Wherever Buddhism has flourished, there were stupas in the form of monuments which have their origin in the tumulm of prehistoric times. After the death of Buddha, his body was cremated following the Indian funeral custom. His ashes, which long reserved for the remains of nobles and holymen, were enshrined under such artificial hills of earth and brick. The Stupa was in origin a simple burial-mound. The form of the burial-mound was a symbolical or magic reconstruction of the imagined shape of the sky, like a dome covering the earth. The domical form of the earliest tumuli may have been concious replicas of the shape of the Vedic hut. There are relationships which may have originally existed between the stupa and West Asiatic monuments. Buddhist Stupa originally cosisted of an almost hemispherical tumulus(anda) and an altar-like structure (harmika) on its top, surmounted by one or several superimposed honorific umbrellas (hti, catta). This hemispherical form is associated with centralisation, lunar worship, mother earth, and Siva. Anda means a symbol of latent creative power, the harmika symbolizes the sanctuary enthroned aboved the world. The honorific umbrella, as an abstract imitation of the shade-giving tree is one of the chief solar symbols and that of enlightenment.