Find the word definition

Crossword clues for hamitic

The Collaborative International Dictionary
Hamitic

Hamitic \Ham*it"ic\ (h[a^]m*[i^]t"[i^]k), a. Pertaining to Ham or his descendants.

Hamitic languages, the group of languages spoken mainly in the Sahara, Egypt, Galla, and Som[^a]li Land, and supposed to be allied to the Semitic.
--Keith Johnston.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Hamitic

language group that included ancient Egyptian, Berber, Galla, etc.; 1842, from Ham, second son of Noah (Gen. ix:18-19).

Wikipedia
Hamitic

Hamitic (from the biblical Ham) is a historical term in ethnology and linguistics for a division of the Caucasian race and the group of related languages these populations spoke. "Hamitic" was applied to the non- Semitic languages in the Afroasiatic family, which was thus formerly labelled "Hamito-Semitic". The Hamitic languages were classified as including the Berber, Cushitic and Egyptian branches. However, since these branches have not been shown to form an exclusive ( monophyletic) phylogenetic unit of their own, separate from other Afroasiatic languages, linguists no longer use the term in this sense. Each of these branches is instead now regarded as an independent subgroup of the larger Afroasiatic family.

Beginning in the 19th century, scholars generally classified the Hamitic race as a subgroup of the Caucasian race, along with the Semitic race – thus grouping the non-Semitic populations native to North Africa and the Horn of Africa, including the Ancient Egyptians. According to the Hamitic theory, this "Hamitic race" was superior to or more advanced than Negroid populations of Sub-Saharan Africa. In its most extreme form, in the writings of C. G. Seligman, this theory asserted that virtually all significant achievements in African history were the work of "Hamites" who had migrated into central Africa as pastoralists, bringing new customs, languages, technologies and administrative skills with them. In the early 20th century, theoretical models of Hamitic languages and of Hamitic races were intertwined.

This nomenclature gradually fell out of favour between the 1960s and 1980s, in large part due to its perceived association with colonial paternalism. The populations of Hamitic ancestral stock are now more commonly known as "Caucasoid".

Usage examples of "hamitic".

So that not only the Mohammedan and Christian but the Buddhistic religion seem to be derived from branches of the Hamitic or red stock.

Asiatic Hamites, and the Semitic adoption of the Hamitic gods and religious system.

Science of writing, as it appears to have been pursued in Chaldea, and as we can actually trace its progress in Egypt, that we can hardly hesitate to assign the original invention to a period before the Hamitic race had broken up and divided.

So great is the analogy between the first principles of the Science of writing, as it appears to have been pursued in Chaldea, and as we can actually trace its progress in Egypt, that we can hardly hesitate to assign the original invention to a period before the Hamitic race had broken up and divided.