<P> Although early forms of the novel are to be found in a number of places, including classical Rome, 10th--and 11th - century Japan, and Elizabethan England, the European novel is often said to have begun with Don Quixote in 1605 . </P> <P> Early works of extended fictional prose, or novels, include works in Latin like the Satyricon by Petronius (c. 50 AD), and The Golden Ass by Apuleius (c. 150 AD), works in Ancient Greek such as Daphnis and Chloe by Longus (c. late second century AD), works in Sanskrit such as the 6th--or 7th - century Daśakumāracarita by Daṇḍin, and in the 7th - century Kadambari by Banabhatta, Murasaki Shikibu's 11th - century Japanese work The Tale of Genji, the 12th - century Hayy ibn Yaqdhan (or Philosophus Autodidactus, the 17th - century Latin title) by Ibn Tufail, who wrote in Arabic, the 13th - century Theologus Autodidactus by Ibn al - Nafis, another Arabic novelist, and Blanquerna, written in Catalan by Ramon Llull (1283), and the 14th - century Chinese Romance of the Three Kingdoms by Luo Guanzhong . </P> <P> Murasaki Shikibu's Tale of Genji (1010) has been described as the world's first novel and shows essentially all the qualities for which Marie de La Fayette's novel La Princesse de Clèves (1678) has been praised: individuality of perception, an interest in character development, and psychological observation . Urbanization and the spread of printed books in Song Dynasty (960 - 1279) China led to the evolution of oral storytelling into consciously fictional novels by the Ming dynasty (1368--1644). Parallel European developments did not occur for centuries, and awaited the time when the availability of paper allowed for similar opportunities . </P> <P> By contrast, Ibn Tufail's Hayy ibn Yaqdhan and Ibn al - Nafis' Theologus Autodidactus are works of didactic philosophy and theology . In this sense, Hayy ibn Yaqdhan would be considered an early example of a philosophical novel, while Theologus Autodidactus would be considered an early theological novel . Hayy ibn Yaqdhan, with its story of a human outcast surviving on an island, is also likely to have influenced Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe (1719), because the work was available in an English edition in 1711 . </P>

When did the novel emerged as a form of literature