Japan's Kongō Gumi stayed independent for 1,428 years, from 578 to 2006.

578 · 2006 · apart: 1428 years

A carpenter brought from Korea to build a temple founded it, and 40 generations of his descendants built and repaired temples until another company bought it.

◍ Show on the globe

The event

• Kongō Gumi is founded578 · Osaka. The carpenter Kongō Shigemitsu was invited from the Korean kingdom of Baekje to build the Shitennō-ji temple and founded a building firm. Forty generations of Kongōs ran it, and it stayed independent until 2006 — the world's oldest documented company.

6th century · 21st century

More amazing facts

• 550 A Buddha was dug up in Sweden.
• 552 The secret of silk left Asia inside walking sticks.
• 578 · 622 The Japanese company Kongō Gumi is older than Islam: it was founded in 578, 44 years before the Hijra — Muhammad's move to Medina, from which the Islamic calendar counts its years.
• 589 Toilet paper is first mentioned in 589, the year the Sui reunited China.
• 600 'Checkmate' is Persian shāh māt, 'the king is helpless'. Around 600 chess reached Sasanian Persia from India as chatrang, and spread from there to the Arabs and Europe.
• 607 A Chinese emperor took offence at Japan over the sun. In 607 Prince Shōtoku wrote to him: 'The Son of Heaven where the sun rises, to the Son of Heaven where the sun sets.' Emperor Yang was furious.

All amazing facts (1058) →