Place · Buddhist rock-cut caves · India
Aurangabad Caves
Also known as Aurangabad, Vakataka Buddhist caves
The 12 Buddhist rock-cut caves at Aurangabad in Maharashtra, 10 kilometres from Aurangabad city — a 6-7th century CE Mahayana Buddhist cave complex cut into the Satmala range hills north of the city. The caves document the late-Mahayana to early-Vajrayana transition in Deccan Buddhism, with caves 2, 6, 7 and 9 containing distinctively feminine Tara and Avalokiteshvara iconography that would come to dominate Vajrayana practice. Cave 7 contains the elaborate Mahayana panels of the Thousand-Buddha composition. The caves are architecturally derivative of Ajanta (3rd century BCE-7th century CE) but reflect a later-stage Buddhist religious transition. ASI protection since 1951. The site is near the UNESCO-listed Ellora caves (30 km away) and the Bibi ka Maqbara.
- Function
- Sacred site & pilgrimage
- Confidence
- Established / referenced
- Location
- 19.926, 75.328
Connections (2)
- Adjacent rock-cut siteEllorā
The twelve Buddhist caves on the hill above Aurangabad, cut in the sixth and seventh centuries, sit a few kilometres from Ellora, and their Tara and Avalokiteshvara figures belong to the same late Mahayana phase as Ellora's Buddhist group. Two chapters of one Deccan tradition of cutting monasteries and temples from the trap rock, which ran for a thousand years and ended when the patronage that funded it moved elsewhere.
- Site withinAurangabad / Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar
The Aurangabad Caves — twelve rock-cut Buddhist caves of the sixth and seventh centuries — sit within the modern city limits, two kilometres north of the Bibi ka Maqbara. The caves are a Vakataka-period extension of the Ajanta-Ellora rock-cut Buddhist tradition and are administered under the Aurangabad ASI circle. They are the only major rock-cut site within the Aurangabad city boundary.
Sources
Wikipedia, “Aurangabad Caves”. Archaeological Survey of India and State Archaeology monument records, and the standard regional literature.
Open Aurangabad Caves in the repository →