In Genesis, Ham is the son of Noah associated with the ancestry of Canaan.
Genesis 10:6 lists Canaan among Ham’s sons, alongside Cush, Mizraim, and Put. The chapter’s genealogical list is commonly called the Table of Nations and connects Noah’s descendants with peoples and regions known to the biblical world.
Ham’s association with Canaan is often confused with the later “curse of Ham.” Genesis 9 does not actually say that Ham was cursed; Noah pronounces a curse on Canaan after an incident involving Noah’s nakedness. The distinction is important, because later interpreters misused the story to justify racialized systems of slavery, despite the text naming Canaan rather than Ham.
Genesis 10 separately lists Shem’s descendants and Japheth’s descendants. The genealogy is a theological and ethnographic framework, not a modern scientific account of human population history.