History of Japan

The written history of Japan begins with brief information of Twenty-Four Histories, a collection of Chinese historical texts, in the 1st century AD. However, there is evidence that suggest people were living on the islands of Japan since the upper paleolithic period.[1] Following the last ice-age, around 12,000 BC, the rich ecosystem of the Japanese Archipelago fostered human development. The earliest-known pottery belongs to the Jōmon period. The Japanese Paleolithic age covers a period starting from around 100,000 to 30,000 BC, when the earliest stone tool implements have been found, and ending around 12,000 BC, at the end of the last ice age, corresponding with the beginning of the Mesolithic Jōmon period. A start date of around 35,000 BC is most generally accepted.[2] The Japanese archipelago was disconnected from the continent after the last ice age, around 11,000 BC. After a hoax by an amateur researcher, Shinichi Fujimura, had been exposed[3], the Lower and Middle Paleolithic evidence reported by Fujimura and his associates has been rejected after thorough reinvestigation. Only some Upper Paleolithic evidence not associated with Fujimura can be considered well established