dormitories, filled the space on either side of the main
building line. Monks’ quarters sometimes contained a
single huge bed on which monks meditated and slept.
By the thirteenth century, monastery architecture in
China was marked by great variety. The lack of con-
sistency can in part be explained by numerous Bud-
dhist schools and by an increasing syncretism in
Buddhist and Daoist worship that gave rise to new
sects. Often a twelfth- or thirteenth-century Buddhist
monastery was architecturally indistinguishable from
a Daoist one until one entered the halls and saw the
statues and paintings. In addition, Daoist precincts
could be constructed at Buddhist monasteries and
Buddhist precincts at Daoist temple complexes.
Lamaist monasteries in China
By the fourteenth century, Lamaist Buddhist architec-
ture also was present on the Chinese landscape. The
most representative structure of a Lamaist Buddhist
monastery is the bulb-shaped pagoda known as a
dagoda,often painted white. The Lamaist pagodas of
Miaoying Monastery, built in 1279, and in Beihai Park,
built in 1651, still rise above much of the rest of Bei-
jing’s architecture. Lamaism and its architecture dom-
inated the regions of China adjacent to Tibet, the
center of this branch of Buddhism, in particular the
areas of Sichuan and Gansu and regions adjacent to
them in Ningxia Hui, Qinghai, and Inner Mongolia.
Patronized by the Manchu rulers of the last Chinese
dynasty, Qing (1644–1911), some of the most creative
architecture of China’s last three imperial centuries
stands at Lamaseries. The most purely Tibetan monas-
teries, in Qinghai and Sichuan, include multistory
stone buildings with small windows and flat roofs, the
style famous on the mountainous terrain of Tibet. The
Sino-Tibetan style of Inner Mongolia, Ningxia, and
Gansu, represented by Wudangzhao in Baotou or Xil-
ituzhao in Hohhot, both in Inner Mongolia, is char-
acterized by the axial arrangements seen in Chinese
monasteries but with great sutra halls in the block style
of Tibet, as well as numerous funerary pagodas. Often
several buildings are interconnected into one block-
like structure, but roofs may be of Chinese glazed ce-
ramic tile.
Ta’er Monastery in Qinghai is of this type. Most im-
pressive are the Sino-Tibetan Lamaseries of Chengde
(formerly Jehol) in Hebei province. Site of a summer
palace of the Qing emperors, Chengde had twelve tem-
ple complexes, known as the Eight Outer Temples
after the eight offices through which they were ad-
ministered in the eighteenth century. Often the monas-
teries contain Chinese-style architecture in the front
and Tibetan-style buildings behind. One monastery
even had architecture that replicated the POTALA
palace in Tibet. Dominated by great sutra halls, tradi-
tional buildings dedicated to, for example, the four di-
vine kings, are also present at the Eight Outer Temples.
This kind of regionalism in architecture was wide-
spread in Qing China, giving way not only to scores of
residential styles among the “minority” peoples of the
empire, but also to Sino-Burmese Buddhist monaster-
ies in Xishuangbanna in southwestern Yunnan
province near the border with Myanmar. Traditional
Buddhist monasteries never disappeared from China.
Yonghegong, a princely palace in the heart of Beijing
that was turned into a lamasery during the eighteenth
century, with its main halls painted red and golden
rooftops on an axial line, represents a Chinese-style
lamasery. In other parts of China, Chan monasteries
continued to be built and restored, especially at his-
torically sacred locations, such as the four great peaks:
These include Wutai in Shanxi province, dedicated to
Mañjus ́r; Putuo, the unique island setting off the coast
of Ningbo, dedicated to Avalokites ́vara; Emei in
Sichuan, dedicated to Samantabhadra; and Jiuhua in
Anhui, dedicated to Ksitigarbha. The later monaster-
ies of traditional sects retained axial arrangements but
were larger than their pre-fourteenth century prede-
cessors, with two new hall types, the diamond hall
and the hall of divine kings. Both halls were incorpo-
rated into Lamaist construction in China. Also new in
the fourteenth century were brick halls, nicknamed
“beamless” halls, which stood in sharp contrast to the
ubiquitous wooden buildings of Chinese construction.Monastic architecture in Korea
Since initial contacts in Northeast Asia, things Chinese
were transmitted to the Korean peninsula. Buddhism
entered Korea from China officially in 372. Although
not every Chinese Buddhist school became popular in
Korea, most were known to Korean monks who trav-
eled to China or through Chinese Buddhist mission-
aries. Korean Buddhist monasteries thus contained the
standard structures of Chinese monasteries. A stan-
dard plan in Korean Buddhist monasteries has an en-
try gate with a pair of divine kings on each side,
followed by a dharma hall and main hall.
Buddha halls, pagodas, and cave sanctuaries all are
found in Korea. Korea’s best-known Buddhist monas-
teries, Pulguksa and SO ̆KKURAM, both in the outskirts
of Kyo ̆ngju, capital of the unified Silla kingdomMONASTICARCHITECTURE