History of Surea

The written history of Surea begins with brief information of Twenty-Four Histories, a collection of Chinese historical texts, in the 1st century AD. However, there is evidence that suggest people were living on the islands of Surea since the upper paleolithic period. Following the last ice-age, around 12,000 BC, the rich ecosystem of the Surean Archipelago fostered human development. The earliest-known pottery belongs to the Shodai period.

Prehistory Period
The first signs of occupation on the Surean Archipelago appeared with a Paleolithic culture around 23,000 BC, followed from around 10,000 BC by the Shodai Period, a Mesolithic to Neolithic semi-sedentary hunter-gatherer culture of pit dwelling and a rudimentary form of agriculture. Decorated clay vessels from this period, often with plaited patterns, are some of the oldest surviving examples of pottery in the world.

Shodai Period
The Shodai period lasted from about 10,000 BC to 1,200 BC. The first signs of civilization and stable living patterns appeared around 10,000 BC with the Shodai culture, characterized by a mesolithic to neolithic semi-sedentary hunter-gatherer lifestyle of wood stilt house and pit dwelling and a rudimentary form of agriculture. Weaving was still unknown and clothes were often made of fur. The Shodai people started to make clay vessels, decorated with patterns made by impressing the wet clay with braided or unbraided cord and sticks. Some of the oldest surviving examples of pottery in the world may be found in Surea, based on radio-carbon dating, along with daggers, jade, combs made of shells, and other household items dated to the 8th millennium BC, although the specific dating is disputed. Clay figures known as kunigama (植偶) were also excavated. The household items suggest trade routes existed with places as far away as Yoyoki. DNA analysis suggests that the Fusosaki, an indigenous people that live in central part of Honpura are descended from the Shodai and thus represent descendants of the first inhabitants of Surea. Shodai pottery basic design and form similarities to the Jeulmun potteries in Korea, Jōmon cultures in Japan and to that of the Russian Maritime Province, Mongolia, and the Amur River and Sungari River basins of Manchuria.

Gobun Period
The Gobun period lasted from about 1,200 BC to 400 AD. The start of the Gobun period marked the influx of new practices such as weaving, rice farming, shamanism, iron and bronze-making brought from Korea or China. For example, some paleoethnobotany studies show that wet-rice cultivation began about 8000 BC in the Yangtze River Delta and spread to Surea about 1000 BC.

Surea first appeared in written records in AD 57 with the following mention in China's Book of the Later Han: ''Across the ocean from Lelang are the people of Kie. Formed from more than one hundred tribes, they come and pay tribute frequently''.

The Kyumoki site (大野遺跡) is the most famous archaeological site in the Gobun period and reveals a large, continuously inhabited settlement in Honpura for several hundreds of years. Excavation has shown the most ancient parts to be around 400 BC. Among the artifacts are iron and bronze objects, including those from china via Korean Peninsula. It appears the inhabitants had frequent communication with the mainland and trade relations. Today some reconstructed buildings stand in the park on the archaeological site.

Yuan Dynasty
The Yuan Dynasty (also known as the Yuan Clan Dynasty), starting around the second century BC, saw the introduction of many new practices, such as wet-rice farming, new style of pottery, iron and bronze making, which was brought by migrants from China. Yuan Dynasty was an ancient Surean kingdom, considered the first proper nation of the Surean people.

The Yuan Dynasty also saw the establishment of strong military states centered around powerful clans, and the establishment of the dominant Shōsumo polity centered in the Shōsumo and Risa provinces, from the 2nd century BC to the 4th century AD, origin of the Surean imperial lineage. The polity, suppressing the clans and acquiring agricultural lands, maintained a strong influence in the western part of Surea. Surea started to send tributes to Imperial China in the 2th century. In the Chinese history records, the polity was called Kie and its twelve kings were recorded. Based upon the Chinese model, they developed a central administration and an imperial court system and its society was organized into occupation groups.

According to legend, around 205 BC, most citizens of the unified China were not pleased with Emperor Qin Shi Huang’s dictatorial rule; one of them was a noble general in the court, General Ming Ren. When the emperor was starting get be obsess with the expedition of finding the elixir of life on the legendary Isle of Penglai, General Ming volunteer to lead a great fleet on the expedition. In reality, General Ming had not intended to lead the fleet to find the elixir, but rather to find a new land where they can live, far from the rule of Qin Shi Huang. General Ming’s fleet arrived at the Surean archipelago during the expedition. The fleet was said to consist of around 3000 crew members, 1000 soldiers, 500 boys and girls, and experts of different fields. When they settled down at the archipelago, General Ming acknowledges its natural defenses. They also encounter the then uncivilized natives. Being worshiped as god from heaven by the natives because of their better weapon and knowledge, General Ming was selected as their leader and eventually, became the first emperor of Surea knowed as Emperor Shinmei. Slowly, Emperor Shinmei and his people conquered nearby areas and united the natives and formed a small nation. Before Shinmei died in 198 BC, he passed his throne to his most trusted subordinate, Yuan Wu. Yuan Wu was regarded as the most talented subordinate of Shinmei, having knowledge about astrology, geology, even to the extent of warfare. Soon before his death, he passed his throne to his son, Yuan Kai, marking the precedence for Dynastic Rule or the Hereditary System in Surea.

