HAM is the name of Noah's second son. It is true that, con trary to the prevailing tradition, he appears in Gen. ix. 24 as the youngest of Noah's three sons, but close examination of this story makes it clear that here the name Ham has replaced an original Canaan. The table of nations in Gen. x. represents Ham as the ancestor of Cush (=Ethiopia) , Mizraim (=Egypt), Put, and Canaan, that is, of the original inhabitants of Palestine and the peoples to the south-west. Ham appears also as a place-name Gen. xiv. 5, and as the designation of a people or place, z Chron. iv. 4o: both references are obscure. See the Cambridge Ancient History, vol. 1, p. 184 seq.