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[[File:Asiacolour.PNG|thumb|upright=1.35|Map of Asia
]] Prehistoric Asia refers to events in Asia during the period of human existence prior to the invention of writing systems or the documentation of recorded history. This includes portions of the land mass currently or traditionally considered as the continent of Asia. The continent is commonly described as the region east of the Ural Mountains, the Caucasus Mountains, the Caspian Sea, Black Sea and Red Sea, bounded by the Pacific Ocean, Indian Ocean, and . This article gives an overview of the many regions of Asia during prehistoric times.
The earliest human fossils found outside of Africa are skulls and mandibles of the Asian Homo erectus from Dmanisi (modern Republic of Georgia) in Caucasus, which is a land corridor that led to North Asia from Africa and Near East or Middle East. They are approximately 1.8 Ma (Megaannum, or million years) old. Archaeologists have named these fossils Homo erectus georgicus. There were also some remains that looked similar to the Homo ergaster, which may mean that there were several species living about that time in Caucasus. Bones of animals found near the human remains included short-necked , , ancient rhinoceroses from Africa and Machairodontinae and wolf from Eurasia. Tools found with the human fossils include simple stone tools like those used in Africa: a lithic flake, lithic core and a chopper.
The oldest Southeast Asian Homo fossils, known as the Homo erectus Java Man, were found between layers of volcano debris in Java, Indonesia. Fossils representing 40 Homo erectus individuals, known as Peking Man, were found near Beijing at Zhoukoudian that date to about 400,000 years ago. The species was believed to have lived for at least several hundred thousand years in China, Peking Man . The History of Human Evolution. American Museum of Natural History. April 23, 2014. and possibly until 200,000 years ago in Indonesia. They may have been the first to use fire and cook food. Homo erectus. London: Natural History Museum. Retrieved April 23, 2014.
Skulls were found in Java of Homo erectus that dated to about 300,000 years ago.Keat Gin Ooi. Southeast Asia: A Historical Encyclopedia, from Angkor Wat to East Timor. ABC-CLIO; 1 January 2004. . p. 173–174. A skull was found in Central China that was similar to the Homo heidelbergensis remains that were found in Europe and Africa and are dated between 200,000 and 50,000 years ago. New Migrants. American Museum of Natural History. Retrieved April 23, 2014.
Researchers believe that the modern human, or Homo sapiens, migrated about 60,000 years ago to South Asia along the Indian Ocean, because people living in the most isolated areas of the Indian Ocean have the oldest non-African DNA markers. Humans migrated into inland Asia, likely by following herds of bison and mammoth and arrived in southern Siberia by about 43,000 years ago and some people moved south or east from there. By Land and Sea. American Museum of Natural History. Retrieved April 23, 2014. Steppes into Asia. American Museum of Natural History. Retrieved April 23, 2014. By about 40,000 years ago Homo sapiens made it to Malaysia, where a skull was found on Borneo in Niah Cave. Modern humans interbred with an archaic human species called Denisovans on the islands of Southeast Asia.
Homo sapiens females weighed an average of and were on average tall. The males weighed an average of and were on average tall. They were omnivorous. As compared to earlier hominids, Homo sapiens had larger brains and used more complex tools, including, blades, awls, and out of antlers, bones and ivory. They were the only hominids known to develop language, make clothes, create shelters, and store food underground for preservation. In addition, language was formed, rituals were created, and prehistoric art was made. Life During the Ice Age. American Museum of Natural History. Retrieved April 23, 2014.
At the southwestern edge of North Asia is Caucasus. It is a region at the border of Europe and Asia, situated between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea seas. Caucasus is home to the Caucasus Mountains, which contain Europe's highest mountain, Mount Elbrus. The southern part of the Caucasus consists of independent sovereign states, whereas the northern parts are under the jurisdiction of the Russian Federation.
Evidence from full genomic studies suggests that the first people in the Americas diverged from Ancient East Asians about 36,000 years ago and expanded northwards into Siberia, where they encountered and interacted with a different Paleolithic Siberian population (known as Ancient North Eurasians), giving rise to both Paleosiberian peoples and Ancient Native Americans, which later migrated towards the Beringian region, became isolated from other populations, and subsequently populated the Americas.
The Armenian Highland, in Prehistoric Armenia, shows traces of settlement from the Neolithic era. The Shulaveri-Shomu culture of the central South Caucasus region is one of the earliest known prehistoric culture in the area, carbon-dated to roughly 6000–4000 BC. Another early culture in the area is the Kura-Araxes culture, assigned to the period of ca. 3300–2000 BC, succeeded by the Georgian Trialeti culture (ca. 3000–1500 BC).
The prehistory of Georgia is the period between the first human habitation of the territory of modern-day nation of Georgia and the time when and Urartu, and more firmly, the Classical accounts, brought the proto-Georgian tribes into the scope of recorded history.
Ancestors of East Asians split from other human populations possibly as early as 70,000 to 50,000 years ago. Ancestral East Asians, which gave rise to modern East/Southeast Asians, Polynesians, Siberians and Native Americans, expanded in multiple waves outgoing from Southern China northwards and southwards respectively. Population genomic data suggest that Paleolithic East Asian show continuity to modern East Asians and related groups.
