a single center and system all its own". Different types of Shinto have been identified. "Shrine Shinto" refers to the practices centred around shrines, and "Domestic Shinto" to the ways in which are venerated in the home. Some scholars have used the term "Folk Shinto" to designate localised Shinto practices, or practices outside of an institutionalised setting. In various eras of the past, there was also a "State Shinto", in which Shinto beliefs and practices were closely interlinked with the Japanese state. In representing "a portmanteau term" for many varied traditions across Japan, the term "Shinto" is similar to the term "Hinduism", used to describe varied traditions across South Asia. Etymology The term Shinto is often translated into English as "the way of the ", although its meaning has varied throughout Japanese history. Other terms are sometimes used synonymously with "Shinto"; these include (, "the way of the "), (, also written or , "the way of the from time immemorial"), (, "the ancient way"), (, "the great way"), and (, "the imperial way"). The term Shinto derives from the combination of two Chinese characters: shen (), which means "spirit," and dao (), which means "way", "road" or "path". "Shendao" () was a term already used in the Yijing referring to the divine order of nature. Around the time of the spread of Buddhism in the Han dynasty (206 BC – 220 AD), it was used to distinguish indigenous Chinese religions from the imported religion. Ge Hong used it in his Baopuzi as a synonym for Taoism. The Chinese term Shendao was originally adopted into Japanese as Jindō; this was possibly first used as a Buddhist term to refer to non-Buddhist deities. Among the earliest known appearances of the term Shinto in Japan is in the 8th-century text, Nihon Shoki. Here, it may be a generic term for popular belief, or alternatively reference Taoism, as many Taoist practices had recently been imported from mainland Asia. In these early Japanese uses, the word Shinto did not apply to a distinct religious tradition nor to anything uniquely Japanese; the 11th century Konjaku monogatarishui for instance refers to a woman in China practicing Shinto, and also to people in India worshipping , indicating these terms were being used to describe religions outside Japan itself. In medieval Japan, -worship was generally seen as being part of Japanese Buddhism, with the themselves often interpreted as