Bronze Age

Dolmen

The Bronze Age is often held to have begun around 1500 ~ 1000 BCE in Korea, though recent archaeological evidence suggests it might have started as far back as 2500 BCE, through the developed areas of Manchuria as migrating Altaic tribes entered Korea. Bronze daggers, mirrors, and weaponry have been found, as well as evidence of walled-cities. It is believed that by the third century BCE, iron culture was developing and the warring states of China pushed refugees eastward and south. Recently however, an iron mirror has been found in Songseok-ri Kangdong-gun Pyongyang in North Korea, that may have originated from 1200 BCE.Dolmen burial sites with huge stones, some weighing as much as 60 tons are found as well .

Sometime during the late Bronze Age, half a dozen loosely affiliated walled-town states grew powerful on the peninsula and in Manchuria, and kingships became institutionalized. Of these, the most significant were Puyo, in the middle Sungari River basin of central Manchuria; Old Choson, spread from the Liao River in southern Manchuria to the Taedong River in North Korea; and Chin, which occupied the peninsula's lower region. These states were the first to be mentioned in Chinese records. Old Choson closest to China-was the most advanced and the strongest. lis people were known to the Chinese as the "eastern barbarians" or "eastern bowmen." After repeated warfare with various Chinese kingdoms, Old Choson was overcome in 190 B.C. by Wiman, an expatriate of one of those kingdoms. Wiman Choson was easily overcome by Han China in 108 B.C., and the area between the Han River and the middle of Manchuria was made into four provincial commands, ruled by the Chinese as an outpost colony. In northern Manchuria, Puyo continued to survive for some time, and Chin was basically left alone in the southern portion of the peninsula.