Jōmon period

History of Japan
Periods Paleolithic before 14,000 BC Jōmon 14,000 – 300 BC Yayoi 300 BC – 300 AD Kofun 300–538 Asuka 538–710 Nara 710–794 Heian 794–1185 Kamakura 1185–1333 Kenmu Restoration 1333–1336 Muromachi (Ashikaga) Nanboku-chō Sengoku 1336–1573 Azuchi–Momoyama Nanban trade 1573–1603 Edo (Tokugawa) Sakoku Convention of Kanagawa Bakumatsu 1603–1868 Meiji Boshin War Restoration First Sino-Japanese War Boxer Rebellion Russo-Japanese War 1868–1912 Taishō World War I 1912–1926 Shōwa Financial crisis Militarism World War II Occupation Economic miracle Post-occupation Bubble economy 1926–1989 Heisei Lost Decade Great Hanshin earthquake Great East Japan earthquake Imperial transition 1989–2019 (planned) Reiwa 2019 (planned)
Topics Currency Earthquakes Economy Education Empire Historiography Military Naval Post-war
Glossary Timeline

The is the time in Japanese prehistory which started in roughly 14,000 BC to 10,000 BC.

The period ended in roughly 500 BC or 400 BC to 300 BC.

"Jōmon" means "patterns of plaited cord" or "cord-patterned" from the way they decorated their pottery. The Jōmon people were closely related to the ancestors of other East Asians, but became isolated on the Japanese archipelago in 15,000BCE and recived some geneflow from an European-related population from Siberia along a North to South cline. It is suggested that the Jōmon, like other East Asians and Native Americans, ultimately originated in Southeast Asia. Cultural similarities exist with Native Americans.

Gallery

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  Jōmon pottery

Jōmon Period Media

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  Reconstruction of the Sannai-Maruyama Site in the Aomori Prefecture. It shares cultural similarities with settlements of Northeast Asia and the Korean Peninsula, as well as with later Japanese culture.

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  Incipient Jōmon pottery (14th–8th millennium BC) Tokyo National Museum, Japan

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  Jōmon pottery in the Yamanashi museum.

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  Spray style Jōmon pottery

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  The Japanese archipelago, during the last glaciation in about 20,000BC.

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  Azuki bean cultivation was common in southern Jōmon period Japan and also in southern China and Bhutan.

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  Jōmon clay mask, bearing similarities to clay masks found in the Amur region.

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  The Magatama is jewelry from Jōmon period Japan, and was also found in the Korean Peninsula and Northeast Asia.

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  Reconstruction of Jōmon period houses in the Aomori Prefecture.

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  Jōmon period clay figure from the Yamanashi Prefecture.

Related pages

• Ainu people

Other websites

Media related to Jōmon period at Wikimedia Commons

• University of Tokyo, Memory of the Jomon Period
• Niigata Prefectural Museum of History, The Prehistoric Archaeology of Japan Archived 2011-07-16 at the Wayback Machine