Ajanta Caves are the prodigious masterpieces that displays Indian art. The places a Historical as well as Archaeological importance. Ajanta and Ellora caves are situated in the Aurangabad district of Maharashtra, and are oldest UNESCO World Heritage Site. These caves display painting depicting era between 2nd century BC and 6th century AD. Classical India Art is at huge display. It is a renowned Buddhist monument in India. The caves are in horse shoe shaped. There are many amazing things to be read about these caves, let’s read about them.
1. The paintings on the walls explains two eras, depicting the life of Buddha. The caves were listed as the World Heritage Site in 1983.
2. The cave is not only about paintings, there were also Buddhist stupas and pillars
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3. The Buddhist stupas are worshiped by the believers. It is believed that many Buddhist monks stayed there during monsoon. And to spend their time they put their creativity into these paintings.
4. Apart from Ajanta and Ellora, there were 30 more caves found, which belonged to Vakataka period and the Satvahana period.
5. Caves present there are chaityagrihas and viharas.
6. A British Officer, John Smith accidently discovered the caves.
7. The painting made by the monks are mostly made using hammer and chisel. The colours used were red and yellow ochre, and building materials like gypsum and lapis lazuli can also be seen on the paintings.
8. Artistic style from Srilanka and Tibet are the major influence. The paintings depict the incidents from the life of Gautam Buddha and the Jataka Tales. Though, Buddha throughout his life, was against sculpting and painting and believed that life is a process through which one must overcome desire in order to attain salvation.
9. The caves are famous around the world for Murals. The Ellora caves are 34 in number, which are carved on the sides of basaltic hill.
10. The paintings were binded using glue. It took almost 2,00,000 tons of rocks to build these caves.