During the fifth and sixth centuries A.D. the early Japanese became aware of the complex Chinese culture on the Asian mainland, and by the beginning of the eighth century they had forsworn the primitive tropical architecture of Shinto and begun to surround themselves with palaces and temples modeled on the Chinese. During the Heian era, a Chinese-inspired aristocrat dwelling developed which represented a compromise between Japanese requirements and Chinese models. Although influenced by T'ang Chinese palaces, it was the first indigenous Japanese architectural style and is known as _shinden_. The _shinden _mansion was a sprawling complex dominated by a main building facing a pond, around which were flanked ancillary structures connected to it by open galleries protected only by a roof. These open galleries, being very much the fashion, were also built around the outside of all the larger rooms and served as passageways. There were no solid walls inside the buildings; privacy was obtained by curtains and two-part horizontal doors hinged at the top and attached to the ceiling. Adopting Chinese construction methods, Japanese began roofing the buildings with dark clay tiles instead of native thatch, and walls were frequently surfaced with clay rather than wood planks or woven straw. Exterior woods were painted Chinese vermilion instead of being left to age naturally. Furnishings were meager, and rooms were not identified according to usage; the building was one large area temporarily divided according to the needs of the moment. Instead of chairs there were movable floor mats of woven straw, while around the exterior of the rooms there were heavy shutters; these could be removed in summer or replaced by light bamboo blinds, which rolled down like window shades. Lighting was not a prominent feature of _shinden _mansions, and in winter the aristocracy huddled around a smoky fire in almost total darkness, the price of seeing being to open the blinds and freeze. The _shinden_ style suppressed for a time the indigenous affection for simplicity and unadorned natural materials revealed in the earlier, pre-Heian dwellings. However, it was never really naturalized, and it was eventually to be remembered in Japan's architectural history largely as an aberrant interlude, whose major legacy was the sense of openness or fluid space in the classic Zen house.