8000 BC - 2050 BC

Evidence of pottery making appears during the Early Neolithic period with the rise of agriculture and sedentary living. As villages develop into settled cultures, discrete ceramic traditions evolve that show a distinctive Chinese approach to form, decoration, and technique, leading to the identification of more than thirty Late Neolithic cultures throughout China. Other artifacts include the earliest multinote instrument (flute) and reveal evidence of the earliest uses of lacquer, writing, and the themes of the tiger and dragon. Objects made of jade are thought to have played a ceremonial role in Late Neolithic cultures.

* Early Neolithic period, ca. 10,000–5000 B.C.E.
* Late Neolithic period, ca. 5000–2000 B.C.E.
   * Yangshao culture (North and Northwest China), ca. 5000–1500 B.C.E.
   * Dawenkou culture (East Coast), ca. 4500–2500 B.C.E.
   * Hemudu culture (South China), ca. 5000–4500 B.C.E.
   * Hongshan culture (North China), ca. 3500–2500 B.C.E.
   * Liangzhu culture (South China), ca. 3500–2500 B.C.E.
   * Longshan culture (East Coast), ca. 2500–1700 B.C.E.

ca. 3500–2500 B.C.E.. Cultures such as the Hongshan in the northeast and the Liangzhu in the southeast produce an astonishing range of figurines, adornments, and implements made of jade (nephrite), and often decorated with engravings or low-relief carvings. In addition, unusual (for China) clay sculptures of women with protruding stomachs (probably indicative of pregnancy), a few lifesize, are found in sites associated with the Hongshan culture such as Dongshangzui and the "Temple of the Goddess" in Liaoning Province.
EVENTS:
CHINA:
3000s B.C.E. Cultivation of silk worms to make silk
2000s B.C.E. Bronze working begins

WORLD:
c.3760 B.C.E. Year 1 of the Jewish Calendar
c.3200 B.C.E. Writing first used in Mesopotamia
c.3200 B.C.E. Bronze work begins in Greece
c.3000-1900 B.C.E. Indus Valley civilization ion northern India
c.2600 B.C.E. First stone circle constructed at Stonehenge in England
c.2570 B.C.E. Great pyramid of Giza built in Egypt
c.2150 B.C.E. The Flood, “Noah’s Ark”