5.6 The far east: 3000 to 1500 b.c.

China and manchuria

Back to The Far East: 5000 to 3000 B.C.

Chinese legends are bountiful with alleged records at least back to 3,000 B.C., all of which are not easy to substantiate. Excavations in Chekany province in central southern China have revealed a Neolithic Culture, the Yang-Shao, which we have mentioned previously, with painted pottery, dating to about 3,000 BC. The more wide-spread Lung- Shan, black pottery culture peaked at about 2,000 B.C. The legends describe a number of great emperors who taught the people marriage, music, writing, painting, fishing with nets, domestication of animals and the feeding of silk worms. Tradition has it that Empress Si-Ling, wife of the great Huang-Ti, discovered silk about 2,640 B.C. Brick structures may have been erected about 2,600 B.C. along with observations for the study of stars and the construction of a correct calendar. Chinese medicine allegedly began with the legendary Fu Hsi in 2,953 B.C. followed by Shen Nung, the Red Emperor (Hung-Ti), who compiled the first medical herbal material, the Pen-Tsao, about 2,800 B.C. He supposedly personally tested 365 drugs and drew up the first acupuncture charts. More famous is the great medical compendium, the Nei Ching (Canon on Medicine) allegedly developed by Yu Hsiung, the Yellow Emperor (Huang Ti), about 2,600 B.C.. This was transmitted orally until probably the 3rd century B.C. and was still later revised in the 8th century of the Christian Era. The Nei Ching deals with all phases of health and illness, prevention as well as treatment, including acupuncture. Tea, which grows wild in Manchuria

From the middle of the third millennium B.C. the heart of the Yellow River valley was densely populated. It took a large and disciplined force to drain and flood control this flood plain. A small type of pig was found in every hut and the ox-cart was known by 2,000 B.C. The horse and chariot came a little later with the horses similar to the wild Mongolian ponies with heavy heads and short legs. Foxtail millet and a small amount of wheat (spread from the west) were grown. Rice was cultivated much later, beginning south of the Yangzte

Japan

Peopled with Neolithic societies.

Korea

There is archeological evidence of people on this peninsula in a Neolithic society by 3,000 B.C. (Ref. 113 )

Southeast asia

Most of this area had peasant farmers and hunting groups and we know that bronze was used very early in Thailand. Iron objects seem to have been made there about 1,600 B.C. or even earlier. This was "wrought" iron, made by heating ore only to about 1,083 degrees Centigrade and then hammering away the slag from the iron globules. (Ref. 8 , 215 )

Waves of Stone Age people colonized the Indonesian islands from the mainland. An Austronesian people using Lapita pottery appeared in the Moluccas area of Indonesia sometime in this period, and they began to migrate slowly eastward. From about 3,000 B.C. on, the Malays in the Philippines were joined by a more advanced race from Indonesia. These two peoples merged, building up a tribal system known as the barangay. (Ref. 8 , 175 )

Forward to The Far East: 1500 to 1000 B.C.

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