Genesis 10 contains a table of the nations that has been and can be readily verified by secular history, archaeology and culture but is also very accurate just in a biblical context. This table begins with Noah and his three sons including Japheth. Japheth as the head of the Indo-European people as well as probably the Chinese and other Far East people has been in different cultures made into a god. For example it is from this name came Iupater or then Jupiter who was the father of the gods for the Romans. Japheth is the ancestor of the white or light skinned people of the world. Japheth was also worshipped by the early Greeks as Iapetos or Iapetus that they thought was the son of heaven and earth and the father of a multitude of nations. The Irish Celts, Britons and Saxons also traced their royal dynasties to Japheth.
Gomer was the ancestor of the Cymry who later came to live in Wales and the Cimerians or Cimbri from whom came the Celtic people or the Germanic people. From Gomer also came Ashkenaz which name was associated with Germany in Jewish literature in medieval times. In Jeremiah 51:27 it is mentioned that Ashkenaz at first came to live in Ararat and Armenia. Ashkenaz was one of the grandsons of Japheth through Gomer and was the ancestor of the Germanic people and their languages including German, Dutch, and English. The Jews of Germany and Eastern Europe are still called Ashkenazi Jews today. The Ashkenazi people first dwelt in Armenia in central Asia. Ashkenaz and his father Gomer were eventually related to the Germanic people. The Assyrians mention a tribe, the Askuza, involved in a revolt in the 600s BC that is also mentioned in Jeremiah 51:27 in the Old Testament. From the Bible reference it can be determined that the Askuza can be associated with the descendants of Ashkenaz Based on the Encyclopeia Judaica the Ashkenaz later came to live in what is now Germany especially around the Rhine River. Even up to the present the Ashkenazi Jews is a term for Jews of Europe especially Germany or Eastern Europe. However, Ashkenaz would refer to Germanic people that are Gentiles based on Genesis 10 including the Saxons in Germany and the Angles from Denmark that later migrated to the British Isles then other English speaking parts of the world as the Anglo-Saxons. This is a much better and more biblical and accurate historical basis for the origin of the Anglo-Saxon people than the so-called British Israelism that proposes that the Anglo-Saxons are descendants of the 10 lost tribes of Israel. The people of Gomer originally dwelt on the shores of the Caspian Sea. In the 1st century and there is historical basis that they were Celtic people who migrated to Turkey in the 1st or 2nd century BC from France but what was before called Gaul. Gaul was the name for the region of France as used by the ancient Romans and perhaps the ancient Greeks.
Riphath was a son of Gomer the son of Japheth who named his descendants the Riphaei, Riphaces and Piphlataci who were known after more time as the Paphlagonians who were a people and former Roman Empire province in what is now northern Turkey on the shore of the Black Sea. This identity is confirmed by the Jewish historian Josephus. Riphath also gave his name to the Riphaean mountains that some ancient scholars considered the northern boundary of the Earth. The descendants of Togarmah at first lived in the region of Armenia which then spread into what is now Turkey. The people of Armenia have claimed to be the descendants of Togramah and Ashkenaz. It is probable the ancient people of Turkey descended from Togarmah.
Magog probably gave birth to the people called by the Greeks the Scythians or Tartars who even to current times compose a significant part of the population of what is now called Russia. Their Y Chromosome from the males is still prevalent in the area now called Uzbekistan which would probably be under Magog in Genesis 10. Magog is a term for the people who became known at the Scythians (Skythai) according to the 5th century BC (BCE) Greek historian Herodotus. Magog is a term for Russia, Ukraine, north-eastern Europe and northern Asia. Magog is a Hebrew word that is sometimes used interchangeably with the Greek Scythia which referred to roughly the same area. The Irish are also said to be descendants of Japheth through Magog. The Aryan or lighter skinned people of north India or northern south Asia are probably partly derived from Magog and central Asia as could be supported by the frequent reference to ceremonial horse sacrifices in the ancient Hindu Rig Veda scriptures that were the scriptures brought by the Aryan invaders into India around the 15th century BC.
The Dravidians or the former Indus Valley civilation are more now in southern India such as the Tamils and Telegu. They are probably derived from Cush the son of Ham, especially his sons Seba and Sabteca who lived in East Africa near the Red Sea. Madai the son of Japheth are the people that in English are called the Medes and dwelt mostly in what is now called Iran or Persia. Iran is said to mean the land of the Aryans and were composed of the Medes or the Madai and the Semite Elamites. These Iranians or Persians probably carried out the early invasion of about 1500 BC into India that brought Aryan people to India and displaced the earlier Dravidian people of India. These Aryan people as descendents of Japheth through Madai also brought Hinduism including the Hindu god Pra-japati (lord of offspring) and the Vedas or early Hindu scriptures. The Aryan people of India are, like the Iranians, generally olive skinned and look somewhat Caucasian in contrast to the people of India of Dravidian background that are generally of brown or darker skin. Also the Aryan languages of Northern India are of the Indo-European family of languages that includes Persian or Iranian languages but also languages such as Sanskrit, Hindi and Urdu, Bengali, Panjabi, Marathi and Gujarati. The Dravidian family of languages includes languages such as Telegu, Tamil, Kanarese and Malayalam and probably native to India for a longer period and are now spoken mostly in southern India.
