Curse of Ham the ark and "was smitten in his skin"; according to another, Noah cursed him because he castrated his father. Although the Talmud refers only to Ham, the version brought in a midrash goes on further to say "Ham, that Cush came from him" in reference to the blackness, that the curse did not apply to all of Ham but only to his eldest son Cush, Cush being a sub-Saharan African. Thus, two distinct traditions existed, one explaining dark skin as the result of a curse on Ham, the other explaining slavery by the separate curse on Canaan. The concepts were
Canaan (son of Ham) Semitic name for this region. The etymology is uncertain. One explanation is that it has an original meaning of "lowlands", from a Semitic root "to be low, humble, depressed", in contrast with Aram, "highlands". An alternative suggestion derives the term from Hurrian "Kinahhu", purportedly referring to the colour purple, so that "Canaan" and "Phoenicia" would be synonyms ("Land of Purple"), but it is just as common to assume that "Kinahhu" was simply the Hurrian rendition of the Semitic . Canaan (son of Ham) Canaan ( "Kena‘an"), according to the "Book of Genesis" in the Hebrew Bible, was a son of