Semitic [E19th] In the Old Testament story of Noah, Shem or Sem is his eldest son, the others being Japhet and Ham. Their descendants are said to have repopulated the earth after the Flood (Genesis 10). The forms Shemite and Shemitic are found in English, but the forms Semitic and Semite [L16th], based on Sem, the Latin form of his name (Latin has no ‘sh’ sound) is much more usual. Despite the fact that Semite and Semitic are most often found as synonyms for ‘Jew, Jewish’, frequently in a derogatory sense, Shem’s descendants are said to have repopulated much of the land to the east of the Mediterranean, and traditionally included the Hebrews, Aramaeans, Assyrians, and Arabs. The words were initially introduced as linguistic terms to describe a family of languages of which Hebrew, Aramaic, Arabic, Ethiopic, and ancient Assyrian are members. Anti-Semitic is mid 19th century, and anti-Semitism late 19th.