Paper short abstract:

A Late Neolithic decline affected many parts of Eurasia including Japan during the 4th-3rd millennia BC. This paper reviews evidence for the decline in Japan and considers implications for post-decline re-settlement and language change.

Paper long abstract:

A Late Neolithic decline seems to have affected many parts of Eurasia during the fourth to third millennia BC. It has long been recognised that Jomon societies in Japan experienced a comparable decline and reorganisation over the same time period. In central Honshu, a population decline of as much as 60% has been estimated between the Middle and Late Jomon phases. Possible causes of the Late Neolithic decline have been much debated but include climate change and plague (Yersinia pestis). Although DNA evidence of plague from Jomon Japan has yet to be reported, Y. pestis has been identified from a site in Yakutia dating to 1800 BC, meaning that it is quite possible it also reached Japan. This paper will review evidence for the Late Neolithic decline in Japan and consider possible implications for language change. While in many other parts of Eurasia, depopulation resulted in quite rapid re-settlement by new groups and languages, that process was delayed in Japan by several millennia. The development of a more resilient agricultural package including West Asian cereals seems to have provided the basis for the Bronze Age colonisation of Japan by Japonic-speaking populations from the East Asian mainland after 1000 BC.