Cave Temples In Asia
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Cave Temples In Asia
Cave temples are subterranean Sacral architecture, sacred buildings carved into the List of rock formations, rock or created in a natural cave. Cave temples and monolithic rock temples carved out of the stone are a form of early natural architecture and rock construction, a building technique in solid rock closely related to sculpture. The most extensive artificially created cave temple complexes (subterranea) originated in India, where about 1200 complexes are documented, and in the neighboring regions of Asia. The basic form of cave temples in Asia was developed from the second century BCE in western India from the prefiguration of the mountain Hermitage (religious retreat), hermitage of the world-weary Śramaṇa, ''Śramaṇa'' Movement (Sanskrit, m., श्रमण, ''śramaṇa'', Pali, m., ''samaṇa'', mendicant monk), a detached hut or cave used as a dwelling for Asceticism, ascetics. Central design principles are probably derived from the model of wooden open-air buildin ...
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Aurangabad - Ajanta Caves (32)
Aurangabad (), officially renamed as Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar in 2023, is a city in the Indian state of Maharashtra. It is the administrative headquarters of Aurangabad district, Maharashtra, Aurangabad district and is the largest city in the Marathwada region. Located on a hilly upland terrain in the Deccan Traps, Aurangabad is the fifth-most populous urban area in Maharashtra, after Mumbai, Pune, Nagpur and Nashik, with a population of 1,175,116. The city is a major production center of cotton textile and artistic silk fabrics. Several prominent educational institutions, including Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Marathwada University, are located in the city. The city is also a popular tourism hub, with attractions like the Ajanta Caves, Ajanta and Ellora Caves, Ellora caves lying on its outskirts, both of which have been designated as UNESCO World Heritage Sites since 1983, the Aurangabad Caves, Daulatabad Fort, Devagiri Fort, Grishneshwar Temple, Jama Mosque, Aurangabad, Jama Mos ...
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Elephanta Caves
The Elephanta Caves are a collection of cave temples predominantly dedicated to the Hindu god Shiva, which have been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. They are on Elephanta Island, or ''Gharapuri'' (literally meaning "the city of caves"), in Mumbai Harbour, east of Mumbai in the Indian state of Maharashtra. The island, about west of the Jawaharlal Nehru Port, consists of five Hindu caves, a few Buddhist stupa mounds that date back to the 2nd century BCE,Elephanta Island
Encyclopedia Britannica
and two Buddhist caves with water tanks. The Elephanta Caves contain rock-cut stone sculptures, mostly in high

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S F-E-CAMERON EGYPT 2006 FEB 00661
S, or s, is the nineteenth letter of the Latin alphabet, used in the English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and other latin alphabets worldwide. Its name in English is ''ess'' (pronounced ), plural ''esses''. History Northwest Semitic šîn represented a voiceless postalveolar fricative (as in 'ip'). It originated most likely as a pictogram of a tooth () and represented the phoneme via the acrophonic principle. Ancient Greek did not have a "sh" phoneme, so the derived Greek letter Sigma () came to represent the voiceless alveolar sibilant . While the letter shape Σ continues Phoenician ''šîn'', its name ''sigma'' is taken from the letter ''Samekh'', while the shape and position of ''samekh'' but name of ''šîn'' is continued in the '' xi''. Within Greek, the name of ''sigma'' was influenced by its association with the Greek word (earlier ), "to hiss". The original name of the letter "Sigma" may have been ''san'', but due to the earl ...