Javan is said to refer to the people of Greece, Syria and adjacent regions. Javan is said to have changed to Iamanu then Iawones from which we get our term Ionian in English for a region of Greece especially the islands of Greece between Greece and Turkey and the Sea or part of the Mediterranean Sea between them. Elishah, like his father Javan, was identified with the Greek people. There are two Greek cities named after Elishah, Elis and Elissus as well as the larger area of Ellas. This term also gave rise to the term Hellas or Hellenic or Hellenism for the Greek land, language, people or culture. The title Elishah probably also is the original inspiration for the Elysian Fields which was a paradise imagined in Greek mythology. Kittim of Javan and his descendants moved and dwelt in what is now the island of Cyprus. In the Bible and other ancient literature the people and land of Cyprus is Kittim. Finally Dodanim of Javan came from Dodan and the Greeks called them the Dardani or Dandanians of Asia Minor. This name is preserved in the Strait of Dardanelles between European and Asian Turkey and this name is still used today. The ancient Britons of Great Britain claimed to derive from Dardanus.
Tubal is a son of Japheth that is said to have originally lived on the south side of the Black Sea and from there spread north and east to the Caucas. There is evidence that they left their name to Tbilisi the capital of the country of Georgia in the Caucasus area of central Asia and to Tobolsk a major industrial city of Russian Siberia and other parts of central or perhaps some of eastern Siberia. They were called Thobelities by the Jewish 1st century historian Josephus and were later called Iberes which they probably continued with in their dwelling place in the Iberian peninsula of Spain and Portugal. Meshech is a name that also especially refers to the people of what is now Russia and the term for the capital of Russia, Moscow is probably derived from Meshech. Meshech is also often used with Tubal which also refers to the area and people of what is now Russia. By 1200 BC it was mentioned that the people of Meshech had overcome the Hittites and the Jewish historian Josephus in his time says the people of Meshech were called the Cappadocians which were a people of what is now central Turkey. Tiras gave birth to the people who before and still live in what is now Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Albania and other parts of the Balkans of southeast Europe. According to the book After the Flood by Bill Cooper in the Appendix about the nations of Japheth and according to Henry Morris in his book the Genesis Record Tiras the son of Japheth is also thought to have given rise to the Etruscans. They were some of the early inhabitants of Italy. The Jewish historian identifies the descendants of Tiras as the Thirasians that is name called the Thracians. They had a reputation of being warlike and given to overusing alcohol. It is likely the name of the present capital of Albania, Tiranna, is derived from the name Tiras the probable ancestor of the Albanians. Also the descendants of Tiras worshipped him eventually as the god Thuras or Thor. It is also stated that the islands or coastlands of the nations were derived from the sons of Japheth and their descendants and these descendants could include many of the people of the Indian subcontinent, the Far East and the indigenous people of the Americas. The scripture reference in Genesis 10 of the sons of Japheth from which many of the nations descended is as follows:
Now these are the generations of the sons of Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth: and unto them were sons born after the flood. The sons of Japheth; Gomer, and Magog, and Madai, and Javan, and Tubal, and Meshech, and Tiras. And the sons of Gomer; Ashkenaz, and Riphath, and Togarmah. And the sons of Javan; Elishah, and Tarshish, Kittim, and Dodanim. By these were the isles of the Gentiles divided in their lands; every one after his tongue, after their families, in their nations. Genesis 10:1-5
<Tarshish also gave rise to a branch of the Greek people, or of Javan, that is often identified with people who came to live in Spain. It is probable that the ancient Spanish city of Tartesus on the south Spanish coast on the Atlantic side of the Strait of Gilbralter is named after Tarshish. Tartessos and probably Tarshish was located between what is now the city of Cadiz and the Portuguese border being the main location of Tarshish. Previously the Mediterranean Sea was also called the Sea of Tarshish and the Phoenicians who previously lived in an area centred on what is now Lebanon built ships for trading through the Mediterranean that were called ships of Tarshish. It is also possible the people of Tarshish in Spain gave rise to the legend of Atlantis. There was an article on the BBC (British Broadasting Corporation) on June 6, 2004 that gives the most convincing association of existing ruins or physical features with the description by Plato, who is our earliest remaining source of this legend.
For more information see my web page about Atlantis (and Tarshish) at: Atlantis and Biblical Tarshish
For more information, comments, questions and advice contact Doug at dougforheavens33@gmail.com Contact Spirit and Truth Ministries
For an excellent book from a Christian but historically accurate perspective from which much of the information in this article is derived see the book After The Flood The Early Post-Flood History of Europe Traced Back to Noah by Bill Cooper from New Wine Press. Another good source for information is The Genesis Record by Henry Morris from which I have also found some information. Another good source of information of origins of the Germanic people including the Anglo-Saxons is the booklet Germany and the European Nations In Prophecy by Gary Hedrick and published by The Christian Jew Foundation.