The History of Japan

Although the Japanese archipelago has been inhabited for the last 40,000 years, the History of Japan does not begin until the final centuries BCE with the arrival of the Yayoi people from mainland Asia.

Timeline of the History of Japan

Prehistory Japan During The Palaeolithic Period

Archaeological evidence shows that the Japanese archipelago has been inhabited by modern humans for about 40,000 years — as far as we can tell, given that Japanese soil is very acidic and breaks down bone rather quickly, making the preservation of human remains significantly less likely.

The first hunter-gatherers arrived in the Japanese islands during the last ice age between about 38–36,000 BCE. [1] This palaeolithic culture called these islands home for almost the next 30,000 years, before the next major cultural revolutions took place at the End of the Last Ice Age, at the hands of the Jomon People.

The Jomon are the indigenous people of Japan. Beginning around 13,000 BCE — literally during the Younger Dryas at the End of the Last Ice Age, the final glacial phase — we see the first evidence of typical Jomon pottery. Their pottery is the oldest of East Asia, marked by distinct cord impressions made on their pottery before the clay was dry.

However, the Jomon culture was not to last. In a story very similar to that of the interactions with the European settlers and the American Indians, it was the arrival of a foreign people from mainland Asia (the lands of modern China, or Korea more likely) that the true foundations of Japanese society were laid.

Major Periods of Japanese History

Asuka Period

The Asuka Period [538 – 710] was a period of thriving artistic, social, and political development. We might trace the roots of these transformations back to the Kofun Period.