Labelling of Ethnicities

Ethnicities or ethnic groups are people who identify with each other on the basis of perceived shared attributes that distinguish them from other groups. Those obsolete attributes can include people of a common language, culture, and common sets of ancestry, traditions, society, religion, history, or social treatment.

Noah (1051 AM) son of Lamech grandson of Methuselah appears as the last of the Antediluvian Patriarchs in the traditions of Abrahamic religions.

His story appears in the Hebrew Bible, the Quran and Baha'i writings. He is referenced in various other books of the Bible, including the New Testament, and in associated deuterocanonical books.

According to the Table of Nations in the Book of Genesis, the flood narratives tell how Noah and his three sons Shem, Ham, and Japheth, together with their wives, were saved from the Deluge to repopulate the Earth.

• Shem, was the eldest son of Noah and the father of Elam; Ashur; Arphaxad; Lud and Aram, in addition to unnamed daughters, that are said to have populated regions now part of modern-day Iran, Iraq, and the Arabian Peninsula.
• Ham, was the second son of Noah and the father of Cush; Mizraim; Put, and Canaan. Ham's descendants are interpreted by Josephus and others as having populated Africa, and adjoining parts of Asia.
• Japheth, was the youngest son of Noah and the father of Magog; Gomer; Javan; Madai; Meshech; Tiras; Turk, and Tubal. Not mentioned by name in the Quran, he plays a role in the story of Noah's drunkenness and the curse of Ham, and subsequently in the Table of Nations as the ancestor of the peoples of the Aegean Sea, Anatolia, Caucasus, Greece, and Eurasia.

Medieval ethnographers believed that the world had been divided into three large-scale groupings, corresponding to the three classical continents: the Semitic peoples of Asia, the Hamitic peoples of Africa, and the Japhetic peoples of Europe.

1. Semites, are categorized as any of the peoples who spoke Semitic languages, with the territory they occupied extending from Mesha (Jordan) all the way to Sephar in the eastern mountains (South Arabia), and are alleged to be descendants of Shem, son of Noah.
2. Hamites, are categorized as any as any of the peoples who spoke Afroasiatic languages, principally the Asia Minor (Hamito-Semitic) and North African peoples, from Berber, Cushitic, and Egyptian branches, supposedly the descendants of Ham, son of Noah.
3. Japhetites, (also spelled Japhethites) are categorized as the seafaring peoples, in a racial sense White people (Caucasians) who spoke Indo-European languages that spread out to various lands of Europa, and are contended to be descendants of Japheth, son of Noah.

That said, constant invasions, intermarriages, and migration patterns over time have but eroded such ethnicities rendering the Semites, Hamites, and Japhetites obsolete linguistic label terms for ethnic, cultural or racial groups...

??????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

Food for thought!