Following theJōmon period, which was characterized by a hunter-gatherer economy, the Yayoi period marked the transition to a productive economy based on wet-rice agriculture. In the latter half of the late Yayoi period (around the 1st century CE), large regional powers emerged throughout western Japan, including the Tokai and Hokuriku regions. By the end of the 2nd century, the political entity known asWa-koku (倭国) had formed. It is generally considered that the Yayoi period transitioned into theKofun period around the mid-3rd century, although the precise starting point of the Kofun period remains debated among scholars.[1][2]
The name “Yayoi” was given in the 19th century by archaeologists, after artifacts and remains characteristic of this period were discovered in the Yayoi district ofTokyo.[1]The most distinctive features of the Yayoi period are the emergence of a new style of pottery and the beginning of intensive rice cultivation in paddy fields.Yayoi pottery is moreutilitarian and simpler in design compared to the decorative and intricateJōmon pottery. With the advent of rice farming, people began tosettle in one place for extended periods. Metallurgical techniques based onbronze andiron were introduced, and the inhabitants began to weave hemp, and to live in raised-floor dwellings withthatched roofs.[3][4]
From an archaeological perspective, the term "Yayoi people" refers collectively to agricultural migrants from theKorean Peninsula and regions to the south, such as the South Pacific, who arrived during the Yayoi period. It does not denote a single ethnic group. These migrants gradually assimilated with the indigenous Jōmon population, forming the foundation of the modernJapanese people.[5]
The degree of Yayoi cultural influence varied by region:Kyushu,Okinawa, and theTōhoku region retained strongerJōmon traits, whileKansai andShikoku exhibited more pronounced Yayoi characteristics.[6]
The Yayoi period is, generally, accepted to date from circa 300 BC to 300 AD.[7][8][9][10] However, although highly controversial,radiocarbon evidence, from organic samples attached to pottery shards, may suggest a date up to 500 years earlier, between ca. 1000 BC and 800 BC.[11][12] During this period, Japan largely transitioned to a more settled, agricultural society, adopting methods of farming and crop production that were introduced to the country (initially in theKyūshū region) from Korea.[13][14][15]
The earliest archaeological evidence of the Yayoi Period is found on northern Kyūshū,[16] though that is still debated. Yayoi culture quickly spread to the main island ofHonshū, mixing with nativeJōmon culture.[17] The name Yayoi is borrowed from a location inTokyo, where pottery of the Yayoi period was first found.[15] Yayoipottery was simply decorated and produced, using the samecoiling technique previously used in Jōmon pottery.[18] Yayoi craft specialists madebronze ceremonial bells (dōtaku), mirrors, and weapons. By the 1st century AD, Yayoi people began usingiron agricultural tools and weapons.
As the Yayoi population increased, the society became more stratified and complex. They wovetextiles, lived in permanent farming villages, and constructed buildings with wood and stone. They also accumulated wealth throughland ownership and the storage of grain. Such factors promoted the development of distinct social classes. Contemporary Chinese sources described the people as havingtattoos and other bodily markings which indicated differences in social status.[19] Yayoi chiefs, in some parts of Kyūshū, appear to have sponsored, and politically manipulated, trade in bronze and other prestige objects.[20] That was made possible by the introduction of an irrigated, wet-rice agriculture from theYangtze estuary in southernChina via theRyukyu Islands orKorean Peninsula.[10][21]
Direct comparisons between Jōmon and Yayoi skeletons show that the two peoples are noticeably distinguishable.[22] The Jōmon tended to be shorter, with relatively longer forearms and lower legs, more deep-set eyes, shorter and wider faces, and much more pronounced facial topography. They also have strikingly raised brow ridges, noses, and nose bridges. Yayoi people, on the other hand, averaged 2.5–5 cm (0.98–1.97 in) taller, with shallow-set eyes, high and narrow faces, and flat brow ridges and noses. By theKofun period, almost all skeletons excavated in Japan except those of theAinu are of the Yayoi type with some having small Jōmon admixture,[23] resembling those of modern-day Japanese.[24]
Northern Kyushu is the part of Japan closest to the Asian mainland.
