Editing Asia (section)

== History ==
{{Main|History of Asia}}

=== Ancient era ===
{{See also|Sinosphere|Greater India|Greater Iran}}[[File:Silkroutes.jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|The [[Silk Road]] connected civilisations across Asia.<ref>{{cite web |author=Lee |first=Adela C. Y. |title=Ancient Silk Road Travellers |url=http://www.silk-road.com/artl/srtravelmain.shtml |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171108022054/http://www.silk-road.com/artl/srtravelmain.shtml |archive-date=8 November 2017 |access-date=9 November 2017 |website=Silk-road.com |publisher=Silkroad Foundation}}</ref>]]The history of Asia can be seen as the distinct histories of several peripheral coastal regions: [[East Asia]], [[South Asia]], [[Southeast Asia]], [[Central Asia]], and [[West Asia]]. The coastal periphery was home to some of the world's earliest known civilisations, each of them developing around fertile river valleys. The civilisations in [[Mesopotamia]], the [[Indus Valley]] and the [[Yellow River]] shared many similarities. These civilisations may well have exchanged technologies and ideas such as [[mathematics]] and the [[wheel]]. Other innovations, such as writing, seem to have been developed individually in each area. Cities, states and empires developed in these lowlands.

The central steppe region had long been inhabited by horse-mounted nomads who could reach all areas of Asia from the [[steppe]]s. The earliest postulated expansion out of the steppe is that of the [[Indo-Europeans]], who spread their languages into West Asia, South Asia, and the borders of China, where the [[Tocharians]] resided. The northernmost part of Asia, including much of [[Siberia]], was largely inaccessible to the steppe nomads, owing to the dense forests, climate and [[tundra]]. These areas remained very sparsely populated.

The center and the peripheries were mostly kept separated by mountains and deserts. The [[Caucasus]] and [[Himalaya]] mountains and the [[Karakum Desert|Karakum]] and [[Gobi]] deserts formed barriers that the steppe horsemen could cross only with difficulty. While the urban city dwellers were more advanced technologically and socially, in many cases they could do little in a military aspect to defend against the mounted hordes of the steppe. However, the lowlands did not have enough open grasslands to support a large equestrian force; for this and other reasons, the nomads who conquered states in China, India, and the Middle East often found themselves adapting to the local, more affluent societies.

=== Medieval era ===
[[File:Mongol dominions1.jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|The [[Mongol Empire]] at its greatest extent. The gray area is the later [[Timurid Empire]].]]The Islamic [[Caliphate]]'s defeats of the [[Byzantine]] and Persian empires led to West Asia and southern parts of [[Central Asia]] and [[Northwestern South Asia|western parts of South Asia]] under its control during [[Early Muslim conquests|its conquests]] of the 7th century; Islam also [[Spread of Islam|spread]] over centuries to the southern regions of India and Southeast Asia through trade along the [[Maritime Silk Road]].<ref>{{Cite web |title=How Islam Spread Throughout the World |url=https://yaqeeninstitute.org/read/paper/how-islam-spread-throughout-the-world |access-date=8 August 2024 |website=Yaqeen Institute for Islamic Research}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Did you know?: The Spread of Islam in Southeast Asia through the Trade Routes |url=https://en.unesco.org/silkroad/content/did-you-know-spread-islam-southeast-asia-through-trade-routes |access-date=8 August 2024 |website=en.unesco.org}}</ref> The [[Mongol Empire]] conquered a large part of Asia in the 13th century, an area extending from China to Europe. Before the Mongol invasion, [[Song dynasty]] reportedly had approximately 120 million citizens; the 1300 census which followed the invasion reported roughly 60 million people.<ref>Ping-ti Ho. "An Estimate of the Total Population of Sung-Chin China", in ''Études Song'', Series 1, No. 1, (1970). pp. 33–53.</ref>

The [[Black Death]], one of the most devastating [[pandemic]]s in human history, is thought to have originated in the arid plains of central Asia, where it then travelled along the [[Silk Road]].<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/middle_ages/blackdisease_01.shtml |title=Black Death |publisher=BBC |date=17 February 2011 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120605000815/http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/middle_ages/blackdisease_01.shtml |archive-date=5 June 2012}}</ref>

=== Modern era ===
{{See also|History of Eurasia#Modern era|Afro-Asia#Modern era}}
European involvement in Asia became more significant from the [[Age of Discovery]] onward, with Iberian-sponsored sailors such as [[Christopher Columbus]] and [[Vasco da Gama]] paving the way for new routes from [[Atlantic Europe]] to [[Pacific Asia]] and the Indian Ocean respectively in the late 15th century.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Hu-DeHart |first1=Evelyn |last2=López |first2=Kathleen |date=2008 |title=Asian Diasporas in Latin America and the Caribbean: An Historical Overview |jstor=23055220 |journal=Afro-Hispanic Review |volume=27 |issue=1 |pages=9–21 |issn=0278-8969}}</ref> The [[Russian Empire]] also began to expand into northwestern Asia from the 17th century, and would eventually take control of all of Siberia and most of Central Asia by the end of the 19th century.

