In Maharashtra, in northern Deccan, the early part of the period saw intense activity in the creation and decoration of cave-shrines and monasteries, extending down as far as the cave-temples in Badami and Aihole, in the northern part of the present state of Karnataka, west of the centre of Deccan, meagrely watered by the Malprabha and its tributaries, but bountifully provided with splendid sandstone. This was the scene of unexpected accomplishments in temple architecture in that mixture of fashions hereafter to be trademark of Deccan architecture and sculpture, along with its inimitable provincial elements.

The handful of Gupta shrines that remain, many in a state of severe decrepitude, however prove that a number of the distinctive facets on the Indian temple had evolved by c. 55°. They consist of a raised, normally rectangular platform, sometimes previously with the primary shrine in the centre and auxiliary shrines at the corners, and a sanctum, almost customarily windowless and understated, encircled, in larger shrines, by an enwrapped ambulatory passage, often illuminated by stonegrilled windows to the outside, normally with an intricately carved entryway and in some cases introduced by a pillared hall. Many of these maturations can be seen in the Mahayana Buddhist caves in Ajanta and elsewhere; given the patronage they attracted and the utmost conservatism of Indian constructors, there must have been an inverse flow of influence during this time- from the rock-cut monuments to the new structural temples in stone.

Less is known about the superstructures of the early free-standing temples in brick or stone. From occasional illustrations on stone reliefs and on sealings, primarily the Kumrahar `plaque`, it is know that many-storeyed superstructures like the Mahabodhi in Bodh Gaya (previous to its numerous renovations), possibly existed from Kusana times onwards. .

The many temples built under the early western Chalukyas between the end of 6th century and the end of the 8th, which survive virtually intact, offer significant landmarks in the maturation of the Hindu temple. A few 7th and 8th century temples remain elsewhere in India, but only on or near the banks of the Malprabha, in northwestern Karnataka, however, is such an aggregation to be found, and (what is even more stupefying) only here is it possible to see side-by-side, and already amply developed, temples of the `northern` Nagara kind and others in the Dravida mode of south India. The Nagara kind has a `tower` or shikhara of layer on layer of kapotas and gavasaka courses, crowned by a huge amalaka and with smaller ones inset at the nooks, the Dravida increasingly smaller storeys encircled by small pavilions and coronated by a dome (the `shikhara` in southern terminology) above a narrower throat.

It is now commonly accepted that the region was a meeting place of styles, well on their way to development elsewhere, conserved because little or no succeeding building has taken place at these comparatively remote rural spots. Particular facets of the early western Chalukya mandapa connected to the front of the shrine proper, in alignment with one or two of the temples, alone allows one to glimpse a pretty long period of progress, a supposition to which the breakthrough of the remains of a brick pillared hall of probably Satavahana date, lends weight. Even so, the type has fractional parallels of early date elsewhere.

Though traces of Buddhist doings, possibly of the 6th century, have been discovered in Badami and Aihole, the earliest excavated cave temples, structural temples, and sculpture for which there is more than excavated or secondary evidence, correspond with the accession to power of the early western Chalukya in the mid 6th century, and are principally Hindu with a splashing of Jain monuments. The first significant king of the dynasty was Palaces I (c. 535-66), but it was Palaces II (610-42), who overpowered the great Habra of Kanauj and conquered Kanchipuram, the capital of the Pallavas, who stretched the Chalukya dominions to include Maharagra, the Konkan, the entire Karnataka (later English `Carnatic`), and possibly even Lara (Gujarat). His reign ended devastatingly with the seizure of most of his province, including the capital Badami, by the Pallava king. Chalukya power was soon reestablished, however, by Pulakesin`s son Vikramaditya I (655-81) and went forward until the middle of 8th century.

The early western Chalukya temples can be separated into those of the late 6th, 7th and perhaps early 8th centuries in three diverse sites- Badami (ancient Vatapi), Aihole (ancient Ayyavolt) and Mahavira; and a `second generation` in the succeeding century, including some far bigger than any that had gone before, at Piratical. The classes are not absolute, and some temples in Aihole belong to the early 8th century. There are also the rock-cut Hindu and Jain temples at Badami, one of them (Cave III) an art-historical milestone because, alone among the caves, it is dated (578), and the lesser but equally exquisite cave-temples in Aihole, all with remarkable sculpture.

