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Semite
people
Semite, obsolete term, popularized in the 19th century, that originally described a member of any people who speak one of the Semitic languages, a family of languages that includes Arabic, Hebrew, Amharic, Aramaic, and Tigrinya, among others. The term was later used in an ethnic sense, even though there has never been a shared Semitic identity among Semitic-speaking peoples. When used in that sense, Semite often referred specifically to people of Jewish origin, regardless of what language they spoke, a reflection of the antisemitism that was concurrent in 19th-century Europe.
The Editors of Encyclopaedia BritannicaThis article was most recently revised and updated by Adam Zeidan.
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