Among non-European empires, the [[Ottoman Empire]] controlled Anatolia, most of the Middle East, North Africa and the Balkans from the mid 16th century onward, while in the 17th century, the [[Manchu]] conquered China and established the [[Qing dynasty]]. The Islamic [[Mughal Empire]] (preceded by the [[Delhi Sultanate]] of the 13th to early 16th century)<ref>{{Cite web |title=The Story of India |publisher=PBS |url=https://www.pbs.org/thestoryofindia/timeline/5/ |access-date=8 August 2024 |website=www.pbs.org}}</ref> and the Hindu [[Maratha Empire]] controlled much of India in the 16th and 18th centuries respectively.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Sen |first1=Sailendra Nath |title=An Advanced History of Modern India |page=11 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bXWiACEwPR8C&pg=PA1941-IA82 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200422184802/https://books.google.com/books?id=bXWiACEwPR8C&pg=PA1941-IA82 |archive-date=22 April 2020 |isbn=978-0-230-32885-3 |year=2010 |publisher=Macmillan}}</ref>

{{Multiple image
| image1            = Robert Clive and Mir Jafar after the Battle of Plassey, 1757 by Francis Hayman.jpg
| image2            = China, the cake of kings and emperors, Le Petit Journal 1898.jpg
| total_width       = 350
| caption1          = The aftermath of the 1757 [[Battle of Plassey]], which eventually led to British India
| caption2          = An 1898 depiction of Western powers [[Foreign concessions in China|carving up China]]
| image3            = Victor Gillam A Thing Well Begun Is Half Done 1899 Cornell CUL PJM 1136 01.jpg
| caption3          = A depiction of America building [[Panama Canal|connections to the Pacific]] and its Filipino colony (left) after the 1898 [[Spanish–American War]]
| direction         = horizontal
| width2            = 120
| align             = left
}}

[[Western imperialism in Asia]] from the 18th to 20th centuries coincided with the [[Industrial Revolution]] in the West and the dethroning of India and China as the world's foremost economies.<ref>{{Cite magazine |date=28 July 2023 |title=How India's Economy Will Overtake the U.S.'s |url=https://time.com/6297539/how-india-economy-will-surpass-us/ |access-date=31 August 2023 |magazine=Time |archive-date=31 August 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230831071229/https://time.com/6297539/how-india-economy-will-surpass-us/ |url-status=live}}</ref> The [[British Empire]] first became dominant in South Asia, with most of the region being [[Company rule in India|conquered by British traders]] in the late 18th and early 19th centuries before falling under [[British Raj|direct British rule]] after a failed [[1857 revolt]]; the 1869 completion of the [[Suez Canal]], which increased British access to India, went on to [[New Imperialism|further European influence]] over Africa and Asia.<ref>{{Cite magazine |title=Behind the Enduring Relevance of the Suez Canal Is the Long Shadow of European Colonialism |url=https://thewire.in/history/suez-canal-relevance-europe-colonialism |access-date=9 August 2024 |magazine=The Wire}}</ref> Around this time, Western powers started to dominate China in what later became known as the [[century of humiliation]], with the British-supported [[History of opium in China#Growth of the opium trade|opium trade]] and later [[Opium Wars]] resulting in China being forced into an unprecedented situation of importing more than it exported.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Milestones: 1830–1860 – Office of the Historian |url=https://history.state.gov/milestones/1830-1860/china-1 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230831071219/https://history.state.gov/milestones/1830-1860/china-1 |archive-date=31 August 2023 |access-date=31 August 2023 |website=history.state.gov}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |date=28 September 2021 |title=For China, the history that matters is its 'century of humiliation' |url=https://www.scmp.com/comment/opinion/article/3150233/china-history-matters-still-century-humiliation |access-date=31 August 2023 |work=South China Morning Post |archive-date=31 August 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230831071219/https://www.scmp.com/comment/opinion/article/3150233/china-history-matters-still-century-humiliation |url-status=live}}</ref>

