

Horn of Africa

The Horn of Africa is a peninsula in East Africa that juts for hundreds of kilometers into the Arabian Sea, and lies along the southern side of the Gulf of Aden....
and South Arabia

South Arabia

South Arabia as a general term refers to several regions as currently recognized, in chief the Republic of Yemen; yet it has historically also included Najran, Jizan, and 'Asir which are presently in Saudi Arabia, and Dhofar presently in Oman....
.

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Hamitic is a historical term for the peoples supposedly descended from Noah's son Ham

Ham, son of Noah

Ham , according to the Table of Nations in the Book of Genesis, was a son of Noah and the father of Cush , Mizraim, Phut, and Canaan ....
, paralleling Semitic

Semitic

In linguistics and ethnology, Semitic was first used to refer to a language family of largely Middle Eastern origin, now called the Semitic languages....
and Japhetic

Japhetic

Afro-Asiatic languages

Scientific racism

Caucasian race

North Africa

Horn of Africa

The Horn of Africa is a peninsula in East Africa that juts for hundreds of kilometers into the Arabian Sea, and lies along the southern side of the Gulf of Aden....
and South Arabia

South Arabia

Negroid

Negroid is an adjective derived from the term Negro and refers to a Race of people whose recent ancestors are mostly from sub-Saharan Africa. The concept originated with a now defunct typological method of racial classification, but is still used, in a less rigid or essentialism sense, by many anthropology, especially physical anthropolog...
populations of Sub-Saharan Africa

Sub-Saharan Africa

Sub-Saharan Africa is a geographical term used to describe the area of the African continent which lies south of the Sahara, or those African countries which are fully or partially located south of the Sahara....
. In its most extreme form, in the writings of C. G. Seligman it asserted that all significant achievements in African history were the work of "Hamites" who migrated into central Africa as pastoralists, bringing technologies and civilizing skills with them. Theoretical models of Hamitic languages and of Hamitic races were interlinked in the early twentieth century.

Hamitic race

Curse of Ham

The term Hamitic originally referred to the peoples believed to have been descended from the biblical Ham

Ham

Ham is the thigh and rump of pork, cut from the haunch of a pig or boar. Although it may be cooked and served fresh, most ham is Curing in some fashion....
, one of the Sons of Noah

Sons of Noah

The Table of Nations or Sons of Noah is an extensive list of descendants of Noah appearing within the Torah at Genesis 10, representing an ethnology from an Iron Age Levantine perspective and its reflections in the medieval and modern history and genealogy researches....
. When Ham dishonors his father, Noah pronounces a curse on him, stating that the descendents of his son Canaan

Canaan

Canaan is an ancient term for a region encompassing modern-day Israel and Lebanon, the Palestinian Territories, plus adjoining coastal lands and parts of Jordan, Syria and northeastern Egypt....
will be "servants of servants". Of Ham's four sons, Canaan fathered the Canaanites, while Mizraim fathered the Egyptians

Egyptians

Egyptians is the name of the nationality and Mediterranean North African ethnic group native to Egypt.Egyptian identity is closely tied to the Geography of Egypt, dominated by the lower Nile Valley, the small strip of cultivable land stretching from the Cataracts of the Nile to the Mediterranean Sea and enclosed by desert both to the Easte...
, Cush the Cushites and Phut the Libyans

Libu

The Libu were an ancient north African tribe, from which the name Libya derives.Their occupation of ancient Libya is first attested in Egyptian language texts from the New Kingdom, especially from the Ramesside Period....
.

During the Middle Ages, this was interpreted to define Ham as the ancestor of all Africans. The curse was regularly interpreted as having created visible racial characteristics in Ham's offspring, notably black skin. According to Bernard Lewis, the sixth-century Babylonian Talmud

Talmud

The Talmud is a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Halakha, Jewish ethics, customs, and history. It is a central text of mainstream Judaism....
states that "the descendants of Ham are cursed by being Black and are sinful with a degenerate progeny." Both Arab and later European and American slave traders used this story to justify African slavery. In fact, the Bible restricts the curse to the offspring of Ham's son Canaan, who occupied the Levant, not to his other sons who are supposed to have populated Africa. According to Edith Sanders, this restriction was increasingly emphasised by 19th century theologians, who rejected the curse as a justification for slavery.

Hamitic

Hamitic race

Curse of Ham

Hamitic hypothesis