CENTER FOR ART AND ARCHAEOLOGY 
Cave 18 is an elaborate cistern chamber that also functions as a pillared passage linking Upendragupta’s Caves 17 and 19. It commenced in 463/464 CE and was sponsored by Upendragupta, the sub-king at Ajanta. This water-channel, probably served both of its adjacent caves - Caves 17 and 19. An inscription in Upendragupta’s Cave 17 on a wall shared that the cistern shares with the cave’s court honors it with a special reference to its always being “filled with sweet, light, clear, cold and copious water”.
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Cave 19 is Upendragupta’s “perfumed hall” that commenced in 470s. It was conceived originally as the devotional focus of the site. The exquisite facade of this chaitya-griha (monastery) with its pillared portico and projected cornice is dominated by chaitya window in the facade. This apsidal cave is divided into a nave, an apse, and aisles by colonnade of seventeen pillars. At the center of the apse stands a stupa and an umbrella wholly in stones reaching almost to the roof of the cave. The roof of the aisles has been painted chiefly with ornamental flower scrolls.
Cave 19’s motifs served as models for much later work but before the hall could be put into worship, the victorious Asmakas took over the region, broke a path through its forward court cells in order to more easily reach their own rival Cave 26, and forbade this cave’s use. Later on, in mid 478–480 CE, during the disruption of authority over the site following Harisena’s death, the eager donors covered Cave 19’s court extensions with intrusive votive images. For instance, the famous cobra king (Nagaraja) at the left would originally have been paired with another ancient divinity at the right; but since Upendragupta’s program was never completed, an intrusive seated Buddha, his seat planted on the ground in a characteristically late way, was placed there instead.
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Cave 20 is a richly colonnaded vihara or monastery on which work started in 470CE. The pilaster at the left end of the verandah contains a fragmentary inscription recording the gift of the mandapa by one Upendra. This cave had to be hastily dedicated and then abandoned because of the Asmaka takeover in the early 470’s. It has a difficult history since, more than Upendragupta’s other caves, it suffered from cutbacks during the Recession. As a result, parts of Cave 20’s main Buddha image had to be expediently completed with mud plaster just before work on the cave broke off in 471 CE. This vihara presents a new feature in its antechamber advancing into the hall. The pillars and pilasters of the verandah, while resembling those of Cave 1, have bracket figures of graceful sala-bhanjikas on each side of the capitals. The roof of the verandah has imitation beams and rafters. The design of the lintel of the door with two arches, in the firm of elephant’s trunk issuing from the mouths of makaras (sea creatures in Hindu mythology) is again an innovation. The capitals of the pillars’ antechamber support an entablature carved in panels with seven Buddhas accompanied by attendants. The hall has no pillars, and some of the cells are somewhat unfinished. Most of the paintings have disappeared.
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Cave 21 is a vihara or monastery that was probably inaugurated around 465-466 CE with the cutting back of its court area. It consists of a pillared verandah whose pillars are now cemented replacements, a pillared hall with 12 cells, antechamber, a sanctum flanked by two cells. There is an image of a Buddha in preaching attitude in the sanctum. Cave 21 was relatively simple at its inception but it incorporated new ideas and forms as it went along and by 477 CE when it was nearing completion, it represented the Vakataka vihara in a much elaborated form. It took advantage of the many stylistic and technological changes that occurred in the meantime particularly in the royal caves like Cave1, 17, 19 and 20.
It’s fine carved decoration, dating from the period of Asmaka domination starting in 475 CE, was still underway when Harisena died, and was never finished. It was possibly later undertaken by Monk Buddhabhadra, a friend of Bhavviraja, a minister of the king of Asmaka. There are also traces of painting of a panel depicting Buddha preaching a congregation. Cave 21 also has spacious cistern that was never finished.
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