Foreign domination of China was furthered by the [[Japanese colonial empire]], which controlled some of East Asia and briefly much of Southeast Asia (which had earlier been [[European colonisation of Southeast Asia|taken over]] by the British, Dutch and French in the late 19th century),<ref>{{Cite web |title=Southeast Asia, 1800–1900 A.D. |publisher=Metropolitan Museum of Art |url=https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/ht/10/sse.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230831071219/https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/ht/10/sse.html |archive-date=31 August 2023 |access-date=31 August 2023 |website=The Met's Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History}}</ref> [[New Guinea]] and the [[Pacific islands]]; Japan's domination was enabled by its rapid rise that had taken place during the [[Meiji era]] of the late 19th century, in which it applied industrial knowledge learned from the West and thus overtook the rest of Asia.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Introduction: Race and Empire in Meiji Japan |url=https://apjjf.org/2020/20/Zohar.html |access-date=31 August 2023 |website=The Asia–Pacific Journal: Japan Focus |date=15 October 2020 |archive-date=31 August 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230831071219/https://apjjf.org/2020/20/Zohar.html |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Huffman |first=James L. |author1-link=James Huffman (historian) |title=The Rise and Evolution of Meiji Japan |date=2019 |publisher=Amsterdam University Press |doi=10.2307/j.ctvzgb64z |jstor=j.ctvzgb64z |isbn=978-1-898823-94-0 |s2cid=216630259}}</ref> One significant influence on Japan had been the United States, which had begun projecting influence across the Pacific after its early-to-mid-19th century [[westward expansion]].<ref>{{Cite web |title=The United States and the Opening to Japan, 1853 |url=https://history.state.gov/milestones/1830-1860/opening-to-japan}}</ref> The [[Decline of the Ottoman Empire|breakup of the Ottoman Empire]] in the early 20th century led to the Middle East also being [[History of the Middle East#Modern Middle East|contested and partitioned]] by the British and French.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Yakoubi |first=Myriam |date=4 January 2022 |title=The French, the British and their Middle Eastern Mandates (1918-1939): Two Political Strategies |journal=Revue Française de Civilisation Britannique. French Journal of British Studies |volume=XXVII |issue=1 |doi=10.4000/rfcb.8787 |issn=0248-9015 |s2cid=246524226 |doi-access=free}}</ref>

=== Contemporary era ===
[[File:Soviet Union and China map including the three co-bordering countries.svg|thumb|The Soviet Union (in red) and China (yellow) controlled most of Asia in the late 20th century.]]
With the end of [[World War II]] in 1945 and the wartime ruination of Europe and imperial Japan, many countries in Asia were able to rapidly [[Decolonisation of Asia|free themselves]] of colonial rule.<ref>{{cite book | last=Kennedy | first=Dane | title=Decolonization: A Very Short Introduction | publisher=Oxford University Press | date=2016 | isbn=978-0-19-934049-1 | doi=10.1093/actrade/9780199340491.003.0003 |chapter=Global war's colonial consequence| pages=25–45 }}</ref> The [[independence of India]] came along with the [[Partition of India|carving out]] of a separate nation for the majority of [[South Asian Muslims]], which in 1971 [[Bangladesh Liberation War|further split]] into Pakistan and [[Bangladesh]];<ref>{{Cite magazine |last=Dalrymple |first=William |date=22 June 2015 |title=The Mutual Genocide of Indian Partition |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/06/29/the-great-divide-books-dalrymple |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190423182031/https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/06/29/the-great-divide-books-dalrymple |archive-date=23 April 2019 |access-date=31 August 2023 |magazine=The New Yorker |issn=0028-792X}}</ref> The [[Cold War in Asia]] strained relations between India and Pakistan and affected Asia more generally.<ref>{{Cite magazine |title=How the Cold War Shaped Bangladesh's Liberation War |url=https://thediplomat.com/2021/03/how-the-cold-war-shaped-bangladeshs-liberation-war/ |access-date=7 August 2024 |magazine=the Diplomat}}</ref> The [[end of the Cold War]] and the [[Dissolution of the Soviet Union|Soviet Union]] by 1991 saw the independence of the five modern Central Asian countries.<ref>{{Cite magazine |last=Foust |first=Joshua |date=16 December 2011 |title=No Great Game: The Story of Post-Cold War Powers in Central Asia |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2011/12/no-great-game-the-story-of-post-cold-war-powers-in-central-asia/250010/ |access-date=8 August 2024 |magazine=The Atlantic}}</ref>

