Ancient Civilization of Taiwan

ANCIENT CIVILIZATION OF TAIWAN

I/ Introduction

The History of Taiwan is the history of the people and area of Taiwan. Evidence of human habitation on Taiwan dates back tens of thousands of years. The sudden appearance of an agrarian culture around 3000 BC is believed to reflect the arrival of the ancestors of today's Taiwanese aborigines. The island was colonized by the Dutch in the 17th century, followed by an influx of Han Chinese including Hakka immigrants from areas of Fujian and Guangdong of mainland China, across the Taiwan Strait. The Spanish also built a settlement in the north for a brief period, but were driven out by the Dutch in 1642. The Chinese name of the island, "臺灣" ("Taiwan"), derives from an aboriginal term; in the past (from the 16th century), the island has been called "Formosa" (from Portuguese: Ilha Formosa, "Beautiful Island") by the west. In 1662, Koxinga (Zheng Cheng-gong), a loyalist of the Ming Dynasty, which had lost control of mainland China in 1644, defeated the Dutch and established a base of operations on the island. Zheng's forces were later defeated by the Qing Dynasty in 1683. From then, parts of Taiwan became increasingly integrated into the Qing Dynasty before it ceded the island, along with Penghu, to the Empire of Japan in 1895, following the First Sino-Japanese War. Taiwan produced rice and sugar to be exported to the Empire of Japan, and also served as a base for the Japanese colonial expansion into Southeast Asia and the Pacific during World War II. Japanese imperial education was implemented in Taiwan and many Taiwanese also fought for Japan during the war.

In 1945, following the end of World War II, the Republic of China (ROC), led by the Kuomintang (KMT), became the governing polity on Taiwan. In 1949, after losing control of mainland China following the Chinese civil war, the ROC government under the KMT withdrew to Taiwan and Chiang Kai-shek declared martial law. Japan formally renounced all territorial rights to...