The document provides an overview of the geography, prehistory, and early mythology of East Asia, including China, Japan, and Korea. It describes the varied landscapes and climates of different regions in each country. It discusses the theories of early human migration and settlement, including the development of agriculture, pottery, and other Neolithic technologies. It then summarizes some of the key creation myths and mythological rulers in early Chinese history, including the stories of Pan-gu, Yu the Great, and the Xia Dynasty. It concludes with summaries of important Japanese creation myths involving the gods Izanagi and Izanami and their children including Amaterasu.

1. Geography, Prehistory,
Mythology of East Asia and
the Shang Dynasty of China

2. Geography of China
● China as we know it today is much larger than China at many points in its history
○ Current borders encase roughly 3.7 million square miles, making China the 4th largest country in
the world by area, just smaller than the United States
○ Historical China is the area settled by Chinese speakers (Han Chinese) and the territory directly
controlled by them
■ This will be challenged at various points in history as non-Han dynasties control the Empire
● China is generally protected by mountain ranges and deserts in the west and
North, and by the sea in the east.
○ Geographically, the country varies from semi-tropical wetlands to grasslands, plains, deserts and
steppes

3. Political Divisions
● 23 provinces
● 4 municipalities:
Beijing, Shanghai,
Tianjin, Chongqing
● 5 autonomous
regions: Xinjiang,
Ningxia, Tibet
(Xizang), Inner
Mongolia, and
Guangxi
● 2 Special
Administrative
Regions: Macao and
Hong Kong

4. Geographic Divisions of China
● North China Plain
● Loess Plateau
● Sichuan Basin
● Yangtze River Valley
● Southeast Coast
● Southwest Uplands
● Tibetan Plateau
● Xinjiang
● Manchuria

5. North China Plain
● One of the cradles of Chinese civilization, home of the Yellow (Huang) River
○ Often flooded, region has lots of marshes and lakes
○ Provides fertile loess soil for farms, empties into the Yellow Sea
● Known for tamped earth (hangtu) construction
● Wheat-based foods are staples
● Extreme winter and summer temperatures
● Dust storms are common, poor air quality especially in modern times

6. Loess Plateau
● Known for wind-blown alluvium dust
● Fertile land, but arid climate
● Also known for tamped earth construction and cave dwellings
● Wheat products are staples as well
● North and west of the Loess Plateau is the Gobi Desert, 500,000 square miles
covering Inner Mongolia, China, and Mongolia

7. Sichuan Basin
● High mountains surrounding the Basin
● Accessible by the Yangzi River
● Mild climate and fertile soil
● Diverse diet and plentiful crops
● Tea and silkworm growing region
● Known for panda reserves
● Houses are built of timber, stone and straw

8. Yangtze River Valley and Shanghai
● Centered around the Yangzi River
○ Third longest river in the world
○ Dammed by the Three Gorges Dam:
largest hydroelectric plant in the world
○ Major source of irrigation, travel, commerce, and industry
● Cut off from the rest of the country by mountains and wetlands
● Hot and humid summers,
cold but short winters
● Rice and fish are staples
● Plaster construction

9. Southeast Coast
● Similar to the Yangzi River Valley, wet, with wetlands
● The Pearl River system
flows through the region
● Hot, humid summers, mild winters
● Abundant food, up to
three crops a year, with lots of seafood and fowl as well
● High standard of living
and high populations
● Western regions are mountainous
● Houses are built with plaster or
brick due to the high amounts of rain
● Also known for tea
Hong Kong

10. Southwest Uplands
● Rugged mountains and hills
● Lots of rain
● Diverse, with several ethnic groups including Laotians, Vietnamese, Thai, and
Myanma
● Diverse diet, animal grazing, and tea production are common
● Cave dwellings and mud brick homes

11. Tibet and Qinghai
● High altitudes, cold temperatures
● Home of the Himalaya Mountain Range (Home of Mount Everest)
● Arid land with some semi-tropical areas in the south and west
● Nomadic, sparsely populated, known for raising sheep and goats
● Religious life-Buddhism and Islam, is important
● Tents made of yak-felt, and mud brick or stone homes are common

12. Xinjiang
● Desert region surrounded by mountains
● Mountains are the Tianshan Mountain Range
● Desert is the Taklimakan Desert, oasis areas provide cotton, and a variety of fruits
● Native peoples are related to Mongol peoples, but are less nomadic
● Home to the Uighur minority, a Central Asian Muslim people
● Associated with the Silk Road
● Trade is important, wheat is grown when possible
● Yurts and earth/adobe houses are common dwellings

13. Manchuria
● Cold with wetlands from two major rivers
● Rich with natural resources like iron and coal
● Lots of heavy industry today
● Meat and soybeans are common in their diet
● Caves and mud-brick houses are traditional dwellings

14. Geography of Japan
● More than 6,850 islands with 4 main
islands: Hokkaido, Honshu, Shikoku,
and Kyushu. Around the size of
California, but climate varies as much
as the East Coast of the United States
● Island nation, to the north is the Sea
of Okhosk, the Sea of Japan (or the
East Sea in China and Korea) to the
west, the Pacific Ocean and the
Philippine Sea to the south
● Densely forested and mountainous,
most habitable land is along the coast.

