Prehistory

Notable prehistoric finds include the Yuanmou Man, a Homo erectus fossil unearthed by railway engineers in the 1960s and determined to be the oldest known hominid fossil in China.

Neolithic

By the Neolithic period, human settlements existed in the area of Lake Dian, close to modern-day Kunming, Yunnan's capital. The inhabitants used stone tools and constructed simple wooden structures.

The Kingdom of Dian

Bronze sculpture of the Dian Kingdom, 3rd century BCE.Yunnan, China. The Dian culture was distributed around the Lake Dian area and dated, though controversial, between the 6th century BC and the 1st century AD. The culture is divided into an early and a late phase. Under Emperor Wu, a series of military campaigns were dispatched against the Dian during the southward expansion of the Han dynasty. In 109 BC, the kingdom officially became a vassal state of the Han empire.

Han dynasty

In 109 BC, Emperor Wu sent General Guo Chang south to Yunnan, establishing the Yizhou commandery. The commandery seat was at Dianchi county (present day Jinning). To expand the burgeoning trade with Burma and India, Emperor Wu also sent Tang Meng to maintain and expand the Five Foot Way, renaming it "Southwest Barbarian Circuit". By this time, agricultural technology in Yunnan had markedly improved. The local people used bronze tools, and plows and kept a variety of livestock, including cattle, horses, sheep, goats, pigs, and dogs. They lived in tribal congregations, sometimes led by exiled Chinese.

In the Records of the Grand Historian, Zhang Qian (113 BC) and Sima Qian (145-90 BC) make references to "Sendhuk", which may have been referring to an Indianised community taking the name from the Indus Valley (the Sindh province in modern Pakistan), originally known as "Sindhu" in Sanskrit. When Yunnan was annexed by the Han dynasty, Chinese authorities also reported a Sendhuk" (Indianised) community living in the area. In 109 AD, the Han court established Yunnan county, a part of the Yizhou commandery. Because the county seat was south of Mount Yun, the county was named "Yunnan" – literally "south of Yun".

Reference: Wikipedia

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