Hagarite

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A member of an ancient nomadic people of the Old Testament, traditionally regarded as descendants of Hagar, the servant of Abraham
2. One of a biblical tribe of desert wanderers who were said to trace their lineage back to Hagar, the mother of Ishmael
3. Describing a person belonging to an ancient Arab-related people in the Bible who were thought to descend from Abraham's servant Hagar

Etymology: The word is a close synonym of "Hagarene," and both trace back to Hagar, the Egyptian servant of Abraham and mother of his son Ishmael in the Book of Genesis. Hagar's descendants were thought to be the Hagarites, a people named in the Hebrew Bible (Psalm 83 and 1 Chronicles 5 mention them), and the name passed into the Western languages as a label for the Arabs. Medieval Latin formed "Agarenus" from the same root, and English took the form "Agarene" from that Latin in the Middle English period. The "-ite" ending in "Hagarite" is the familiar suffix used to mark a group of people descended from or belonging to a named ancestor, as in "Israelite," which is why it sits alongside the "-ene" form, which follows Latin patterns. Both forms rest on the same belief: that the Arabs were the children of Hagar and, through Ishmael, of Abraham. The name records a claim about ancestry rather than a verified historical link.