and from the people
to the pretended ancestor. But this opinion is shown to be untenable by
the considerations, that, according to historical tradition, Canaan
appears first as [Pg 33] the name of the ancestor;--that the verb
[Hebrew: kne] is never used of natural lowness, but always of
humiliation;--that in our passage, where the name first occurs, it
stands in connection with servitude;--that the masculine form of the
noun (on the adjective termination _an_, compare _Ewald's Lehrb. d.
Heb. Spr._ Sec. 163, b.) is not applicable to the country;--that the
country Canaan is so far from being a lowland, that it appears,
everywhere in the Pentateuch, as a land of hills (see Deut. xi.
2, iii. 25, where the land itself is even called, "that goodly
mountain");[2]--and, finally, that, from all appearance, Canaan is
primarily the name, not of the country, but of the people--the former
being called [Hebrew: arvr kneN], the land of Canaan.

The real etymology of the name is almost expressly given in Judges iv.
23; [Hebrew: vikne], "and God bowed down, or _humbled_, on that day
Jabin the king of _Canaan_." Compare also Deut. ix. 3, where, in
reference to the Canaanites, it is said, [Hebrew: hva iknieM], "He will
humble or subdue them;" and Nehem. ix. 24: "Thou bowedest down before
them the inhabitants of the land--the Canaanites." Our passage also
proceeds upon this interpretation of the name. We are the rather
induced to assume a connection betwixt the name "Canaan," and the
words, "a servant of servants shall he be," as in the case of Japheth
also there is certainly an allusion to the signification of the name,
and probably in the case of Shem also. Perhaps even the name Ham,
_i.e._, "the blackish one," may be connected with the character which
he here displays--a suggestion which we do not here follow up. We
refer, however, for an analogy, to what has been remarked in our
Commentary on the Psalms, in the Introduction of Ps. vii.

Canaan means: "the submissive one." It is a name which the people
themselves, on whose monuments it appears, would never have
appropriated to themselves (just as in the case of the Egyptians also,
on which point _Gesenius_ in the _Thesaurus_, and my work _Egypt_,
etc., p. 210, may be compared), unless it had been proper to them from
their very origin. Ham gave this name to his son from the obedience
which he demanded, but [Pg 34] did not himself yield. The son was to be
the servant of the father (for