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Nabataeans
The Nabataeans or Nabateans (; Nabataean Aramaic: , , vocalized as ) were an ancient Arabs, Arab people who inhabited northern Arabian Peninsula, Arabia and the southern Levant. Their settlements—most prominently the assumed capital city of Raqmu (present-day Petra, Jordan)—gave the name ''Nabatene'' () to the Arabian borderland that stretched from the Euphrates to the Red Sea. The Nabateans emerged as a distinct civilization and political entity between the 4th and 2nd centuries BC, with Nabataean Kingdom, their kingdom centered around a loosely controlled trading network that brought considerable wealth and influence across the ancient world. Described as fiercely independent by contemporary Greco-Roman accounts, the Nabataeans were annexed into the Roman Empire by Emperor Trajan in 106 AD. Nabataeans' individual culture, easily identified by their characteristic finely potted painted ceramics, was adopted into the larger Greco-Roman culture. They converted to Christi ...
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Lycia
Lycia (; Lycian: 𐊗𐊕𐊐𐊎𐊆𐊖 ''Trm̃mis''; , ; ) was a historical region in Anatolia from 15–14th centuries BC (as Lukka) to 546 BC. It bordered the Mediterranean Sea in what is today the provinces of Antalya and Muğla in Turkey as well some inland parts of Burdur Province. The region was known to history from the Late Bronze Age records of ancient Egypt and the Hittite Empire. Lycia was populated by speakers of Luwic languages. Written records began to be inscribed in stone in the Lycian language after Lycia's involuntary incorporation into the Achaemenid Empire in the Iron Age. At that time (546 BC) the Luwian speakers were displaced as Lycia received an influx of Persian speakers. The many cities in Lycia were wealthy as shown by their elaborate architecture starting at least from the 5th century BC and extending to the Roman period. Lycia fought for the Persians in the Persian Wars, but on the defeat of the Achaemenid Empire by the G ...
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Hittites
The Hittites () were an Anatolian peoples, Anatolian Proto-Indo-Europeans, Indo-European people who formed one of the first major civilizations of the Bronze Age in West Asia. Possibly originating from beyond the Black Sea, they settled in modern-day Turkey in the early 2nd millennium BC. The Hittites formed a series of Polity, polities in north-central Anatolia, including the kingdom of Kussara (before 1750 BC), the Kültepe, Kanesh or Nesha Kingdom (–1650 BC), and an empire centered on their capital, Hattusa (around 1650 BC). Known in modern times as the Hittite Empire, it reached its peak during the mid-14th century BC under Šuppiluliuma I, when it encompassed most of Anatolia and parts of the northern Levant and Upper Mesopotamia, bordering the rival empires of the Hurri-Mitanni and Assyrians. Between the 15th and 13th centuries BC, the Hittites were one of the dominant powers of the Near East, coming into conflict with the New Kingdom of Egypt, the Middle Assyrian Empi ...
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Assyria
Assyria (Neo-Assyrian cuneiform: , ''māt Aššur'') was a major ancient Mesopotamian civilization that existed as a city-state from the 21st century BC to the 14th century BC and eventually expanded into an empire from the 14th century BC to the 7th century BC. Spanning from the early Bronze Age to the late Iron Age, modern historians typically divide ancient Assyrian history into the Early Assyrian period, Early Assyrian ( 2600–2025 BC), Old Assyrian period, Old Assyrian ( 2025–1364 BC), Middle Assyrian Empire, Middle Assyrian ( 1363–912 BC), Neo-Assyrian Empire, Neo-Assyrian (911–609 BC), and Post-imperial Assyria, post-imperial (609 BC– AD 240) periods, based on political events and gradual changes in language. Assur, the first Assyrian capital, was founded 2600 BC, but there is no evidence that the city was independent until the collapse of the Third Dynasty of Ur, in the 21st century BC, when a line of independent kings starting with Puzur-Ashur I began rulin ...
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Egypt
Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northern coast of Egypt, the north, the Gaza Strip of Palestine and Israel to Egypt–Israel barrier, the northeast, the Red Sea to the east, Sudan to Egypt–Sudan border, the south, and Libya to Egypt–Libya border, the west; the Gulf of Aqaba in the northeast separates Egypt from Jordan and Saudi Arabia. Cairo is the capital, list of cities and towns in Egypt, largest city, and leading cultural center, while Alexandria is the second-largest city and an important hub of industry and tourism. With over 109 million inhabitants, Egypt is the List of African countries by population, third-most populous country in Africa and List of countries and dependencies by population, 15th-most populated in the world. Egypt has one of the longest histories o ...