The origin of Yayoi culture and theYayoi people has long been debated. The earliest archaeological sites are Itazuke or Nabata in the northern part of Kyūshū. Contacts between fishing communities on this coast and the southern coast of Korea date from theJōmon period, as witnessed by the exchange of trade items such as fishhooks and obsidian.[25] During the Yayoi period,cultural features from Korea and China arrived in this area at various times over several centuries, and later spread to the south and east.[26] This was a period of mixture between immigrants and the indigenous population, and between new cultural influences and existing practices.[27]
Chinese influence was obvious in the bronze and copper weapons,dōkyō,dōtaku, as well as irrigated paddy rice cultivation. Three major symbols of Yayoi culture are the bronze mirror, the bronze sword, and the royal seal stone.
Between 1996 and 1999, a team led by Satoshi Yamaguchi, a researcher at Japan'sNational Museum of Nature and Science, compared Yayoi remains found in Japan'sYamaguchi andFukuoka prefectures with those from China's coastalJiangsu province and found many similarities between the Yayoi and the Jiangsu remains.[28][29]
Further links to the Korean Peninsula have been discovered, and several researchers have reported discoveries/evidence that strongly link the Yayoi culture to the southern part of the Korean Peninsula.Mark J. Hudson has cited archaeological evidence that included "bounded paddy fields, new types of polished stone tools, wooden farming implements, iron tools, weaving technology, ceramic storage jars, exterior bonding of clay coils in pottery fabrication,ditched settlements, domesticated pigs, and jawbone rituals".[30] The migrant transfusion from the Korean peninsula gains strength because Yayoi culture began on the north coast of Kyūshū, where Japan is closest to Korea. Yayoi pottery, burial mounds, andfood preservation were discovered to be very similar to the pottery of southern Korea.[31]
However, some scholars argue that the rapid increase of roughly four million people in Japan between the Jōmon and Yayoi periods cannot be explained by migration alone. They attribute the increase primarily to a shift from a hunter-gatherer to an agricultural diet on the islands, with the introduction of rice. It is quite likely that rice cultivation and its subsequent deification allowed for a slow and gradual population increase.[32] Regardless, there is archaeological evidence that supports the idea that there was an influx of farmers from the continent to Japan that absorbed or overwhelmed the native hunter-gatherer population.[31]
Some pieces of Yayoi pottery clearly show the influence of Jōmon ceramics. In addition, the Yayoi lived in the same type of pit or circular dwelling as that of the Jōmon. Other examples of commonality are chipped stone tools for hunting, bone tools for fishing, shells in bracelet construction, and lacquer decoration for vessels and accessories.
According to several linguists, Japonic or proto-Japonic was present on large parts of the southern Korean peninsula.[33][34] ThesePeninsular Japonic languages, now extinct, were eventually replaced byKoreanic languages.[35] Similarly Whitman suggests that the Yayoi are not related to the proto-Koreans but that they (the Yayoi) were present on the Korean peninsula during theMumun pottery period. According to him and several other researchers, Japonic/proto-Japonic arrived in the Korean peninsula around 1500 BC[36][37] and was brought to the Japanese archipelago by Yayoiwet-rice farmers at some time between 700 and 300 BC.[38][39] Whitman and Miyamoto associate Japonic as the language family of both Mumun and Yayoi cultures.[40][37] Several linguists believe that speakers of Koreanic/proto-Koreanic arrived in the Korean Peninsula at some time after the Japonic/proto-Japonic speakers and coexisted with these peoples (i.e. the descendants of both the Mumun and Yayoi cultures) and possibly assimilated them. Both Koreanic and Japonic had prolonged influence on each other and a laterfounder effect diminished the internal variety of both language families.[41][42][43]
Thegolden seal said to have been granted to the "King ofNa inWo" byEmperor Guangwu of Han in 57 AD. It is inscribedKing of Na of Wo in Han Dynasty (漢委奴國王)
The earliest written records about people in Japan are fromChinese sources from this period.Wo, the pronunciation of an early Chinese name for Japan, was mentioned in 57 AD; theNa state of Wo received a golden seal from theEmperor Guangwu of the LaterHan dynasty. This event was recorded in theBook of the Later Han compiled byFan Ye in the 5th century. The seal itself was discovered in northern Kyūshū in the 18th century.[44] Wo was also mentioned in 257 in theWei zhi, a section of theRecords of the Three Kingdoms compiled by the 3rd-century scholarChen Shou.[45]
Early Chinese historians described Wo as a land of hundreds of scattered tribal communities rather than the unified land with a 700-year tradition as laid out in the 8th-century workNihon Shoki, a historical but heavily narrative streamlined account of Japan which dates the foundation of the country at 660 BC. Archaeological evidence also suggests that frequent conflicts between settlements or statelets broke out in the period. Many excavated settlements were moated or built at the tops of hills. Headless human skeletons[46] discovered inYoshinogari site are regarded as typical examples of finds from the period. In the coastal area of theInland Sea, stone arrowheads are often found among funerary objects.
