and so to new building types. Places of worship in form of cave temples appeared in China, based on Indian rock-cut ones. Another new building type introduced by Buddhism was the Chinese form of stupa (ta) or pagoda. In India, stupas were erected to commemorate well-known people or teachers: consequently, the Buddhist tradition adapted the structure to remember the great teacher, the Buddha. In The Chinese pagoda shared a similar symbolism with the Indian stupa and was built with sponsorship mainly from imperial patrons who hoped to gain earthly merits for the next life. Buddhism reached its peak from the 6th to the 8th centuries when there was an unprecedented number of monasteries thought China. More than 4,600 official and 40,000 unofficial monasteries were built. They varies in size by the number of cloisters they conatined, ranging from 6 to 120. Each cloister consisted of a main stand-alone building – a hall, pagoda of pavilion – and was surrounded by a covered corridor in a rectangular compounded served by a gate building. Chinese and Confucian culture has had a significant influence on the art and architecture in the Sinosphere (mainly Vietnam, Korea, Japan). Korean architecture, especially post Choson period showcases Ming-Qing influences. Traditionally, Japanese architecture was made of wood and fusuma (sliding doors) in place of walls, allowing internal space to be altered to suit different purposes. The introduction of Buddhism in the mid 6th century, via the neighbouring Korean kingdom of Paekche, initiated large-scale wooden temple building with an emphasis on simplicity, and much of the architecture was imported from China and other Asian cultures. By the end of this century, Japan was constructing Continental-style monasteries, notably the temple, known as Horyu-ji in Ikaruga. In contrast with Western architecture, Japanese structures rarely use stone, except for specific elements such as foundations. Walls are light, thin, never load-bearing and often movable. Khmer From the start of the 9th century to the early 15th century, Khmer kings rules over a vad Hindu-Buddhist empire in Southeast Asia. Angkor, in present-day Cambodia, was its capital city, and most of its surviving buildings are east-facing stone temples, many of them constructed in pyramidal, tiered form consisting of five square structures with towers, or prasats, that represent the sacred five-peaked Mount Meru of Hindu, Jain and Buddhist doctrine. As the residences of gods, temples were made of durable materials such as sandstone, brick or laterite,