Gomer (גֹּמֶר) is the firstborn of Yefet and grandfather of three distinct peoples through his sons Ashkenaz, Riphath, and Togarmah. Ancient sources — including the Greek historian Herodotus — identify Gomer's descendants with the Cimmerians, a nomadic people who swept through Anatolia in the 8th–7th centuries BCE, sacking Phrygia and threatening Lydia before being absorbed into the surrounding cultures.
The identification of Gomer with the Germanic and Celtic peoples traces through the ancient connection between the Cimmerians and the Cimbri of northern Europe. Later Jewish commentators associated Gomer specifically with Germany (in medieval Hebrew, Ashkenaz came to mean the German-speaking Jewish world precisely because of Gomer's son Ashkenaz). Togarmah's descendants are associated with the Armenian, Turkish, and Caucasian peoples.
In Ezekiel 38:6, Gomer — "with all its troops" — is listed among the nations that join Gog of Magog in the great northern coalition against Israel in the latter days. The phrase "all its troops" (kol-agafehah) suggests a substantial and organized military contingent. Gomer thus appears not only as a Table of Nations ancestor but as a prophetically significant nation in the eschatological vision of Ezekiel.