Third-century Chinese sources reported that theWa people lived on raw fish, vegetables, and rice served on bamboo and wooden trays,clapped their hands in worship (something still done inShinto shrines today),[47] and built earthen-grave mounds. They also maintained vassal-master relations, collected taxes, had provincial granaries and markets, and observed mourning. Society was characterised byviolent struggles.[48]
TheWei Zhi (Chinese:魏志), which is part of the Records of the three Kingdoms, first mentionsYamataikoku and QueenHimiko in the 3rd century. According to the record, Himiko assumed the throne of Wa, as a spiritual leader, after amajor civil war. Her younger brother was in charge of the affairs of state, including diplomatic relations with the Chinese court of theKingdom of Wei.[49] When asked about their origins by the Wei embassy, the people of Wa claimed to be descendants of theTaibo ofWu, a historic figure of theWu Kingdom around theYangtze Delta of China.
For many years, the location of Yamataikoku and the identity of Queen Himiko have been subject of research. Two possible sites,Yoshinogari inSaga Prefecture andMakimuku inNara Prefecture have been suggested.[50] Recent archaeological research in Makimuku suggests that Yamataikoku was located in the area.[51][52] Some scholars assume that theHashihaka kofun in Makimuku was the tomb of Himiko.[53] Its relation to the origin of theYamato polity in the followingKofun period is also under debate.
^Lock, Margaret (1998)."Japanese".The Encyclopedia of World Cultures CD-ROM.Macmillan. Archived fromthe original on 13 December 2012. Retrieved10 July 2015.
^Pearson, Richard J. Chiefly Exchange Between Kyushu and Okinawa, Japan, in the Yayoi Period.Antiquity 64(245) 912–22, 1990.
^Kidder, J. Edward Jr. (1993). "The earliest societies in Japan". InBrown, Delmer (ed.).Cambridge History of Japan, vol. 1: Ancient Japan. Cambridge University Press. pp. 48–107.ISBN978-0-521-22352-2. p. 81.
^Mark J. Hudson (1999).Ruins of Identity Ethnogenesis in the Japanese Islands. University Hawai'i Press.ISBN0-8248-2156-4.
^abJared Diamond (1 June 1998)."Japanese Roots".Discover Magazine.19 (6, June 1998). Retrieved12 May 2008.Unlike Jomon pottery, Yayoi pottery was very similar to contemporary South Korean pottery in shape. Many other elements of the new Yayoi culture were unmistakably Korean and previously foreign to Japan, including bronze objects, weaving, glass beads, and styles of tools and houses.
^Janhunen, Juha (2010). "Reconstructing the Language Map of Prehistorical Northeast Asia".Studia Orientalia (108).... there are strong indications that the neighbouring Baekje state (in the southwest) was predominantly Japonic-speaking until it was linguistically Koreanized.
^Vovin, Alexander (2013). "From Koguryo to Tamna: Slowly riding to the South with speakers of Proto-Korean".Korean Linguistics.15 (2): 222–240.
^Karako-kagi Archaeological Museum (2007)."ヤマト王権はいかにして始まったか".Comprehensive Database of Archaeological Site Reports in Japan. Retrieved1 September 2016.
Serafim, Leon A. (2008), "The uses of Ryukyuan in understanding Japanese language history", in Frellesvig, Bjarke; Whitman, John (eds.),Proto-Japanese: Issues and Prospects, John Benjamins, pp. 79–99,ISBN978-90-272-4809-1.
Unger, J. Marshall (2009),The role of contact in the origins of the Japanese and Korean languages, Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press,ISBN978-0-8248-3279-7.
Vovin, Alexander (2013), "From Koguryo to Tamna: Slowly riding to the South with speakers of Proto-Korean",Korean Linguistics,15 (2):222–240,doi:10.1075/kl.15.2.03vov.