15. Hokkaido
● Home to the Ainu people, a native ethnic minority in Japan
● Northernmost island, long and harsh winters and mild summers
● Center of the island is mountainous, with plains to the coasts

16. Honshu
● The main island of Japan
● Mountains run through the entire island
● Two major plains
○ The Kanto Plain, home of Tokyo
○ The Kinai Plain, home of Osaka and Kyoto
● Temperate climate and distinctive seasons, same as Shikoku

17. Shikoku and Kyushu
● Shikoku
○ The smallest but most agriculturally productive island.
○ Still mountainous, but easier to farm
○ Temperate climate and distinctive seasons, same as Honshu
● Kyushu
○ Highly mountainous and volcanic
○ Home of many hot-springs and resorts
○ Another major island, Okinawa, is located 400 miles from Kyushu
■ Home of the Okinawan or Ryukyuan people,
also home to the majority of US military bases in Japan
○ Subtropical and warm year round, especially in Okinawa

18. Geography of Korea
● 85,000 square miles, around the size of Minnesota or Utah
● Bordered by China in the north and Russia in the Northeast
● Mountainous, mountains along with major rivers separate the peninsula from the
rest of Asia
○ Baekudaegan Mountains and the Yalu River make
up the Northern border, home of Mount Baekdu,
the mythological of the Korean people. Also part
of the range is Mount Taebaek, an important religious
and cultural monument with Buddhist and Shamanist shrines
● The eastern coast is also mountainous, while the western coast is flatter and easier
to farm
● The Han River flows into the Yellow Sea near Seoul, historically a major trade
route for Koreans

19. Competing Theories of Origination
● Homo erectus appeared in East Asia 1 million+ years ago
○ Peking Man-a collection of skeletal remains of 40 individuals in a cave
complex
○ Earlier examples than the Peking Man have been found in south China.
● Consensus: H. erectus migrated out of Africa to
West Asia to East Asia
● Competing Theory: the Peking Man is an evolutionary
ancestor that evolved to Homo sapiens independently
from African H. erectus
○ Suggests that not all humans are linked to a common genetic ancestor

20. Paleolithic East Asia (100,000 to 10,000 BCE)
● Home to groups of hunter/gatherers and fishers
● Groups moved with the animals they hunted
● Movement from East Asia to Southeast Asia, the Pacific and Australia begins in
this time
● Language begins during this period
○ Following the characteristics of language provides evidence to how people migrated during this
period
○ Korean and Japanese are related to North Asian Ural-Altaic Languages
○ Chinese is more closely related to Sino-Tibetan-Burman Languages
○ This suggests that humans migrated from Mongolia to Manchuria to Korea to Japan, while another
migration pattern began in China to Southeast Asia and Tibet.

21. Neolithic East Asia
● Pottery developed early:
As early as 8,000 BCE in
China and Korea, 10,000
BCE in Japan
● China can be divided into two zones: the north Millet zone and the south Rice
zone, based on the dominant crop in the various sites
○ North China’s Nanzhuangtou site shows people harvested millet with stone sickles. Pottery was
marked with cords. Hunted deer, clams, snails and turtles
○ Northeast China’s Dawenkou site shows elaborate burials and jade and stone jewelry, often buried
with deceased
○ Southeast China’s Hemudu site shows rice cultivation, wooden houses and farming implements.
Fished, wove baskets and began lacquering pottery. Began developing Jade sculptures around 3,000
BCE
■ The jade used is nephrite jade, a gray or greenish jade, not the usual green jade known today

22. ● An east/west divide existed as well, but may have been a divide in language and
religion
● The late Neolithic period was a time of great cultural contact, borrowing, and war
○ Pottery spread east, cooking tripods spread west
○ Defensive walls begin to appear, evidence of human sacrifices exist
● Chinese prehistory ends around 2000 BCE
○ Domestication of horses spreads from southern Russia into Mongolia and China, starting with
chariot riding
○ Iron spread from the Central Asian steppes into China
● Writing and Rice cultivation spread from China to Korea to Japan

