Taiwanese history

Taiwan’s history involves indigenous peoples settling thousands of years ago, followed by periods of Dutch and Spanish colonization in the 17th century. It was later controlled by the Ming and Qing dynasties of China. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Japan governed Taiwan until 1945, when it returned to Chinese control after World War II. In 1949, the Chinese civil war led the Republic of China government to retreat to Taiwan, where it established a separate administration, while the People's Republic of China was founded on the mainland. Today, Taiwan functions as a self-governing entity with a complex international status.