Semitic
Semitic most commonly refers to the Semitic languages, a name used since the 1770s to refer to the language family currently present in West Asia, North and East Africa, and Malta.
The Semitic languages are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family. They include Arabic, Amharic, Hebrew, and numerous other ancient and modern languages.
They are spoken by more than 330 million people across much of West Asia,[note ^1] the Horn of Africa,[note ^2] and latterly North Africa,[note ^3] Malta,[note ^4] West Africa, Chad, and in large immigrant and expatriate communities in North America, Europe, and Australasia.
The terminology was first used in the 1780s by members of the Göttingen school of history, who derived the name from Shem, one of the three sons of Noah in the Book of Genesis.