Another saying is that the founder of the Yuan Dynasty, the legendary Emperor Shinmei, the direct descendant of the Tendou deity Hamukira de Gashin (天昭神), or the Sun Goddess, inside the cave of Mount Tenmon. As the son of heaven, he unified Surea with his divine powers. His throne was passed down generation by generation via his own divine bloodline.

Myō Dynasty
The Myō Dynasty, 438 to 910, is when the proto-Surean Shōsumo polity gradually became a clearly centralized state, defining and applying a code of governing laws, such as the Taiju Reform and Namori Code.

Buddhism was introduced to Surea in 538 by Baekje, to which Surea provided military support, and it was promoted by the ruling class. Prince Yōsūn devoted his efforts to the spread of Buddhism and Chinese culture in Surea. He is credited with bringing relative peace to Surea through the proclamation of the Myō constitution, a Confucian style document that focused on the kinds of morals and virtues that were to be expected of government officials and the emperor's subjects.

A letter brought to the Emperor of China by an emissary from Surea in 587 stated that the Emperor of the Land of Dawn (Surea) sends a letter to the Emperor of the Land of Dusk (China), thereby implying an equal footing with China which angered the Chinese emperor.

Starting with the Taiju Reform, Surean intensified the adoption of Chinese cultural practices and reorganized the government and the penal code in accordance with the Chinese administrative structure (Ryutsumyō 律命) of the time. This paved the way for the influential Confucian philosophy in Surea until the 19th century. This period also saw the first uses of the word Jupon (朝本) as a name for the emerging state.

Warring States Period
In the 9th century AD, power became decentralized during the Warring States Period. In this period, local military leaders known as Daigun (大君) used by the Myō Dynasty began to assert their power and vie for hegemony. To double the trouble, several rebellions broke out from different part of the country hence ushering in an era of warlords. The Warring States Period is marked by a falling apart of the central Myō Dynasty power. Surea now consists of hundreds of states, some only as large as a village with a fort. After further political consolidation, Thirteen prominent states remained by the mid of the 10th century AD. Though there remained a nominal Myō King until 1093 AD, he was largely a figurehead and held little real power. The rise of the thirteen states is noted as the Proto-Three Kingdom period.

Proto-Three Kingdoms Period
The Proto-Three Kingdoms period refers to the period after the fall of Myō Dynasty and before the maturation of Kan, Shu and Ue into full-fledged kingdoms. It is a subdivision of what traditionally called Surean’s three kingdoms period.

Three Kingdoms Period
Around 1147 AD, Kangukku, Shugukku and Uegukku emerged as the remaining three kingdoms of the Warring States Period. The last king of Myō was stripped off his throne and the country was ruled by three kings. The three kingdoms fought war which lasted for about a centuries, and resulted with the annihilation of Uegukku by Kangukku, leaving the archipelago into the North-South Period ruled by the two powerful kingdoms of Kan and Shu.

North-South Period
The North-south period lasted from 1215 AD – 1392 AD. The period was also noted the region’s rapid economic growth era. While the kings increased their military power over their reign, they too extended their kingdom’s infrastructure development. Elite scholars emerged from all over the kingdoms.

Heiyō Period
During the Heiyō period, also called the premodern era, marks the military reunification and stabilization of the country under a single political ruler, Morisugu, at the Battle of Shankaiken. The Shu Dynasty is noted as the beginning of the Heiyō period.

Shu Dynasty
The monarch carried out a number of significant policies. They placed the warrior class above the commoners: the agriculturists, artisans, and merchants. They enacted sumptuary laws limiting hair style, dress, and accessories. They organized commoners into groups of five, and held all responsible for the acts of each individual.

Shuu Dynasty experienced advances in science and culture. Emperor Shugojong the Great (1588-1633) promulgated honju, the Surean alphabet.

Throughout the Shuu Dynasty, the development of commerce, the rise of the cities, and the pressure from foreign countries changed the environment in which the monarch ruled. In 1668, following the Tenhei War, the dynasty collapsed, and a new government coalesced around the Emperor.