The daintiest of the early `southern` temples is the so-called Malaga Himalaya at Badami. Prototypal southern is the configuration of the vicinal (the shrine proper in Dravida temples). Its superstructure consists of storeys (tales) with miniature solid pavilions, forming an unbroken parapet (hire) around the fundamental edifice, which concludes in a dome-like element, octagonal, circular or square, called a shikhara (not to be confused with the entire structure of a `northern` temple). The pavilions at the corners (kowhais or kar1Jakiifas) are square in design, with oblong ones with barrel roofs (salsa) in between, intermingled with paiijaras, protrusions topped by a huge chandrasala (gavasaka). Though both types of superstructure might infrequently house an upper shrine room, the storeys or tiers are not designed to afford interior space

There are three other `southern` temples in Badami, in various conditions of decrepitude. The legendary Meguti temple at Aihole is Jain built. It has an interesting design, and it is impossible even to speculate about the master superstructure. The wall fabric, however, is characteristically `southern`, and the daring mouldings at the base adequately correspond to those of the Malegigi Shivalaya, to designate a similar date for both. Nagral (or Nagaral) is the only substantial temple not at one of the primary sites. Though the superstructure of its vimana is mostly in ruins, it has `southern` facets, distinctive of early western Chalukya temples and no others. The square columns of the porch are engraved with immense mithuna statuettes. More imperative, the mandapa possesses a raised clerestory and is roofed with large slabs of stone; over the joints are placed what are best distinguished as stone logs, split in two and set with the flat surface down.

From Badami, a pilgrim road, some of it on the sheet rock, distinctive of the region, leads over the hills to Mahakuta, an archetypal tirtha (holy site of pilgrimage). A Vijayanagara-period torana stands on the highland before the path drops down into a tiny glen between the hills where, clustered around a sacred tank fed by springs and surrounded by a wall, stands approximately 25 shrines, large and small, some with vimanas of the `southern` kind, some with `northern`-style shikharas, and one with a Kalinga superstructure of the same kind, similar to the Mallikarjuna at Aihole. The two biggest temples are the Mahakutesvara and the Mallikarjuna, both unbroken and both of the same common type, like Nagral, but larger and provided with statuettes in exterior recesses. It was long supposed that the Mahakutesvara was the temple referred to in the illustrious inscription, dated 60, on a pillar, now in Bijapur, which previously stood outside the enclosed space. The dense whitewash masking the outside and the coarsely restructured interior, long made stylistic valuation unmanageable, but now drawn elevations permit the two temples to be equated, and it seems possible that they both belong, along with the Nagral temple, to the third or fourth quarter of the 7th century.

The third significant site, with by far the greatest number of early temples, is Aihole, at the moment an inconsequential village. Many of the temples were utilised until recent times as houses or cattle byres, the names of whose former owner they sometimes bore (e.g. Lad Khan). Aihole`s ancient status is witnessed however by the relics of a colossal city wall and its entryways, at times complete with merlons, the only such fortification to have outlasted from such previous times. The Meguti, already mentioned, subjugated the town from a small acropolis.

It is inconceivable to do justice, in a small compass, to the affluence and diversity of small shrines at Aihole. Some have uncomplicated `southern` domes, others again are simply miniature mandapas with an area partitioned off for the sanctum. This profusion is not a local happening- for every shrine, immense or imperative enough to find its way into art historical books and monographs there exist a score of lesser or smashed edifices, often of substantial antiquity. Temple 73 (Mallikarjuna), in plan a conservative early western Chalukya temple of the `first generation`, deserves citation, due to its Kalinga-type superstructure, a sequence of evenly spaced kapotas girding a straight-sided pyramidal tower with a hefty stone jar or kalaia on its top.

The celebrated La Khan temple, possibly consecrated to Surya-Narayana, is one of the primary buildings of the early period, though it remains problematic. Except for the immense porch with its figure-bearing pillars, representing the front, the design is that of a uniform square hall, with a central square of 12 pillars, sustaining an elevated clerestory and enwrapping an inner group of four pillars. A tiny enclosure against the back wall, now enshrining a lingam, seems to be a late addition, and the Nandi (bull) in the middle of the temple is also of a later period. On the other hand, the tiny aedicule on the roof, to which there is no admittance from the inside, is original and contains reliefs of Vishnu and Surya. The hefty roof slabs, with long log-like stones over the joints, are archetypal of all the mandapas in Aihole.

