1. HISTORY OF ART & ARCHITECTURE 3 China: Art, Architecture & Interior TYPES OF PAGODA General Features of Chinese Pagoda: -Built of any of a number of materials-stone, brick, wood, glazed tile, iron or gold. - In plan figure, it may be round, square, hexagonal or octagonal. - With architectural features such as bas-relief carvings, dougong brackets and upturned eaves. 1.THE CLOSE-EAVED PAGODA -earliest style of Chinese pagodas. -built of bricks and stone. - inside of the pagoda is a structure of 10 to 13 floors, its octagonal rooms linked up by wooden stairs. - example: 12th-century Pagoda of Tianning Temple. The pagoda is a Liao Dynasty pagoda built from around 1100 to 1119 or 1120 CE. 2. THE TOWER PAGODA -most common type of pagodas. - example: Wooden Pagoda in Yingxian County, built in 1056 during the Liao Dynasty, - the tallest and oldest of its kind in the country. (900 years old)

2. HISTORY OF ART & ARCHITECTURE 3 China: Art, Architecture & Interior TYPES OF PAGODA 3. THE DIAMOND-THRONE PAGODAS -has its origin in India and is not often seen in China - common feature: five smaller pagodas being built on a high and solid square base called the "diamond-throne". - Chinese pavilion of glazed tiles with a round roof and double eaves was erected in the midst of the pagodas on the platform base, integration of Chinese and Indian art. 4. THE DAGOBA -pagoda of Tibetan style - the dagoba consists of three parts: the base, the body and the crown. - The base, a huge platform of brick, the body is in the shape of an upturned alms- bowl and the crown of the dagoba, on the plate of the canopy, is a smaller pagoda of 4 metres, glistening with its gold plate in sunlight. - Chinese dagobas were patterned after Nepalese prototypes.

3. HISTORY OF ART & ARCHITECTURE 3 China: Art, Architecture & Interior TYPES OF PAGODA 5. MOTHER-AND-CHILDREN PAGODAS (MIANTA) -a group arrangement of nine pagodas. The one in the middle is the "motherand around her at what would be the corners of a regular octagon are her "children" eight smaller pagodas. - Viewed from above, the group resembles a lotus blossom with its petals open. The pagodas have snow-white bodies and golden tips. 6. FOREST OF PAGODA -a "forest of pagodas" may be said to be the graveyard of Buddhists. - decorated with carvings and inscriptions. - generally of three to seven storeys and of varying heights up to 15 metres. - different forms: square or hexagon in cross-section, a column, a cone or a vase in shape, with straight or curving lines.