23. ● Korea
○ Humans inhabited Korea at least
30,000 years ago
○ Organized village societies with
fishing and hunting
○ Domesticated dogs
○ Pottery had a distinctive “comb
-marked” design
○ Buried deceased in stone mounds
called “dolmans”
○ Bronze use began around 700 BCE
○ Iron use and rice cultivation began
around 300 BCE

24. ● Japan
○ Human inhabited Japan around 20,000 years ago, possibly coming from
Southeast Asia from the Ryukyuan islands
○ Organized villages sustained by fishing and hunting
○ Domesticated dogs
○ Two separate eras: Jomon and Yayoi, named after the distinctive pottery
styles from each era
○ May have adopted doman burial mounds and Yayoi-style pottery from Korea
○ Began using iron, cultivating rice, silk around 300 BCE

25. Chinese Language,
Chinese, Japanese, and
Korean Creation Myths

26. Writing-A Great Unifier
● China’s writing system first appeared on tortoise shells and cattle bones used for
divination, called “oracle bones” in the Shang Dynasty
○ This ability to divine assistance from the spirit realm gave the Shang power
● Despite mutually unintelligible dialects, a unified system of writing allows for
literate Chinese to communicate with each other and other nations (like Korea
and Japan) who know Chinese characters
○ Korea used Chinese characters until the 15th century, when the system known as “hangeul” or
“hangul” was developed at the order of King Sejong
○ Japan used Chinese until the 8th century, then began using a script to represent Japanese grammar
and ideas
● Shared cultural traditions promote a strong national identity

27. Characters
● Characters are derived from
many sources, including
○ Pictures of nouns
○ Symbols
○ Compound characters

28. Creation Myths
● Story of Pan-gu
○ At the beginning of time, the heavens and the earth were one in a dark, chaotic, egg-shaped mass
○ Pan-gu was born in the egg, and lived inside it for hundreds of thousands of years
○ He shattered the egg and emerged
■ The light bits of the egg rose to form the sky, the heavy bits formed the earth
○ Pan-gu held up the sky for 18,000 years
○ The action of holding the sky exhausted him and he died
■ His breath became the wind and clouds
■ His voice became the thunder
■ His left eye became the moon, his right the sun
■ His muscles became mountains and his fluids the rivers
■ His hair became trees, flowers, and plants
■ The fleas on his skin became living things

29. The Mythological Kings
● King Yao
○ Ruler of China during the period of the Great Flood
○ Credited with the establishment of the central government, the
astrological
calendar and unified the realm by appointing men to rule in each
of the four “corners”
○ He chose a worthy successor rather than appoint his son as heir
■ His successor was Shun, a peasant farmer
■ This action demonstrated his “illustrious virtue”
● Merit and ability to provide just and able government
were more
important than kinship
○ He was a worthy ruler, but could not control the floods, and therefore
the realm

30. ● Shun
○ Recommended based on his filial piety, creating
harmony in his family despite their contempt for
him, his ability to learn and improve himself, and
his willingness to teach
○ He led by example and transformed everyone he
came in contact with through his behavior
○ Shun refused the throne and ruled alongside Yao
before eventually taking the throne
■ Yao and Shun established a precedent of
benevolent and virtuous patriarchal rule

31. ● Yu the Great
○ Yu’s father was appointed by King Yao to control the floods, but he failed
○ Yu was appointed to continue this work-he left home and traveled for years,
building dykes and dams to control the floods
■ He passed over his family in his travels to avoid distraction
○ He succeeded in taming the floods
○ Chosen by King Shun to rule
○ He appointed his son as his heir and established the first dynasty of China,
the Xia Dynasty

32. Xia Dynasty
● No written records exist from the Xia Dynasty, so it is considered a mythological
era in Chinese history
● May have lasted around 400 years
● Many of the early sites may have connections to the Xia, but no records exist to
prove this

33. Japanese Creation Myths
● The Kojiki
○ The story of the age of the gods, when the gods were
in charge of all matters
○ One story is the story of Izanagi and Izanami, the
Brother and sister gods who created Japan
● Izanagi and Izanami
○ Using a jeweled spear, they stirred the oceans and
created the first landmasses
○ After creating land masses, the married and attempted to have children
■ The first, Hiruko (late known as Ebisu) was
deformed and set adrift in the seas
○ In the first attempt at marriage, the sister Izanami spoke first, a ritual error (women shouldn’t speak first)
■ After correcting the error, they gave birth to the many deities and islands in Japan
○ Izanami gave birth to the fire god and was burned to death, going to the land of darkness
■ Izanagi follows and finds she had eaten the food there and could not leave. She was covered in maggots and was rotting. Izanagi fled and was
pursued by her and the host of the dead. He escaped and sealed off Izanami forever
○ Izanagi purified himself in the river, bringing many gods into being, including Amaterasu, the sun goddess, Tsukuyomi, the
moon god and Susanoo, the storm god

