SEMITO-CAMITIC. — The names “Semites” and “Hamites” derive from the list of peoples in the Bible (Gen. 10), where a certain number of peoples are presented as descendants of Shem and Ham. From the 17th century, the term “Semites” has been used to designate the peoples of a linguistic group; from the 19th century, the name “Hamites” has been used to designate the peoples of another linguistic group, distinct from the Semitic one. Linguistic relations correspond also to cultural relations between the two groups of peoples.
I. Race
Among the Semites are found representatives of different races, especially the Oriental and the Near Eastern (Armenoid). Among the Hamites there are at least three races: among the Eastern Hamites (Cushites) the Ethiopian race; among the Western Hamites (Berbers) the Mediterranean race, as well as descendants of the prehistoric Cro-Magnon race. Therefore, it is unjustified and erroneous to speak of a Semitic and Hamitic race. Both of these groups of peoples belong to the cycle of the Europid races, and although some Hamites have dark pigmentation, according to other anthropological characteristics they do not belong to the cycle of the Negroid races.II. Diffusion
Apart from the recent and very recent migrations of Semitic groups and the remote progressive diffusion of the Jews (v.) to all continents, the geographical area of the Semites is reduced to South-Western Asia and to Northern and Eastern Africa. In ancient times, in the Near East there lived the Babylonians, the Assyrians, the Arameans, the Phoenicians, the Canaanites, the Hebrews, the Northern Arabs and the Southern Arabs (the Sabaeans, the Minaeans, etc.). The commercial colonies of the Phoenicians spread as far as the western basin of the Mediterranean. In Abyssinia there migrated at a very remote time a Semitic group, which certainly came from Southern Arabia. Even more ancient are the Semitic infiltrations in Egypt, where the language and culture of the emigrants mixed with indigenous elements. With the Islamic conquest of the 7th century there was a strong Arab migration, so that Mesopotamia, Syria, Palestine, Egypt and North Africa were largely Arabized (at least linguistically, while in culture many pre-Arabic elements remained). The total number of Arabs, considered in the broadest sense, i.e., all those who speak Arabic, may today reach 60 million; that of the Jews 13 million; that of the groups speaking Aramaic in Syria and Mesopotamia only a few tens of thousands. As regards the Hamites, there is no agreement on determining the extent of their linguistic group. Mostly distinguished are the Eastern Hamites (Cushites), to which belong the Beja, then the Danakil, the Somalis, the Galla, the Kafficho, the Kunama and the Bari, from the Western Hamites, to which belong the Berbers who were once called Libyans. The ancient Egyptians hold an intermediate position, but are closer to the Libyans. To the Eastern Hamites must be connected the so-called Hamitoids, called by some Niloto-Hamites, who are culturally related but linguistically do not belong to the Hamites, e.g., the Masai, the Nandi, the Suk, the Didinga, the Lotuko, the Bari, the Turkana; moreover, the groups of the territory of the great lakes of Eastern Africa, who have adopted a Bantu language, e.g., the Wa-Hima, the Wa-Tussi. Infiltrations of Hamitic culture are also found among the cattle-herding peoples of Southern and South-Western Africa, e.g., among the Kaffirs, the Herero, the Hottentots. These do not linguistically belong to the Hamites, while perhaps the Khoi-San linguistic group could be related to Hamitic languages. The Nilotic languages and some of those of Western Sudan, such as Hausa and Fulbe, have likewise been grouped by some authors with the Hamitic languages, evidently by improper extension. On the contrary, the Guanches of the Canary Islands must be culturally connected with the Berbers.III. Origin
It is undisputed that there is a certain linguistic and also cultural dependence between the Semites and the Hamites; but from the different ways in which these linguistic and cultural relations have been conceived, contrasting answers have also come to the question of origins. In general it is held that the place where the Semitic and Hamitic languages and cultures first took on their characteristic qualities is within the present territory they inhabit, and this is the only point unanimously accepted. Some scholars, especially the older ones, consider the Semites as a branch detached from the Hamites, which migrated from North Africa into Asia. Most scholars, however, seek the place of origin of the Semites in some part of Western Asia: in Arabia, in Mesopotamia, in northern Syria or in places further north. For a long time the theory of Arabia as the “cradle of nations” had wide currency, from which four great migrations would have emerged in succession: Amorite-Babylonian, Canaanite, Aramean and Arab. But against this theory is the following fact: the settlement of the interior of Arabia was possible only with the introduction of camel herding, which occurred quite late, as will be seen. A denser settlement of Arabia without camel herding would have been possible only if those places had once been rich in water and later had become arid. This theory is supported by some Orientalists but strongly contested by others. It may be that the aridification of Arabia did indeed occur, but it certainly happened at a prehistoric time so ancient as to have no influence on the formation of the Semites. In any case, the place of origin of the Semites certainly enjoyed cultural relations with the pastoral peoples of Central Asia (Indo-Europeans, Turkic-Mongols) and therefore should not be sought too far to the west.For the Hamites it is doubtful whether one can generally speak of a common place of origin. The Berbers are connected by some scholars with the ancient Mediterranean European culture and freed from any relation with the Eastern Hamites. According to new investigations it appears impossible to reconstruct a primitive Hamitic language, from which the individual Hamitic languages would have derived; the unity would rather be only secondary and attributable to the influence of Semitic languages on a linguistic foundation not originally unified, and this, presumably, must have occurred in Africa. It is not excluded, however, that a part of the Hamitic peoples, as such, formed in Asia and then migrated to Africa under Semitic pressure.
