The origins of farming in East Asia
Before 8000 BCE, East Asia, like most of the rest of the world, was home to hunter-gatherer peoples. Throughout most of this vast region, small, mobile bands of hunter-gatherers roamed the land.
On the coast, however, comparatively large and stable communities had grown up, nourished by the rich and self-replenishing supplies of sea food available to them. These communities dotted the coastline in a thin chain stretching all the way from Vietnam in the south to Korea in the north, and along the western shores of the Japanese archipelago. They had a remarkably high level of material culture, making fine ceramics (the Jomon people of Japan produced the earliest pottery in the world, dating from c.10500 BCE), polished stone tools and other materials. There is strong evidence for advanced boat-building techniques, and the fact that sea turtles, crocodiles, whales and sharks all featured in their diet suggests that the people were making deep water fishing trips.
Sometime between 8000 and 6000 BCE, farming began in East Asia, in two separate areas. The plateau and central plain of the Yellow River (Huang He) gave rise to an agriculture based on millet, whilst to the south, in the central Yangtze river valley, wet-rice farming emerged. Of the two, the wet-rice agriculture of the Yangtze valley was probably the first to develop.
Wet-rice farming in the Yangtze valley
Wild rice is a marsh plant, so it is hardly surprising that the earliest wet-rice agriculture began in wetland environments of the central Yangtze river basin, on the margins of lakes and rivers.
In the areas where it grew, wild rice had always been a part of the hunter-gatherer diet. The Yangtze valley is on the northern edge of wild rice habitats, and the presence of wild rice there had fluctuated with climatic changes. It is possible that, as the climate cooled after c. 7000 BCE, techniques for cultivating rice were developed so that as the wild rice receded south, a domesticated variety remained, though retaining wild features such as small grains.
By c. 6500 BCE, rice cultivation had become fully established in the central Yangtze valley, although as only one element in a varied diet. Edible water plants such as lotuses and water caltrop were also prominent, and hunting and foraging were still important sources of food. This mix of wetland plant cultivation and hunter-gathering was well suited to this low-lying region of lakes and marshes, and enabled these early farmers to expand outwards into new lands.
Along with stone tools, which included the traditional flaked pebble choppers and axes which harked back to earlier hunter-gatherer times, these people made wooden spades specially to cultivate the soil, and also possessed pottery (in which rice husks were added to improve its firing qualities) and weaving technologies. They lived in permanent villages surrounded by defensive ditches, and their houses were raised on piles or posts above flood levels.
Intensification of rice cultivation
The early farmers soon benefited from the nutritious qualities of rice, and after 6000 BCE they relied more and more upon this plant. The mature domesticated strain was developed, soon dividing into its two main varieties, Indica and Japonica. By c. 4500 BCE, the Daxi culture people in the central Yangze valley lived in large villages containing rectangular, multi-roomed houses constructed of clay, bamboo and reed. They were located in swampy terrain suited to the establishment of rice fields, and the use of the plough shows a further intensification of rice cultivation. The Daxi people also raised cattle, sheep and pigs, and supplemented their diet with hunting and fishing.
Wet-rice agriculture spread out from the core lakelands of the central Yangtze valley and down towards the sea. It also spread upriver, into the Three Gorges area of the Yangtze valley.
The Yellow River region
Several hundred miles north of the Yangtze river, the Yellow River region is much drier and cooler, and unsuitable for rice cultivation. Here, millet became the major crop.
After rising in Tibet and crossing regions of mountain and grassland, the Yellow River cuts through a plateau covered by deep loess soil. Loess is a fine dust which has been blown in from the central Asian steppes over thousands of years, and is some of the most fertile earth on the planet.
The river carries vast quantities of loess as it flows eastward into the huge North China plain and on to the sea. The soil in the water builds up in places, making the river prone to frequent flooding. This has caused immense destruction during China’s long history, but it has also deposited the rich loess over the flood plain.
By c. 6000 BCE, farming villages had appeared in the Yellow River region, practicing a mixed economy in which millet cultivation and stock-raising were combined with hunting, gathering and fishing to provide a stable subsistence base. The villages contained sunken houses with walls made from wood and clay, and roofs made of thatch; the inhabitants of these villages would have numbered in the low hundreds.
Later, two major Neolitihic cultures developed, the Yangshao culture (c. 5200-3000 BCE), on the loess plateau, and the Dawenkou culture (c. 4300-2400 BCE, on the North China plain. As time went by, both cultures saw increasing population densities and social stratification. Surrounding ditches and wooden palisades showed the need for defence.
One interesting development that appears in the Yellow River region around 4000 BCE is pottery inscribed with symbols which look very much like primitive characters. These were probably marks of ownership, or something simple like that, but it represents strong evidence that what later became the Chinese writing system had its roots in this early period.
South-east China – and beyond
The expansion of rice farmers into the sub-tropical zone in south China was taking place by c. 3500 BCE.
Hundreds of miles to the south of the Yangtze valley, wet-rice farming reached the south coast of China, around the mouth of the Pearl River (near present-day Macao and Hong Kong), sometime after 3000 BCE. For millennia, this region had been occupied by hunter-gatherers and fisher groups. As elsewhere, the rich marine environment had enabled them to form impressively large communities. The intrusion of farmers into the area in the 3rd millennium BCE resulted in the emergence of a new hybrid culture.
From the coast of southern China, farming spread to Taiwan. Deep-water transport technologies had been developed by coastal populations by c. 3000 BCE at the latest. Similarities in material culture show that groups had crossed from the mainland to Taiwan by c. 2500 BCE. Such groups were probably ancestral to the Austronesian-speaking peoples who would go on to colonize much of South East Asia, the far-flung islands of the Pacific and as far west as Madagascar.
South-west China – and beyond
Rice farmers had reached the area of the modern-day province of Yunnan, in south-west China, in c. 2500 BCE, dotting the river banks with their villages.
Some of the greatest rivers of Asia flow through Yunnan, from sources high in Tibet or in Yunnan itself. On a map of East and South-East Asia, these rivers resemble the spokes of a wheel, with Yunnan as the hub. The Yangtze and Pearl rivers head east towards the coast of China; the Red River heads south east into Vietnam; the Mekong heads south towards Burma, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam; and the Salween and Irrawaddy rivers flow south and west through Burma and into the Indian Ocean. It is easy to see how Yunnan functioned as the hub for the movement of peoples and cultures from southern China into South East Asia.
The region has a densely wooded, mountainous landscape, and journeys are most easily undertaken by boat, even today. It was by boat that the rice-farming settlers had first arrived in the region from lower down the Yangtze, and it was by boat that their descendants carried their rice-farming culture down into the lands to the south. There they would become the ancestors of the Burmans, Mon, Khmer, Viet and many other groups in South East Asia.
Korea and Japan
Farming came to the Korean peninsula in c. 4500 BCE, from northern China, with the cultivation of millet. Wet-rice cultivation probably reached the peninsula from China early in the 2nd millennium BCE, but then took centuries of adaptation to adapt to the northern climate. After 1000 BCE, however, wet-rice became established as the staple crop, at least in southern Korea.
In Japan, meanwhile, the very successful Jomon hunter-gatherer-fisher culture continued to flourish, effectively keeping farming at bay. The large coastal settlements showed many similarities with farming communities elsewhere – the earliest pottery anywhere in the world comes from Japan, dated to as early as 10500 BCE. After c. 1000 BCE there is evidence that the Jomon people were familiar with rice cultivation, and had also begun to grow some local wild plants, such as yams and taro. However, farming did not become a major part of the economy until after 500 BCE.
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