UNESCO World Heritage Site

Ajanta CavesName as inscribed on the World Heritage List (http://whc.unesco.org/en/list)

Type Cultural

Criteria i, ii, iii, vi

Reference 242(http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/242)

UNESCO region (http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/?

search=&search_by_country=&type=&media=&region=&order=region)

Asia-Pacific

Coordinates 20°33′09″N 75°42′02″E

Inscription historyInscription 1983 (7th Session)

Location of Ajanta Caves in Maharashtra.

Ajanta CavesFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The AjantaCaves (Ajiṇṭhāleni; Marathi:अिजठंा लणेी) inAurangabaddistrict ofMaharashtra,India are about30 rock-cutBuddhist cavemonumentswhich date fromthe 2nd centuryBCE to about480 or 650 CE.[1]

The cavesinclude paintingsand sculpturesdescribed by thegovernmentArchaeologicalSurvey of Indiaas "the finestsurvivingexamples ofIndian art,particularlypainting",[2]

which aremasterpieces ofBuddhistreligious art,with figures ofthe Buddha anddepictions of theJataka tales.[3]

The caves werebuilt in twophases startingaround the 2ndcentury BCE,with the second group of caves built around 400–650 CE according to older accounts, or all in a brief

Coordinates: 20°33′09″N 75°42′02″E

period of 460 to 480 according to the recent proposals of Walter M. Spink.[4] The site is a protectedmonument in the care of the Archaeological Survey of India,[5] and since 1983, the Ajanta Caves have beena UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The caves are located in the Indian state of Maharashtra, near Jalgaon and just outside the village of Ajinṭhā), about 59 kilometres (37 miles) from Jalgaon railway station on the Delhi –

Mumbai line and Howrah-Nagpur-Mumbai line of the Central Railway zone, and 104 kilometres (65 miles)from the city of Aurangabad. They are 100 kilometres (62 miles) from the Ellora Caves, which containHindu and Jain temples as well as Buddhist caves, the last dating from a period similar to Ajanta. TheAjanta caves are cut into the side of a cliff that is on the south side of a U-shaped gorge on the small riverWaghur,[6] and although they are now along and above a modern pathway running across the cliff theywere originally reached by individual stairs or ladders from the side of the river 35 to 110 feet below.[7]

The area was previously heavily forested, and after the site ceased to be used the caves were covered byjungle until accidentally rediscovered in 1819 by a British officer on a hunting party. They are Buddhistmonastic buildings, apparently representing a number of distinct "monasteries" or colleges. The caves arenumbered 1 to 28 according to their place along the path, beginning at the entrance. Several are unfinishedand some barely begun and others are small shrines, included in the traditional numbering as e.g. "9A";"Cave 15A" was still hidden under rubble when the numbering was done.[8] Further round the gorge are anumber of waterfalls, which when the river is high are audible from outside the caves.[9]

The caves form the largest corpus of early Indian wall-painting; other survivals from the area of modernIndia are very few, though they are related to 5th-century paintings at Sigiriya in Sri Lanka.[10] [11] Theelaborate architectural carving in many caves is also very rare, and the style of the many figure sculptures ishighly local, found only at a few nearby contemporary sites, although the Ajanta tradition can be related tothe later Hindu Ellora Caves and other sites.[12]

Contents

1 History1.1 Caves of the first (Satavahana) period1.2 Caves of the later, or Vãkãțaka, period1.3 Rediscovery

2 Paintings2.1 Copies

3 Architecture4 Iconography of the caves5 Caves

5.1 Cave One5.2 Cave Two5.3 Cave Four

20°31′56″N 75°44′44″E

Stupa in cave 10

5.4 Caves 9–105.5 Other caves

6 Spink's detailed chronology7 Impact on modern Indian Paintings8 See also9 Notes10 References11 Further reading12 External links

History

Like the other ancient Buddhist monasteries, Ajanta had alarge emphasis on teaching, and was divided into severaldifferent caves for living, education and worship, under acentral direction. Monks were probably assigned to specificcaves for living. The layout reflects this organizationalstructure, with most of the caves only connected through theexterior. The 7th-century travelling Chinese scholarXuanzang informs us that Dignaga, a celebrated Buddhistphilosopher and controversialist, author of well-knownbooks on logic, lived at Ajanta in the 5th century. In itsprime the settlement would have accommodated severalhundred teachers and pupils. Many monks who had finishedtheir first training may have returned to Ajanta during themonsoon season from an itinerant lifestyle.

The caves are generally agreed to have been made in two distinct periods, separated by several centuries.

Caves of the first (Satavahana) period

The earliest group of caves consists of caves 9, 10, 12, 13 and 15A. According to Walter Spink, they weremade during the period 100 BCE to 100 CE, probably under the patronage of the Satavahana dynasty (230BCE – c. 220 CE) who ruled the region.[13] Other datings prefer the period 300 BCE to 100 BCE, thoughthe grouping of the earlier caves is generally agreed.[14] More early caves may have vanished through laterexcavations. Of these, caves 9 and 10 are stupa halls of chaitya-griha form, and caves 12, 13, and 15A arevihāras (see the architecture section below for descriptions of these types). The first phase is still oftencalled the Hinayāna phase, as it originated when, using traditional terminology, the Hinayāna or LesserVehicle tradition of Buddhism was dominant, when the Buddha was revered symbolically.[15] However theuse of the term Hinayana for this period of Buddhism is now deprecated by historians; equally the caves ofthe second period are now mostly dated too early to be properly called Mahayana, and do not yet show the

The entrance to cave 19

full expanded cast of supernatural beings characteristic of that phase of Buddhist art. The first Satavahanaperiod caves lacked figurative sculpture, emphasizing the stupa instead, and in the caves of the secondperiod the overwhelming majority of images represent the Buddha alone, or narrative scenes of his lives.

