And the sons of Ham
Next to the sons of Japheth, the sons of Ham are reckoned; these,
Josephus F26 says, possessed the land from
Syria, and the mountains of Amanus and Lebanon; laying hold on
whatever was towards the sea, claiming to themselves the
countries unto the ocean, whose names, some of them, are entirely
lost, and others so greatly changed and deflected into other
tongues, that they can scarcely be known, and few whose names are
preserved entire; and the same observation will hold good of
others. Four of the sons of Ham are mentioned,
Cush, and Mizraim, and Phut, and Canaan;
the first of these, Cush, Josephus F1 says, has suffered no
loss by time; for the Ethiopians, whose prince he was, are to
this day by themselves, and all in Asia, called Chusaeans: but
though this word Cush, as used in Scripture, is generally
rendered by us Ethiopia, this must not be understood of Ethiopia
in Africa, but in Arabia; and indeed is always to be understood
of one part of Arabia, and which was near to the land of Judea;
so Moses's wife is called an Ethiopian, when she was an Arabian,
or of Midian, ( Numbers 12:1
) ( Exodus
2:16 Exodus 2:21 ) and
Chusan and Midian are mentioned together, ( Habakkuk 3:7
) see 2Ki 19:9 2Ch 14:9
and Bochart
``the Babylonians say, that the first was Belus, called Cronus or Saturn (that is, Noah), and of him was begotten another Belus and Chanaan (it should be read Cham), and he (i.e. Ham) begat Chanaan, the father of the Phoenicians; and of him another son, Chus, was begotten, whom the Greeks call Asbolos, the father of the Ethiopians, and the brother of Mestraim, the father of the Egyptians.''