IV. Culture
1. Economy and ergology
The S.-C. are considered nomadic herders; but this can be said only of the Arab Bedouins, of a part of the Cushites and Hamitoids and of the Berbers (especially the Tuareg), because a large part of the S.-C. has passed to a sedentary life.Among the Semites, nomadic pastoralism was originally unique or principal. Given that horse breeding appears relatively insignificant, and camel breeding is attested among the Semites only in the 2nd millennium B.C., in the earliest times only the sheep, goat and donkey were kept as domestic animals; the ox only in marginal places. The dwelling is the tent, while the present-day “black tent” became generally used with the breeding of camels. Clothing consists today of an undershirt in the form of a shirt and an overgarment in the form of a cloak, as well as a headdress (the turban among the sedentary); before the introduction of woven fabrics, skins and
— N. Semitic nomads at the beginning of the 2nd millennium. Wall painting in the tomb of an Egyptian nobleman — Beni Hasan.
Leather for clothing is still worked today, as it is for vessels. The main weapons were the spear, the bow and arrow. Food is already indicated by symbiosis with sedentary peoples: cereals and dates as a complement to meat, as well as milk and its products.
Among the Hamites, material culture is similar in some respects. Here, however, cattle raising occupies first place alongside that of sheep and goats, while horse breeding never attained great economic importance; similarly, camel breeding, except among certain tribes, especially the Tuareg. Cattle raising leads to a sedentary life (the conical-roofed house is often found as a dwelling among the Cushites) and facilitates the transition to agriculture, which is now practiced by almost all Cushites (mainly millet). In the oases of the Sahara and in the mountainous countries of North Africa, fruit-tree cultivation is of great importance. As a result of the sedentary life, earthenware vessels (together with wooden ones) have also assumed greater prominence.
2. Sociology
I. The family, both among the Semites and among the Hamites, is essentially patriarchal. Matriarchal traces appear in marginal areas, such as in southern Arabia, among the Baria and Cunama, and among the Berbers. Among the latter, matriarchy may have derived from a completely matriarchal culture of an earlier time; in other cases, however, it is only a matter of external influences. Kinship ties up to a certain degree (e.g., among the Arabs up to the fifth degree in the case of blood vengeance) oblige the formation of a large, solid family; this does not exist everywhere, nor does the right of primogeniture prevail everywhere. Among the Semites, a stricter centralization predominates among the sedentary, while a greater individual independence is found among the nomads. Among the Hamites, such differences appear less marked. True totemism does not exist; what has been explained as a survival of totemism either does not have this character or is traced only to peripheral influences. Circumcision is now in use where Islam predominates, and although it was already widespread before, it was not universal (it existed among the ancient Egyptians, the Arabs, the Hebrews, but not among the Assyrians and Babylonians). Today it still appears in some places as a puberty rite (thus among certain tribes in southern Arabia), a character which in origin seems to have been general.The organization of the larger groupings (tribes for the nomads and village communities for the sedentary) is ordinarily democratic; the chief is markedly subject to the assembly of elders, which, moreover, can also have an aristocratic character. Among the Cushites, social organization has become more complex with the transition to agriculture (cf., e.g., the age-class system among the southern Galla).
3. Religion
The Arabs, the Berbers and a part of the Cushites are today Islamized, except for the remnants of Christianity, once widespread, which survive in Egypt, Palestine, Syria and Mesopotamia. Most of the Cushites, however, still preserve a very lively sense of their own religion, with deep faith and notable cult of a sky god (especially well demonstrated among the Galla). It is difficult to form an idea of the most ancient forms of religion among the Semites. The pre-Islamic religion of the nomads is little known. The religions of high culture in the Semitic area, known from antiquity, reveal a strong non-Semitic imprint, as, e.g., in Babylon on the part of the Sumerians. In historical times, polytheism is mostly noted, especially in the form of astral cult. The theory according to which all Semites originally worshipped the divine triad of Sun, Moon and the planet Venus is untenable; even the cult of the pair Sky and Earth, with a strong emphasis on fertility, is difficult to trace back to the time of Semitic nomadism. Similarly, the importance of animism with regard to the earliest Semitic religion has been exaggerated. The kinship with the Cushites and other reasons indicate that even among the Semites the belief in a sky god was very ancient; among other things, the very common name of God, El, indicates a supreme god once venerated by all Semites.The forms of worship were partly influenced from without. Among the Semites, unlike what seems to have been the case among the Hamites, there was originally no priestly caste. Both these groups of peoples knew only inhumation, not cremation of the dead.