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Kailasa Temple

Religious and Sacred Buildings

The Kailasa Temple is a monolithic Hindu temple at the Ellora Caves complex in Maharashtra, India, dedicated to Shiva and carved as cave sixteen among the site's larger group of Buddhist, Hindu and Jain rock-cut monuments. Rather than being built up from separate stones, the entire temple, including its shrine, courtyard, subsidiary shrines and freestanding sculpted elephants and columns, was excavated downward and inward out of a single basalt cliff face. Commissioned in the eighth century, most likely under the Rashtrakuta king Krishna I, the project is estimated to have required the removal of some 200,000 tonnes of rock. It is considered the largest single monolithic rock excavation in the world and, together with the rest of the Ellora Caves, was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1983.

Facts
Building Type
Rock-cut Hindu temple 2
Location
Ellora, Chhatrapati Sambhaji Nagar district, Maharashtra, India 2
Completed Year
760 2
Most of the excavation of the temple is generally attributed to the eighth century Rashtrakuta king Krishna I, who reigned about 756 to 773, per Wikipedia; no more exact single year is attested.
Height (m)
32.6 2
The top of the structure over the sanctuary is 32.6 metres (107 ft) above the level of the court below, per Wikipedia.
Classification
Standing StatusSourced to the subject's own account
Standing 1
Building Type
Building Type (category)Sourced to the subject's own account
Temple / Shrine 1
Connections

Has Building Type

Temple, Concepts

Entity-backed identity for the building-type enum value this building already carries, resolved to an architecture concept by an explicit value-to-entity map (phase 3 bucket conversion, docs\design_entity_backed_browse_buckets_20260928.md). The building-type fact itself stays on the building unchanged.

In the Other Atlases
  • Also in Geography Atlas: India, located there.
Sources
1. Kailasa Temple (Wikipedia)
Wikimedia Foundation
  • Wikipedia "Kailasa Temple, Ellora" intro (read live, w-fk-arch-rel2-0927c, R-K)
  • lead section, opening sentence
    temple is the largest of the rock-cut Hindu temples at the Ellora Caves in Chhatrapati Sambhaji Nagar district of Maharashtra, India.
  • second paragraph, attribution sentence
    Most of the excavation of the temple is generally attributed to the eighth century Rashtrakuta king Krishna I
  • article text, height description
    The top of the structure over the sanctuary is 32.6 metres (107 ft) above the level of the court below.
  • Entity description and the lead of the Wikipedia article
    The Kailasa Temple is a monolithic Hindu temple at the Ellora Caves complex in Maharashtra, India, dedicated to Shiva and carved as cave sixteen among the site's larger group of Buddhist, Hindu and Jain rock-cut monuments. Rather than being built up from separate stones, the entire temple, including its shrine, courtyard, subsidiary shrines and freestanding sculpted elephants and columns, was excavated downward and inward out of a single basalt cliff face. Commissioned in the eighth century, most likely under the Rashtrakuta king Krishna I, the project is estimated to have required the removal of some 200,000 tonnes of rock. It is considered the largest single monolithic rock excavation in the world and, together with the rest of the Ellora Caves, was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1983.
View the Source
2. Wikipedia
Wikimedia Foundation
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