History of Japan

 History of Japan

History of Japan

The earliest prehistoric civilization in Japan is known as the jomo they are best known for their highly detailed and elaborate pottery they left behind these early prehistoric people in abotu Japan essentially uninterrupted for a period lasting over 10,000 years this came to an end with the migration of the Yayoi whom are believed to have migrated into the archipelago between 1,000 and 300 BC from the south these people brought bronze and Iron Age technology from the mainland and advanced farming techniques which greatly increased crop yields and population these large sedentary populations produce large amounts of wealth and power for those who controlled the land and according to Chinese sources there were a hundred kingdoms in Hwa as they referred to Japan during this period some time before 240 ad the Yamato clan gained hegemony over 

The other clans of Japan and began to be referred to as a single Kingdom by the Chinese the Kofun period is marked by the unification of Japan by the Yamato and the construction of massive pyramidal keel shaped burial mounds for the ruling class the rulers of the yamato state were hereditary line of members who still reigned today as the world’s longest dynasty in 538 Buddhism was introduced to Japan by the king of the Korean Kingdom of bekhten thus beginning the Asuka period named after the capital city during this time which also saw the height of centralized imperial power however in 587 the Soga clan took over the government the Yamato Emperor was relegated to a figurehead while the Soga rule his Regents the name Nihon was first used for japan replacing wat during the saga rule 

History of Japan

The Soga were overthrown by the imperial family in alliance with the founder of the Fujiwara clan who would begin a dynasty of regions that consolidated power over the imperial family to an even greater extent than the Soga this influence was not maintained and cultivated by threat of force but through marriage a yamato emperor would marry a Fujiwara daughter there how Fujiwara son would be raised by tradition with the mother’s family and he too would marry a Fujiwara daughter and so on while the Fujiwara were consolidating power further the Nara period is marked by the relocation of the Capitals to present-day Nara this period was typify by widespread droughts and famines the lack of morality was widely blamed for the deprivation in turn the Nara period saw swath of construction of Buddhist temples and an increase in devotion in 794 

The Emperor moved the capital to high-end kill it was here that the Fujiwara solidified their rulers regions and that clan reached its height of power this period also began with a great plague that killed as much as half the Japanese population as the population declined the imperial court became so self-absorbed with internal power struggles that much of the rural nobility gained autonomy and importantly tax-exempt status and began employing their own armies of samurai warriors to defend from and take advantage of their neighbors would you are a power declined as the influence of the imperial court waned as the Heian period drew drew close to other powerful clans descended from branches of the imperial family began their ascendancy and rivalry the Minamoto and the Taira this eventually led to all-out war in fact a series of wars in the first Tyra 

History of Japan

And Minamoto both supported rival Yamato claimants to the imperial throne Tyra triumphed a few years later Minamoto burned the Imperial Palace to the ground and captured the Emperor and retired emperor who had been de facto ruling the nation however beyond this surprise assault Minamoto had not planned well enough this led to another Tyra victory however Minamoto would win a decisive victory in the third war Minamoto no Yoritomo consolidated power over the entire country by 1185 and was declared the first Shogun a few years later in 1192 he ruled with near absolute power relegating the ember’ to ceremonial status likewise Kyoto remained the official capital while Kamakura was in practice during the Kamakura period the bakufu system where the Shogunate developed with a Shogun rule Japan as a military dictator on the Emperor’s behalf became increasingly decentralized 

Were roughly 300 daimyo ruled over small fiefdom where they would support samurai who evolved into a hereditary class of warriors despite the fractured nature of this system Japan was able to organize and muster the forces to defeat two attempted Mongol invasions in 1333 the Ken mu restoration was an ambitious play by the Emperor to regain power for the imperial court in Kyoto this did not last long Ashikaga takauji of related line to the Minamoto x’ re-established the shogunate’s power dashi cog ashokan it gradually slipped into chaos where the daimyo ruled over numerous fractured independent kingdoms battling to ensure their favourite contender would be shogun oda nobunaga daimyo of a small province use firearms obtained through European merchants to great effect promoting men in his army based on ability instead of birth and earning a reputation for ruthlessness Nobunaga United most of Japan 

History of Japan

Before being ambushed and committing ritual suicide Nobunaga’s general Toyotomi Hideyoshi completed the unification of japan he passed laws freeing the majority of slaves in Japan and then embarked upon a massive invasion of the Korean Peninsula after several years of fighting – a stalemate it aoshi died and the invasion was abandoned as civil strife reignited in Japan the decisive battle of sekigahara with early former ally Emidio XI Tokugawa ASU victorious reestablishing the Shogunate under his clans leadership for over the next 250 years the Edo period was marked with relative peace and prosperity in the first 100 years of Tokugawa rule the population doubled to 30 million literacy increased over 30 percent perhaps the highest in the world at the time this golden age eventually devolved in a stagnation 

And economic decline isolationist policies were increasingly adopted and the samurai class with no Wars to fight became a burden on the state’s economy in 1853 an American naval fleet under come or parry forced Japan to open up trade to the rest of the world and after a brief period of internal strife Japan rapidly modernized with a Tokugawa Shogun and abolished power officially was restored to the ember’ but in fact rested with a group of former samurai known as the meze oligarchs in the russo-japanese war the world was shocked to see a European superpower defeated by an Asian country that was shut off from the world just a few decades before Japan continued to pursue an extremely aggressive expansionist policy after that war through the first world war and after joining to access powers during the Second World War 

History of Japan

Were defeated and brought under US military rule after which the modern parliamentary constitutional monarchy of Japan was established still hungry for more Japanese history after this I would recommend you go check out Lin fami one of my favorite channels with fantastic art and he really dives into the details of Japanese history in an entertaining way.