History: Old Japan

The English word for Japan came to the West via early trade routes. The early Mandarin or possibly Wu Chinese (吳語) word for Japan was recorded by Marco Polo as Cipangu. In modern Shanghainese, a Wu dialect, the accent of characters 日本 'Japan' is Zeppen; in Wu, the character 日 has two accents, informal (白讀) and formal (文讀). (In some southern Wu dialects, 日本) The old Malay word for Japan, Jepang, was borrowed from a Chinese language, and this Malay word was encountered by Portuguese traders in Malacca in the 16th century. It is thought the Portuguese traders were the first to bring the word to Europe. It was first recorded in English in a 1565 letter, spelled Giapan.
Prehistory
A Paleolithic culture around 30,000 BC constitutes the first known habitation of Japan. This was followed from around 14,000 BC (the start of the Jōmon period) by a Mesolithic to Neolithic semi-sedentary hunter-gatherer culture, possibly ancestors of the Ainu people, characterized by pit dwelling and rudimentary agriculture. Decorated clay vessels from this period, often with plaited patterns, are some of the oldest surviving examples of pottery in the world. The Yayoi period, starting around 500 BC, saw the introduction of new practices like wet-rice farming, a new style of pottery, and metallurgy, brought by migrants from China and Korea.