Spink believes that some time after the Satavahana periodcaves were made the site was abandoned for a considerableperiod until the mid-5th century, probably because theregion had turned mainly Hindu[16]

Caves of the later, or Vãkãțaka, period

The second phase began in the 5th century. For a long timeit was thought that the later caves were made over a longperiod from the 4th to the 7th centuries CE,[17] but in recentdecades a series of studies by the leading expert on thecaves, Walter M. Spink, have argued that most of the worktook place over the very brief period from 460 to 480CE,[18] during the reign of Emperor Harishena of theVakataka dynasty. This view has been criticized by somescholars,[19] but is now broadly accepted by most authors ofgeneral books on Indian art, for example Huntington andHarle.

The second phase is still often called the Mahāyāna or Greater Vehicle phase, but scholars now tend toavoid this nomenclature because of the problems that have surfaced regarding our understanding ofMahāyāna.[20]

Some 20 cave temples were simultaneously created, for the most part viharas with a sanctuary at the back.The most elaborate caves were produced in this period, which included some "modernization" of earliercaves. Spink claims that it is possible to establish dating for this period with a very high level of precision; afuller account of his chronology is given below.[21] Although debate continues, Spink's ideas areincreasingly widely accepted, at least in their broad conclusions. The Archaeological Survey of Indiawebsite still presents the traditional dating: "The second phase of paintings started around 5th – 6thcenturies A.D. and continued for the next two centuries".[22] Caves of the second period are 1–8, 11, 14–29,some possibly extensions of earlier caves. Caves 19, 26, and 29 are chaitya-grihas, the rest viharas.

According to Spink, the Ajanta Caves appear to have been abandoned by wealthy patrons shortly after thefall of Harishena, in about 480 CE. They were then gradually abandoned and forgotten.[23] During theintervening centuries, the jungle grew back and the caves were hidden, unvisited and undisturbed, althoughthe local population were aware of at least some of them.[24]

Rediscovery

On 28 April 1819, a British officer for the Madras Presidency, John Smith, of the 28th Cavalry, whilehunting tiger, accidentally discovered the entrance to Cave No. 10 deep within the tangled undergrowth.There were local people already using the caves for prayers with a small fire, when he arrived. Exploring

Scene from cave 1

that first cave, long since a home to nothing more than birds and bats and a lair for other larger animals,Captain Smith vandalized the wall by scratching his name and the date, April 1819. Since he stood on afive-foot high pile of rubble collected over the years, the inscription is well above the eye-level gaze of anadult today.[25] A paper on the caves by William Erskinewas read to the Bombay Literary Society 1n 1822.[26]

Within a few decades, the caves became famous for theirexotic setting, impressive architecture, and above all theirexceptional, all but unique paintings. A number of largeprojects to copy the paintings were made in the centuryafter rediscovery, covered below. In 1848 the RoyalAsiatic Society established the "Bombay Cave TempleCommission" to clear, tidy and record the most importantrock-cut sites in the Bombay Presidency, with JohnWilson, as president. In 1861 this became the nucleus ofthe new Archaeological Survey of India.[27] Until theNizam of Hyderabad built the modern path between thecaves, among other efforts to make the site easy to visit, atrip to Ajanta was a considerable adventure, andcontemporary accounts dwell with relish on the dangersfrom falls off narrow ledges, animals and the Bhil people, who were armed with bows and arrows and had afearsome reputation.[28]

Today, fairly easily combined with Ellora in a single trip, the caves are the most popular tourist destinationin Mahrashtra, and are often crowded at holiday times, increasing the threat to the caves, especially thepaintings.[29] In 2012, the Maharashtra Tourism Development Corporation announced plans to add to theASI visitor centre at the entrance complete replicas of caves 1, 2, 16 & 17 to reduce crowding in theoriginals, and enable visitors to receive a better visual idea of the paintings, which are dimly-lit and hard toread in the caves.[30] Figures for the year to March 2010 showed a total of 390,000 visitors to the site,divided into 362,000 domestic and 27,000 foreign. The trends over the previous few years show aconsiderable growth in domestic visitors, but a decline in foreign ones; the year to 2010 was the first inwhich foreign visitors to Ellora exceeded those to Ajanta.[31]

Paintings

Mural paintings survive from both the earlier and later groups of caves. Several fragments of muralspreserved from the earlier caves (Caves 9 and 11) are effectively unique survivals of court-led painting inIndia from this period, and "show that by Sātavāhana times, if not earlier, the Indian painter had masteredan easy and fluent naturalistic style, dealing with large groups of people in a manner comparable to thereliefs of the Sāñcī toraņa crossbars".[32]

Four of the later caves have large and relatively well-preserved mural paintings which "have come torepresent Indian mural painting to the non-specialist",[33] and fall into two stylistic groups, with the mostfamous in Caves 16 and 17, and apparently later paintings in Caves 1 and 2. The latter group were thoughtto be a century or more later than the others, but the revised chronology proposed by Spink would placethem much closer to the earlier group, perhaps contemporary with it in a more progressive style, or one