34. Amaterasu and Susanoo
● Susanoo was banished from the heavens for
causing destruction on earth
○ On his way to his punishment, he visited his sister Amaterasu to prove his goodness and
honesty
○ The two had a contest, Amaterasu using Susanoo’s sword to produce three beautiful
female goddesses and Susanoo using her jeweled necklace to produce five strong male
gods
○ In celebration, he went on a rampage and destroyed more fields and forests, and as a
joke he flayed Amaterasu’s horse and threw it through her palace roof
● Amaterasu hid herself in a cave
○ All of the gods tried to get her to come out of the cave, but she only came out after
seeing herself in a mirror
○ This mirror is suppose to be in the Ise Shrine

35. Amaterasu and Tsukuyomi
● The pair were married until Tsukuyomi was sent to a feast presented by
the food goddess Uke Mochi
○ The food looked delicious, but produced in such a disgusting manner that Tsukuyomi
was angered and killed the goddess
○ Other versions have Susanoo killing the goddess
● Amaterasu was angered by the killing, and vowed to never look at
Tsukuyomi again, moving to another part of the sky and creating day and
night

36. Korean Creation Myths
● Tan’gun
○ At the time of Emperor Yao (one of the great mythological
emperors in Chinese tradition), Hwan’ung, the son of
Hwan’in (Lord of Heaven) wished to leave heaven and live
on earth
○ After his wish was granted, he and 3,000 followers created a city on Mount Taebeak
○ A tiger and a bear living nearby in a cave prayed to Hwan’ung to let them become human
■ He told the pair to live in the cave, eat mugwort and garlic and avoid the sun for 100 days,
and if they did so they would become human
■ After 21 days, the bear became a woman, but the tiger was unable to follow these instructions
and remained a tiger
○ The bear-woman became pregnant with Hwan’ung’s son, and he was named Tan’gun
○ Tan’gun moved to what is now P’yongyang, made it his capital, and named the kingdom Chosen.
He ruled for 1,500 years and became a mountain god.

37. Shang Dynasty
1600-1050 BCE

38. Characteristics of Shang Culture
● Stratified social classes
● Centralized government
● Bronze metallurgy
● Writing system
● Use of cowrie shells as money
● Urban communities
● Communication with ancestors
using divination
● Tamped earth structures
● Mobilization of population
● Horse-drawn chariots

39. Shang Social Hierarchy
● Elites: Royal family and allies
○ Lived in large compounds and lived
on agricultural surpluses and taxes
○ Power tied to production of bronze
● Aristocracy
○ Extensive land holdings, performed military and administrative purposes with some education
● Artisans and Craftsmen
○ Lived in cities and lived comfortably
● Peasants
○ Lived in the country, worked land they did not own in exchange for a portion of the harvest and
security
● Slaves
○ Captured enemy warriors, performed hard labor and were sacrificed in rituals and funerals

40. Development of Writing and Centralization of
Power● Shang rulers were not considered emperors, but kings
● The Shang state was composed of many smaller states constantly fighting for
territory and supremacy in the Yangzi and Yellow River valleys
○ Shang kings were militaristic in order to maintain their hegemony
○ Ruled a network of walled towns, capital moved with the change of rulers
● By 2000 BCE, the Shang, through oversight and organization from the central
power, became productive Bronze producers
○ Shang rulers monopolized production of bronze by controlling access to copper and tin
○ Many artifacts, including ritual vessels, weapons and chariots have been discovered
■ Ritual artifacts were decorated with geometric animal motifs and taotie masks
■ Artifacts often buried with deceased for use in the afterlife
○ Produced using piece-mold, not lost wax process
● Shang Kings were mediators between earth and the spirit realm
○ Their power was due in part to their ability to communicate with the spirits

41. Oracle Bones and Writing
● Divination was performed using oracle bones: turtle shells or ox scapula, to ask
questions of Shang ancestors, who could affect events on earth
● Offerings and rituals were also a part of this practice
○ Ritual bronze vessels held wine, water, meat, grain, etc, to venerate ancestors
● Bones have been dated as late as 1300 BCE
● Practice
○ Kings make a charge, or affirmative statement
○ A hot poker is applied to the bone, the cracks are interpreted as auspicious or inauspicious
○ The charge is carved into the bone, along with the name of the King or diviner and the result
○ Oracle bones determined harvest times, illnesses, childbirth, military campaigns, dream reading,
natural disasters and other affairs
● Believed in Feng Shui
● Worshipped a supreme deity called Di,who ruled a hierarchy of gods and spirits