This place is considered rightly as one of the places which one must visit at least once in India. Here as in Ajanta, about thirty caves were excavated blank a cliff, during several centuries and were occupied by Hindu, Buddhist monks and jains. The caves thus gather according to the style which characterizes them, style which appears obviously under the direct influence of the religion which inspired them.

Oldest were the bouddhic caves (1 to 12), that one dates from the 7-9èmes centuries, i.e. contemporary of Chalukya de Badami (a little more in the south, in Karnataka). Caves 13 to 19, known as Hindu women, reserved for the worship of Shiva, were carried out between 7th and the 10th century. They are thus partially contemporary the preceding ones, but one continued to arrange some under the dynasty of Rashtrakuta to which one owes especially the fabulous temple of Kailasha (known as cave 16). Caves 30 to 34 are latest, between 9th and 11th centuries. Also dug under the reign of Rashtrakuta, they dealt with the worship jain. A monastic activity will perdura in the centuries which followed.

The North-South cliff being more or less directed and facing the west, one will have advantage to pay the visit the afternoon to ensure itself of a little light in the caves. Those are however as a whole much less dark than those of Ajanta.

They are located completely at the south. All are of type will vihara, i.e. that they are small monasteries. They are relatively late (until the 8th century) and are attached to the Buddhist tradition of Mahayana (Large Vehicle). Often vast, they can be dug on two levels like the caves 4, 10 and 12, even three levels (cave 11). The decoration of the pillars is remarkable, and privileges the floral elements, but one will note especially the relative abundance of the sculptures in low-relief representing the Buddha, of Boddhisatva, the Tara goddess, Ganesh and even Shiva. Cave 10, equipped with a superb frontage, is of a style special, known as chaitya, consisted of a room in apse, at the bottom of which a stupa is drawn up.

They set up the central group and some of them are most prestigious, in particular:

The cave the 14 (Ravana ki Khai, or cave of Ravana, the demon with ten heads which removed Sîtâ, the wife of the Rama god, or even which raised the Kailash Mount remains of the Shiva god and his Pârvatî wife) cave the 15 (Dashavatara, or cave of the misadventures, allusion to the ten incarnations of the Vishnu god to bring back the harmony on ground) cave 16 (temple of Kailash, who is not to be strictly accurate a cave) cave 21 (Rameshvara), to the marvellous frontage and the splendid low-reliefs decorating the walls And cave 29 (Dhumar Lena, or Bath of Sîtâ).