The quite fertile sculpture of the `first generation` early western Chalukya temples is in a combination of styles, whose origins or parallels are to be found outside the region, proved with strong indigenous element, twinning the architecture but with no big relationships with it. Mysteriously enough, the two fine murtis of the Maleg Shivalaya are very close to early post-Gupta sculpture in the north- principally naturalistic, yet overstylish and somewhat unashamedly assertive. Weapons and symbols are assertively individual, the attendees elegantly mannered in the best Gupta tradition, of which the murtis of the Mallikarjuna signify a dishonored version. A gentler and quite appealing early post-Gupta fashion marks the mithunas in temples as varied as the Lad Khan and the Durga, and there is an irregular folk element, for instance in the admired Asvamukha pillar sculptures, where the formal horse-headed yaksa is rowdily approached by the male figurine or stands modestly beside him.

The post-Gupta style is at its perfect and best, in some of the recess figurines of the peristyle inside the Durga temple, especially the Durga, and the Shiva. Naturalism has fundamentally been replaced by conception. Jewellery, for instance, is sculptural rather than realistic; attendee statuettes incline at unimaginable angles.

There is petite real evidence for Pallava influence. Pillars with huge standing figurines, normally mithunas here, belong eventually to the tradition of carved Buddhist stambhas, but in free-standing buildings they do not appear in the south until the late Chola period, long after Andhra and elsewhere. Ceilings richly carved with iconographic themes also remain solely early western Chalukya for a century or two, until they materialise in later post-Gupta temples in Rajasthan and in Orissa. On the borders of many are the Guardians of the Quarters, especially popular from then onwards in Karnataka. Standing Lakulisas are preferred and so are narrative friezes, normally of scenes from the Krishna legend. Those in the Upper Temple in the North Fort again possibly precede those at Osian by a couple of centuries.

Early western Chalukya architecture reached the culmination of its second phase at Pagadakal, a few miles downstream from Aihole on the Malprabha and perhaps an absolutely ceremonial site. Queerly enough, of the four large temples constructed here in the first half of the 8th century, only one- the Papanatha, is Nagara, despite the prevalence of the type at Alampur, a 150 miles to the east. The three other temples are ingenuously Dravida. The earliest, called the Sangamesvara or Sri Vijayesvara after its constructor, VijayadityaSatyasraya (696-733), does not even have a nasika, reverberating the nonexistence of an antechamber in the sanctum, whose walls are extraordinarily thick. The mandapa has moderately disappeared.

From the outset, the luxuriously ornamented interiors of the temples of the Deccan drew upon their own cave convention and eventually on Gupta references, rather than upon Tamil Nadu, where, until a very late date, interiors are severely bare. The Pagadakal temples, including the Dravida ones, maintain the local tradition. The interior pillars of the Virupaksa are carved with scenes from the Ramayana and Mahabharata; comparable reliefs in the Mallikarjuna speak about episodes from the Krishna legend. Only in the iconography of some of their images is there a clear-cut obligation to the Pallavas- one is claimed to be otherwise elite to Tamil Nadu, and both Lingodbhava and Tripurantaka are omnipresent there and rather atypical elsewhere.

Of the four temples at Pattadakar with Nagara shikharas, by far the biggest is the Papanatha. Differentiated by two mandapas in series, and accordingly unreasonably extensive in relation to the sanctum and height of the `northern` shikhara (both perhaps designed or built before the rest of the temple), the Papanatha possibly followed the Virupaksa in time. Any alteration of design or dedication was presumably made before the built of either of the mandapas. The temple is noteworthy for udgamas over the recesses of the Rajasthan honeycomb kind, and for the Ramayana reliefs on the exterior walls, some bearing the names of the sculptors, a very singular happening in India. They are irregularly replicated on the Virupaksa temple- sculptors thus working on two temples in wholly dissimilar traditions is the most striking evidence that the diversity of styles for which the region is noted, does not essentially presuppose discrete groups of stone carvers.

Begun, but maybe not concluded by (756-73), the Kailasa in Ellora is the biggest and most spectacular rock-cut monument in the world. A passageway from one of two contemporary copper-plate inscriptions zealously praising the temple, expresses the profound impression it must have created during the time.

Elapura has been acknowledged as the Ellora (or Eliira) and it is alluring to contemplate that the architect`s letdown refers to one of the two unfinished monoliths to the north of the Kailasanatha. The awesome size of this temple, which still makes an authoritative impression, is indicated by the way in which it was created. Two vast trenches, some 300ft. (90m.) in depth were dug into the hillside at the level of the neighbouring countryside, linked at the deepest point at the backside by another trench, approximately 175ft. (53m.) across.