Early humans were attracted to what was the warm, fertile climate of Central China more than 500,000 years ago.Marshall Cavendish, World and Its Peoples: Eastern and Southern Asia. New York: Marshall Cavendish. 1. 2007. p. 30. Skeletal remains of about 45 individuals, known collectively as Peking Man were found in a limestone cave in Yunnan province at Zhoukoudian. They date from 400,000 to 600,000 years ago and some researchers believe that evidence of hearths and artifacts means that they controlled fire, although this is challenged by other archaeologists. About 800 miles west of this site, near Xi'an in the Shaanxi province are remains of a hominid who lived earlier than Peking Man.
Between 100,000 and 200,000 years ago, humans lived in various places in China, such as Guanyindong in Guizhou, where they made Levallois stone artefacts. After 100,000 Common era, Homo sapiens lived in China and by 25,000 BCE the modern humans lived in isolated locations on the North China Plain, where they fished and hunted for food. They made artifacts of bone and shell. Starting about 5000 BCE humans lived in Yellow River valley settlements where they farmed, fished, raised pigs and dogs for food, and grew millet and rice. Begun during the late Neolithic period, they were the earliest communities in China. Its artifacts include ceramic pots, fishhooks, knives, arrows and needles. In the northwest Shaanxi, Gansu and Henan provinces two cultures were established by about the sixth millennium BCE. They produced red pottery. Other cultures that emerged, that also made pottery, include the Bao-chi and Banpo people of Shaanxi and the Cishan culture people of Hebei.
The Yangshao culture, who existed between 5000 and 2500 BCE, were farmers who lived in distinctive dwelling which were partly below the surface. Their pottery included designs which may have been symbols that later evolved into written language. Their villages were in western Henan, southwestern Shanxi and central Shaanxi. Between 2500 and 1000 BCE the Longshan culture existed in southern, eastern and northeastern China and into Manchuria. They had superior farming and ceramic making techniques to that of the Yangshao people and had ritualistic burial practices and worshiped their ancestors.Marshall Cavendish, World and Its Peoples: Eastern and Southern Asia. New York: Marshall Cavendish. 1. 2007. pp. 30-31. Subsequent dynasties include the Xia dynasty, Shang dynasty, and Zhou dynasty, when the Old Chinese language developed.Marshall Cavendish, World and Its Peoples: Eastern and Southern Asia. New York: Marshall Cavendish. 1. 2007. pp. 31-36.
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from: -3000 till: -2700 text:[[Majiayao|Majiayao culture]]
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from: -3000 till: -2700 text:[[Longshan|Longshan culture]]
from: -2000 till: -1550 text:[[Xia Dynasty]]
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from: -1550 till: -1046 text:[[Shang|Shang Dynasty]]
from: -1046 till: -700 text:Zhōu
At 1.4 million years, Ubeidiya in the northern Jordan River Valley is the earliest Homo erectus site in the Levant.
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from: -3300 till: -1200 text:Classic Bronze Age
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from: -3300 till: -1200 shift:(0,5) text:Ancient Near East
from: -3300 till: -2100 text:Early Bronze Age
from: -2100 till: -1550 text:Intermediate Bronze Age
from: -1550 till: -1200 text:Late Bronze Age
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from: -2900 till: -2350 text:Sumerian city-states
from: -2350 till: -2193 text:[[Akkadia|Akkadian Empire]]
from: -2119 till: -2000 text:Ur
from: -2000 till: -1700 shift:(0,5) text:[[Babylonia]]
from: -2000 till: -1800 text:[[Assyria]]
from: -1600 till: -1200 text:[[Kassites]]
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from: -3200 till: -1070 shift:(0,5) text:[[Ancient Egypt]]
from: -3200 till: -3000 text:[[Protodynastic|Naqada III]]
from: -3000 till: -2700 text:Archaic
from: -2700 till: -2180 text:Old Kingdom
from: -2050 till: -1700 text:Middle Kingdom
from: -1550 till: -1070 text:New Kingdom
The Riwat site in Pakistan contains a few artifacts – a lithic core and two lithic flake – that might date human activity there to 1.9 million years ago, but these dates are still controversial.
The South Asian prehistory is explored in the articles about Prehistoric Sri Lanka, India and Tamil Nadu
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from: -3000 till: -2700 text:Early Indus
from: -2700 till: -1900 text:[[Mature Harappan]]
from: -1900 till: -1550 text:Late Harappa
The rich Sangiran Formation in Central Java (Indonesia) has yielded the earliest evidence of hominin presence in Southeast Asia. These Homo erectus fossils date to more than 1.6 Ma. Remains found in Mojokerto have been dated to 1.49 Ma.
Its history is told by region, including the Early history of Burma and Cambodia, as well as the articles about Prehistoric Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia.
Skeleton remains were found of a hominid that was only tall as an adult in Indonesia on the island of Flores. It had a small brain and, nicknamed "the Hobbit" for its diminutive structure, was classified distinctly as Homo floresiensis. Evidence of H. floresiensis has been dated to be from 50,000 to 190,000 years ago, after early publications suggested the small hominid persisted until as recently as 12,000 years ago. Spreading through Asia. American Museum of Natural History. Retrieved April 23, 2014. Ancestral East Asians are suggested to have originated in Mainland Southeast Asia, before expanding northwards.
The form the indigenous population of Southeast Asia, but were largely absorbed by Austroasiatic- and Austronesian-speaking groups that migrated from southern East Asia into Mainland and Insular Southeast Asia with the Neolithic expansion. The remainders form minority groups in geographically isolated regions.
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