Git is a distributed version control system created by Linus Torvalds in 2005. It uses SHA-1 hashes to verify file integrity and manage revisions. The Git object model consists of commit, tree, and blob objects stored in the local repository. Common Git commands include add, commit, push, pull, checkout, diff, branch, merge, rebase, reset, remote, stash, tag, and ignore. Alias commands can be used to shorten common Git commands.