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Seokguram
Seokguram () is a hermitage and part of the Bulguksa temple complex in Gyeongju, South Korea. It and Bulguksa are both on the mountain Tohamsan, although the two are separated by distance of around . The grotto overlooks the East Sea and rests 750 meters above sea level. In 1962, it was designated the 24th National Treasure of South Korea. In 1995, Seokguram was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List together with the Bulguksa Temple. It exemplifies some of the best Buddhist sculptures in the world. The Seokguram Grotto is said to have been built by Kim Daeseong and originally called Seokbulsa (). Construction began in either 742 or 751, during the cultural peak of the kingdom Unified Silla. The grotto was completed by the Silla court in 774, shortly after Kim's death. The grotto is currently one of the best known cultural destinations in South Korea. A viewing of the sunrise over the sea, which is visible from near the seated Buddha's perch, is especially popular. Archit ...
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Dambulla
Dambulla ( ''Dam̆bulla'', ''Tampuḷḷai'') is a city situated in the north of Matale District, in Sri Lanka's Central Province. It is the second largest populated and urbanised centre after Matale in the Matale District. It is situated north-east of Colombo, north of Matale and north of Kandy. Due to its location at a major junction, it is the centre of major vegetable distribution in the country. Major attractions of the area include the largest and best preserved cave temple complex of Sri Lanka, sigiriya rock fortress located in the division and the Rangiri Dambulla International Stadium, famous for being built in just 167 days. The area also boasts the largest rose quartz mountain range in South Asia, and the Iron wood forest, or Na Uyana Aranya. Ibbankatuwa prehistoric burial site near Dambulla cave temple complexes is the latest archaeological site of significant historical importance found in Dambulla, which is located within of the cave temples provid ...
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Yungang Grottoes
The Yungang Grottoes (), formerly the Wuzhoushan Grottoes (), are ancient Chinese Buddhist temple grottoes built during the Northern Wei dynasty near the city of Datong, then called Pingcheng, in the province of Shanxi. They are excellent examples of rock-cut architecture and one of the three most famous ancient Buddhist sculptural sites of China. The others are Longmen and Mogao. The site is located about 16 km west of the city of Datong, in the valley of the Shi Li river at the base of the Wuzhou Shan mountains. They are an outstanding example of the Chinese stone carvings from the 5th and 6th centuries. There are 53 major caves, along with 51,000 niches housing the same number of Buddha statues. Additionally, there are around 1,100 minor caves. A Ming dynasty-era fort is still located on top of the cliff housing the Yungang Grottoes. The grottoes were excavated in the south face of a sandstone cliff about 2,600 feet long and 30 to 60 feet high. In 2001, the Yungang Gr ...
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Longmen Grottoes
The Longmen Grottoes () or Longmen Caves are some of the finest examples of Chinese Buddhist art. Housing tens of thousands of statues of Shakyamuni Buddha and his disciples, they are located south of present-day Luoyang in Henan province, China. The images, many once painted, were carved as outside rock reliefs and inside artificial caves excavated from the limestone cliffs of the Xiangshan () and Longmenshan, running east and west. The Yi River () flows northward between them and the area used to be called Yique (). The alternative name of "Dragon's Gate Grottoes" derives from the resemblance of the two hills that check the flow of the Yi River to the typical " Chinese gate towers" that once marked the entrance to Luoyang from the south. There are as many as 100,000 statues within the 2,345 caves, ranging from to in height. The area also contains nearly 2,500 stelae and inscriptions, hence the name "Forest of Ancient Stelae", as well as over sixty Buddhist pagodas. S ...
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