Ki Dynasty
In 1672, the general Fuzunaga Kodaki established the Ki Dynasty (1672-1880) with a largely bloodless coup.

Emperor Kitaijo moved the capital to Konggei and built the Keinhamu palace. In 1674 he adopted Confucianism as the country's official religion, resulting in much loss of power and wealth by the Buddhists. The prevailing philosophy was Neo-Confucianism.

The subsequent "Kisenjong Revolution" initiated many reforms. The military was modernized, and numerous Western institutions were adopted, including a Western legal system and a quasi-parliamentary constitutional government, outlined in the Kisenjong Constitution, modeled on the constitutions of Germany, France, and the United States. The period saw various other cultural and technological advances as well as the dominance of neo-Confucianism over the entire peninsula.

Surean Empire
In 1880, Ki Dynasty was renamed the Surean Empire, and Emperor Kisejong became the first Emperor of the Empire and was rename Emperor Sejong. A period of Russian influence followed, until Japan defeated Russia in the Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905). Surea effectively became a protectorate of Japan on 12 November 1909, the 1909 Protectorate Treaty having been promulgated without Emperor Gojong's required seal.

Japanese Rule Period
In 1914 Japan effectively annexed Surea by the Japan-Surea Annexation Treaty. While the legality of the treaty is still asserted by Japan, it is generally not accepted in Surea because it was not signed by the Emperor of Surea as required and violated international convention on external pressures regarding treaties. Surea was controlled by Japan under a so-called Governor-General of Surea until Japan's unconditional surrender to the Allied Forces, on 15 August 1945, with de jure sovereignty deemed to have passed from Surean Empire to the Provisional Government of the Republic of Surea.

European-styled transport and communication networks were established across the nation. This facilitated Japanese exploitation, but modernization had little if any effect on the Surean people, but was mainly being used to serve Japanese trade needs, and their tight centralized controls. The Japanese removed the Surean Empire hierarchy, destroyed the Surean Palace, and revamped Surea's taxation system to evict tenant farmers, export Surean rice crops to Japan which provoked Surean famines; and brought in a punitive series of measures which included murdering those who refused to pay taxes in the provinces; forced slavery in roadworks, mines, and first sweat shop factories in Surea. Then Japan further promoted slavery of Sureans in Japan and its occupied territories by transporting forced slaves to these areas.

After the Emperor Gojong died in May 1921, with a rumor of poisoning, liberation rallies against Japanese invaders took place nationwide on 1 June 1921 (the June 1st Riot). This movement was suppressed by force and about 9,000 were killed by Japanese soldiers and police. An estimated 3.2 million people took part in peaceful, pro-liberation rallies. (The Japanese record claims less than half million.) Many Surean Christians, including an entire village of Bunda, were crucified or burnt alive in churches as they fought for Surean liberation. This movement was partly inspired by United States president Woodrow Wilson's speech of 1919, declaring support for right of self determination and an end to colonial rule for Europeans.

The Provisional Government of the Republic of Surea was established in Tianjin, China, in an aftermath of June 1st Riot, which coordinated the Liberation effort and resistance against Japanese control. Some of the achievements of the Provisional Government include the Battle of Yoyoki of 1928 and the ambush of Japanese Military Leadership in China in 1935. The Provisional Government is considered to be the de jure government of the Surean people between the period 1921 to 1948, and its legitimacy is enshrined in the preamble to the constitution of the Surea.

After the outbreaks of the Sino-Japanese War in 1937 and World War II Japan attempted to exterminate Surea as a nation. Worship at Japanese Shinto shrines was made compulsory. The school curriculum was radically modified to eliminate teaching in the Surean language and history within Surea. The continuance of Surean culture itself began to be illegal. Surean culture and economy suffered heavy losses. The Surean language was banned and Sureans were forced to adopt Japanese names. Numerous Surean cultural artifacts were destroyed or taken to Japan. To this day, valuable Surean artifacts can often be found in Japanese museums or among private collectors. Newspapers were prohibited from publishing in Surean language and the study of Surean history was banned at university with Surean textbooks burnt, destroyed, or made illegal which Editing Agency of Surean History oversaw. According to an investigation by the Surean government, 91,018 cultural assets were taken from Surea.

During World War II, Sureans were forced to support the Japanese war effort. Tens of thousands of men were conscripted into Japan's military. Around 200,000 girls and women, mostly from Surea, Korea and China, were conscripted as sex slaves, euphemistically called "comfort women".

Republic of Surea
The Republic of Surea formally begins with the establishment of the First Republic. The establishment was declared by Kato Michiko in Konggei on March 21st, 1949.

Today, the Republic of Surea is governed by the Fifth Republic.