Gupta Timeline

500 BCE – 1900 CE · 6 sites

All sites in this period

Kailasa Temple (Cave 16) at Ellora, carved from a single basalt outcrop, Maharashtra, India

Ellora Caves

100 BCE – 1100 CE

The world's largest rock-cut monastic and temple complex — 34 monasteries and shrines carved directly into a 2-kilometre basalt escarpment in Maharashtra, representing Buddhist, Hindu, and Jain traditions side by side. The Hindu Kailasa Temple (Cave 16), hewn from a single enormous rock in the 8th century CE, is the largest monolithic structure ever carved from stone and one of humanity's most audacious feats of rock-cut architecture.

ClassicalLate AntiqueEarly Medieval

Rock-cut Buddhist cave monasteries at Ajanta, cut into a horseshoe-shaped gorge, Maharashtra, India

Country Record

Earliest Known Site in India

Ajanta Caves

200 BCE – 480 CE

The greatest gallery of Buddhist art in the ancient world — 30 rock-cut caves carved into a horseshoe-shaped gorge in Maharashtra, containing murals and sculptures produced from the 2nd century BCE to the 6th century CE. The Gupta-period paintings (4th–5th century CE) in Caves 1, 2, 16, and 17 are among the finest figurative paintings to survive from antiquity anywhere in the world, comparable to the frescoes of Pompeii and the mosaics of Byzantine Ravenna.

ClassicalLate Antique

The Mahabodhi Temple at Bodh Gaya, Bihar, India

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Country Record

Oldest Temple in India

Bodh Gaya

500 BCE – 1900 CE

The place where Siddhartha Gautama attained enlightenment under the Bodhi tree — marked by the soaring Mahabodhi Temple in Bihar, India — the holiest pilgrimage site in Buddhism and a UNESCO World Heritage monument drawing devotees from across Asia.

Iron AgeClassicalEarly Medieval

The Trimurti Shiva sculpture in the main cave at Elephanta Island

Country Record

Known by the Most Names in India

Elephanta Caves

500 CE – 800 CE

Rock-cut Shaiva temples on Elephanta Island in Mumbai Harbour — famous for the 6-metre Trimurti Shiva and colonnaded main cave — among India's most visited ancient sites and a UNESCO World Heritage monument reached by ferry from the Gateway of India.

ClassicalEarly MedievalMedieval

Nalanda

427 CE – 1200 CE

The ancient world's greatest university — a walled monastic complex in Bihar, India, that functioned as an international center of Buddhist learning from the 5th to 12th centuries CE, housing up to 10,000 students and monks from China, Korea, Tibet, Central Asia, and Southeast Asia before its destruction in 1193.

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ClassicalEarly MedievalMedieval

The cylindrical Dhamekh Stupa at Sarnath, Uttar Pradesh, with carved Gupta-period stone banding

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Country Record

Oldest Complex in India

Sarnath

500 BCE – 1200 CE

The Deer Park northeast of Varanasi where the Buddha delivered the first sermon and founded the sangha. Ashoka’s lion capital, the Dhamekh Stupa, and sixteen centuries of monasteries were inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage serial property on 25 July 2026.

Iron AgeClassicalLate Antique