Some Arab countries took economic advantage of massive oil deposits that were discovered in their territory, becoming globally influential,<ref>{{Cite web |title=Oil Discovered in Saudi Arabia |url=https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/oil-discovered-saudi-arabia/ |access-date=31 August 2023 |website=education.nationalgeographic.org |archive-date=3 December 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231203035632/https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/oil-discovered-saudi-arabia/ |url-status=live}}</ref> though stability in the Middle East has been affected since 1948 by the [[Arab–Israeli conflict]] and American-led [[United States foreign policy in the Middle East|interventions]].<ref>{{Cite news |last=Bazelon |first=Emily |date=1 February 2024 |title=The Road to 1948, and the Roots of a Perpetual Conflict |url=https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/02/01/magazine/israel-founding-palestinian-conflict.html |access-date=8 August 2024 |work=The New York Times |issn=0362-4331}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |title=America's Middle East Scorecard: Many Interventions, Few Successes |url=https://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2014/08/25/341892606/america-s-middle-east-scorecard-many-interventions-few-successes |work=NPR}}</ref> East Asian nations (along with Singapore in Southeast Asia) became economically prosperous with high-growth "[[tiger economies]]";<ref>{{Cite web |title=Economic Issues 1 – Growth in East Asia |url=https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/issues1/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230320132157/https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/issues1/ |archive-date=20 March 2023 |access-date=31 August 2023 |website=imf.org}}</ref> China, having undergone [[Chinese economic reform|market-driven reforms]] under [[Deng Xiaoping]],<ref>{{Cite web |title=China's Post-1978 Economic Development and Entry into the Global Trading System |url=https://www.cato.org/publications/chinas-post-1978-economic-development-entry-global-trading-system |access-date=9 August 2024 |website=The Cato Institute}}</ref> regained its place among the top two economies of the world by the 21st century.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Saul |first=Derek |title=China And India Will Overtake U.S. Economically By 2075, Goldman Sachs Economists Say |url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/dereksaul/2022/12/06/china-and-india-will-overtake-us-economically-by-2075-goldman-sachs-economists-say/ |access-date=31 August 2023 |work=Forbes |archive-date=5 July 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230705185916/https://www.forbes.com/sites/dereksaul/2022/12/06/china-and-india-will-overtake-us-economically-by-2075-goldman-sachs-economists-say/ |url-status=live}}</ref> India has also grown significantly because of [[Economic liberalisation in India|economic liberalisation]] that started in the 1990s,<ref>{{Cite news |date=7 July 2016 |title=25 years of liberalisation: A glimpse of India's growth in 14 charts |url=https://www.firstpost.com/business/25-years-of-liberalisation-a-glimpse-of-indias-growth-in-14-charts-2877654.html |access-date=4 September 2023 |work=Firstpost |archive-date=4 September 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230904005244/https://www.firstpost.com/business/25-years-of-liberalisation-a-glimpse-of-indias-growth-in-14-charts-2877654.html |url-status=live}}</ref> with extreme poverty now below 20%;<ref>{{Cite news |last=Kumar |first=Manoj |date=17 July 2023 |title=One-tenth of India's population escaped poverty in 5 years – government report |url=https://www.reuters.com/world/india/one-tenth-indias-population-escaped-poverty-5-years-government-report-2023-07-17/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230904034523/https://www.reuters.com/world/india/one-tenth-indias-population-escaped-poverty-5-years-government-report-2023-07-17/ |archive-date=4 September 2023 |access-date=4 September 2023 |work=Reuters}}</ref> India and China's rise has coincided with growing tensions between the two, with the [[Indo-Pacific]] now an actively contested area between China and counterbalancing forces.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Matamis |first=Joaquin |date=16 June 2024 |title=From the Mountains to the Seas: India-China Competition in the Wake of Galwan |url=https://www.stimson.org/2024/from-the-mountains-to-the-seas-india-china-competition-in-the-wake-of-galwan/ |access-date=8 August 2024 |work=Stimson Center}}</ref><ref>{{Cite magazine |last=Kuo |first=Mercy A. |title=The Origin of 'Indo-Pacific' as Geopolitical Construct |url=https://thediplomat.com/2018/01/the-origin-of-indo-pacific-as-geopolitical-construct/ |access-date=8 August 2024 |magazine=The Diplomat}}</ref>

<gallery>
File:Anaximander world map (mul).svg|The threefold division of the [[Old World]] into Europe, Asia and Africa has been in use since the 6th century BCE, due to [[Greek geographers]] such as [[Anaximander]] and [[Hecataeus of Miletus|Hecataeus]].
File:A new universal atlas of the world.Asia.jpg|1825 map of Asia by [[Sidney Edwards Morse]]
File:A Map of the Countries between Constantinople and Calcutta- Including Turkey in Asia, Persia, Afghanistan and Turkestan WDL11753.png|Map of western, southern, and central Asia in 1885<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.wdl.org/en/item/11753/#institution=library-of-congress&page=17 |title=A Map of the Countries between Constantinople and Calcutta: Including Turkey in Asia, Persia, Afghanistan and Turkestan |website=Wdl.org |access-date=9 November 2017 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171017220525/https://www.wdl.org/en/item/11753/#institution=library-of-congress&page=17 |archive-date=17 October 2017 |year=1885}}</ref>
File:Modern Asia (1796).tif|The map of Asia in 1796, which also included the continent of [[Australia (continent)|Australia]] (then known as [[New Holland (Australia)|New Holland]])
File:Asien Bd1.jpg|1890 map of Asia
</gallery>