The curse of Ham theory predated its slave trade use by centuries

Evidence

There was one enslavement theory focused on Black people already circulating, a theory somehow derived from Genesis 9:18–29, which said “that Negroes were the children of Ham, the son of Noah, and that they were singled out to be black as the result of Noah’s curse, which produced Ham’s colour and the slavery God inflicted upon his descendants,” as Khaldun explained. The lineage of this curse of Ham theory curves back through the great Persian scholar Tabari (838–923) all the way to Islamic and Hebrew sources. God had permanently cursed ugly Blackness and slavery into the very nature of African people, curse theorists maintained. As strictly a climate theorist, Khaldun discarded the “silly story” of the curse of Ham. — Ibram X. Kendi, Stamped from the Beginning, 47

Categorization

• DEFINE: Identifies the curse-of-Ham theory and its lineage back through Tabari to Islamic and Hebrew sources.
• XREF: This prefigures the segregationist vs assimilationist split: curse theory is the segregationist variant (genetic/hereditary), climate theory the assimilationist — both antecede the trade itself. — connects to: Cape settlers imported the biblical Ham myth to rationalize racial control by 1707 — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race: Reflections on…, 1352