Japheth - Ethnic Legends

Ethnic Legends

In the seventh century, Isidore of Seville published his noted history, in which he traces the origins of most of the nations of Europe back to Japheth. Scholars in almost every European nation continued to repeat and improve upon Saint Isidore's assertion of descent from Noah through Japheth into the nineteenth century.

Georgian nationalist histories associate Japheth's sons with certain ancient tribes, called Tubals (Tabals, Tibarenoi in Greek) and Meshechs (Meshekhs/Mosokhs, Moschoi in Greek), who they claim represent non-Indo-European and non-Semitic, possibly "Proto-Iberian" tribes of Asia Minor of the 3rd-1st millennia BC.

In the Polish tradition of Sarmatism, the Sarmatians were said to be descended from Japheth, son of Noah, enabling the Polish nobility to imagine themselves able to trace their ancestry directly to Noah.

In Scotland, histories tracing the Scottish people to Japheth were published as late as George Chalmers' well-received Caledonia, published in 3 volumes from 1807 to 1824.