Two special considerations- the survival of more than one style of sculpture, and the fact that the base, including the vast herd of elephants and lions which appear to sustain it, is hideously out of balance to the height of the vimana proper- have led to the supposition that alterations and expansions continued under Karajan`s heirs; but it is uncertain that patronage would have continued over so very long a period. Two Jain temples at the farthest northern end of the scarp, the Indra Sabha and the Jagannatha Sabha, were possibly the last works attempted in Ellora. The Indra Sabha, a lesser version of the great Shiva temple, comprehensive with a tiny gopura, houses some exquisite sculpture, and the adornment is of pretty elevated order. The incomplete Chota Kailas is yet another edition, even smaller.

The early Rashtrakutas thus carried the technique into northernmost Deccan, but there is so far no verification of any structural temples there in the `southern` fashion of their grand rock-cut works in Ellora. Nor did this style continue as such even in central Karnataka, where so many excellent Dravida temples had been erected under the early western Chalukyas. By the end of 8th century, the origin could already be comprehended of Karnataka`s distinctive contribution to Indian temple architecture, which concluded in the later Hindu period, in the Hoysala fashion.

The outlasting shrines of the 9th and 10th centuries in southern Karnataka, generally linked with the Gangas, a local dynasty, are roughly provincial editions of late Pallava and early Chola types. These are well constructed, unblemished, but rather bleak, with a scarcity of external recess sculptures, despite some delicate images inside. In Kolar district to the east, the Ramesvara in Avani, incorporates four shrines, all but one with its own mandapa, and all but one side-by-side..

Lastly, in the very south of Karnataka, almost near the Nilgiri Hills, in the remote village of Narasamangalam, stands the lovely tiny RamalingeSvara temple. The date normally attributed to it- c. 800- may be too early, because of its incredible resemblance to the early Chola temple in Pullamangai, near Thanjavur, with protruding panjaras, coming right down to the base mouldings. There are no recesses or wall reliefs; as a substitute, stucco figurines stand free on the panjaras or among the pavilions of the upper storeys. They have been reinstated from disintegration, but estimating from earlier photographs, their original quality was soaring. Inside there are some exquisite beams and an extraordinarily secure ceiling panel, a dancing Shiva in the centre, encircled by the dikpalas. Such ceiling slabs are found in all the greater temples in Karnataka during this period.

In Alampur, to the northeast, approximately 150 miles east of Badami and Aihole, near the convergence of the Tungabhadra and Krishna, and to another place, towards the east and southeast, as far as the Nallamala Hills and beyond, more temples have outlasted. Influences are miscellaneous in Alampur, as all through the `borderlands` during this time, but more principally `northern`, compared to the west. Of the Navabrahma group, all but one, the Taraka Brahma, have Nagar shikharas of the triratha fashion. The temples are characteristically post-Gupta, with close similarities to Rajasthan and Orissa. `Northern` are the Ganga and Yamuna at the bases of door jambs, image recesses on the walls even of the confined sanctum, and, outside, recesses with honeycomb udgamas. The characteristic nasika protrudes in front of the shikhara, corresponding to an antechamber (antarala) in design and generally in the shape of an immense gavasaka, framing a dancing Shiva, like in Aihole, and also at Pagadakal, where the grand Dravida temples share similar facet. In other regards, the Alampur shrines bear a resemblance with the early Karnataka mandapa temple, with its elevated clerestory above the nave, its enwrapped garbhagriha, and for porches, though at Alampur there is no unfinished walling-up between the pillars.

The sculptural tradition of Buddhist and Jain organisations in the northernmost coastal neighbourhoods of Andhra continued to enlarge until the 9th and 10th centuries, growing closer to that of northern Orissa. The Buddhist sculpture of Amaravati, in the 8th century resembling the early western Chalukyas, although at its best, more forceful, later went nearer to more northern fashions.

The eastern Chalukyas continued to rule over most of the coastal region of Andhra, until 12th century. Rather later shrines - the Bhimesvara at Godavari district, the Chalukya in Bhimavaram (east Godavari district), the Somesvara in Somarama (west Godavari district), and the Amaresvara in Amaravati and the Bhimesvara in Chebrolu (both Guntur district)- all possess two primary storeys, the last two with the ground floor closed and the lingam in the upper storey garbhagriha. They are made from sandstone, with white or black marble lingams. The shikharas continue in square, and the upper storeys of the vimana incline to be condensed, without haras, a quality of long standing in some Chalukya temples.