Buddhist temples in Japan

Buddhist temples or Buddhist monasteries together with Shinto shrines, are considered to be amongst the most numerous, famous, and important religious buildings in Japan. The shogunates or leaders of Japan have made it a priority to update and rebuild Buddhist temples since the Momoyama period. The Japanese word for a Buddhist monastery is tera (寺) (kun reading) and the same kanji also has the pronunciation ji (on reading), so that temple names frequently end in -dera or -ji. Another ending, -in (院), is normally used to refer to minor temples. Such famous temples as Kiyomizu-dera, Enryaku-ji and Kōtoku-in are temples which use the described naming pattern.