To You 2,000 Years Later - Japanese and Seongju Grandma

August 3, 2022

The genetic background of Japanese people is farther away than one might think from Koreans, who are thought to be close, and even more so from the majority of modern Chinese people.

Nearly 40% of the Japanese DNA comes from the Jomon people, who are said to have lived in the Japanese archipelago until the Yayoi period.

On the other hand, Chinese and Korean people have almost no DNA that is the same as that of the Jomon people, so it seems that the ancestors of the Japanese people simply passed through the continent.

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Of the remaining 60% of Japanese DNA, 30% have roots in northern China north of Beijing and 30 % in southern China south of Shanghai.

Since ancient times , the northern part of the country has frequently been invaded by foreign tribes across the Great Wall, resulting in a mixture of farmers and nomads from the Yellow River basin.

The ancient Hua dynasty directly ruled the area up to present-day Pyongyang and indirectly ruled the Korean Peninsula beyond.

Every time a change of dynasty occurred and chaos ensued, Chinese people from Pyongyang would flee in droves to Japan.

Modern Korean DNA is a mix of this Chinese heritage, Siberian and Manchurian heritage from further north, and primitive people different from the Jomon people.

They shared less than 30% of their DNA with Japanese people, who share the same language and cultural heritage .

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It was people living in the area of ​​present-day Shanghai who introduced hydroponic rice cultivation to Japan.

Rice cultivation began in this area 7,500 years ago, but due to drifting and warfare, a group of people traveled all the way across the East China Sea to Japan.

Yes, together with the ancestors of Koshihikari, the first wave of rice began the Yayoi period 3,000 years ago.

At that time, the Shanghainese people were a different ethnic group, collectively known as "Yue Ren," who looked different from the Han Chinese . They were literally considered to be a race similar to the Vietnamese people of today .

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Many Chinese Xingzhou people trace their roots to people who came from Fujian and Guangdong in the 19th century.

As mentioned above, in ancient times the coastal area of ​​China south of Shanghai was the territory of the Yue people, who introduced hydroponic cultivation to Japan.

In other words, Japanese and Chinese share the same DNA through the Yue people. If we go back 2,000 to 3,000 years ago, our ancestors may have grown rice in the same paddy fields.

We share the same DNA as you 2,000 years from now, and the same history in the far-flung Yangtze River basin. And the Japanese and the Chinese are also connected by the rice of Echigo.

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This summer, I've been completely hooked on "Kingdom," a story about the wars of ancient China...

Our ancestors lived in the same place at that time and ate the same rice.

I felt a strange sense of familiarity with the familiar Hanasei-obaasan in her T-shirt, shorts, flip-flops, and black-rimmed round glasses.