The title of this superb volume does not fully prepare the reader for its broad scope of relevance well beyond the site of Aurangabad for an understanding of Indian art, religious communities, and socio-economic history spanning eight hundred years from the first century BCE to the seventh century CE. One would expect from the title a focused monograph on the sculptures carved at the cave temples at Aurangabad in India’s Western Deccan, in the present-day state of Maharashtra, dating primarily to the sixth century. Pia Brancaccio not only provides a much-needed focused study, but she also follows the ramifications of the issues that arise from her examination of the site to lead the reader to international trade communities in Africa, Buddhist pilgrimage routes in China, related monasteries in Gandhara, and temples of the Paśupata sect of Śaivism, to name a few. Her comparative analyses that draw important distinctions between the inland caves of the Deccan plateau and those along the coast introduce the reader to many little-known rupestrian monuments of the region, and the coastal cave temples at Kanheri emerge as being of particular significance. Brancaccio’s wide-ranging discussions are all backed by fully notated sources, with the necessary caveats accompanying her use of primary texts, and are a pleasure to read. The accompanying illustrations provide ample photographic coverage of Aurangabad as well as related sites, many of which have been rarely published in print before. They are thoughtfully ordered at the back of the volume and are adequate in number and quality, considering the near impossibility of conveying through photographs the feeling of being in a cave temple. Since most of the paintings she includes are from comparative sites that have already been well-published, the black-and-white reproductions are unobjectionable.

Overshadowed by its neighboring cave temples at Ajanta and Ellora with their brilliant paintings and impressive structures, Aurangabad has been a relatively neglected site in the scholarly corpus. Even specialists in the field will welcome the clear, helpful descriptions of the western and eastern groups of caves, the layout of their sculptures, and the explanation of their chronology in conjunction with their numbering.

Brancaccio draws attention to the special features that distinguish this site from any other, so that the reader comes to realize the importance of Aurangabad in its own right. In terms of the sculptures, she does not provide overly detailed descriptions or highlight their formal qualities by praising the astonishing power of the figural styles. Instead, she dwells more on their iconography. Unlike other western Indian cave temples, for example, Aurangabad includes a remarkably vast array of female imagery, which Brancaccio links to early tantric ritual trends in which mantras of the vidyā class are personified as female figures, because of the grammatically feminine gender of the word vidyā. Furthermore, she notes the special emphasis on icons of the bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara in his form as savior from the eight perils (aṣṭamahābhaya). She suggests that the popularity of this form of Avalokiteśvara is due to a donor base largely comprising traveling merchants, who would have propitiated him for protection on their journeys. In terms of architectural features, a distinctive aspect of Aurangabad is its lack of monastic dwelling quarters; the few cells that were excavated show no signs of use or wear at the hinges. Brancaccio concludes that throughout its history Aurangabad was not occupied by many monks.

The minimal participation of the Buddhist clergy in the production of the caves and sculptures may be directly linked to another distinctive feature of Aurangabad: its dearth of inscriptions, donative or otherwise—a feature that probably has led to its general neglect in scholarship. Brancaccio makes reference to effaced painted inscriptions in one cave that are supposed to indicate lay patronage, mainly by laywomen, but no transcriptions or translations of these few donative inscriptions are given. It is possible that throughout its history Aurangabad was supported by organized leadership within the Buddhist lay community consisting mainly of merchants and women. As such, it is interesting to note that the innovative imagery with many elements drawn from non-Buddhist sources may have been conceived and funded by non-monastic members of the saṅgha.

The substantial chapter on the early centuries of activity at Aurangabad is eye-opening. Most readers would not have known that Aurangabad had an early phase, and Brancaccio rightly draws attention to the exceptional carved architectural ornament of the early, barrel-vaulted worship hall. She presents major insights with well-founded evidence that bespeak an impressive understanding of early Indic culture and the interrelationships of the western Deccan with Andhra to the southeast, Gandhara to the north, and trade routes across the Indian Ocean to the Near East and Mediterranean. All students of Indian art should read her analysis of the word caitya as referring to a locus of sanctity, be it a stūpa or a sculpted image of the anthropomorphic Buddha. Of especial note is her realization that the Kṣatrapas, a foreign group of rulers, exerted far greater influence than has been previously acknowledged. She cogently argues that their interest in controlling mercantile centers and guiding the flow of trade through their territories directly affected the construction and flourishing of Buddhist sites such as Aurangabad, situated as it is in the heart of land ideal for producing cotton used in making the internationally coveted Indian textiles.

The impact of foreign rulers, she observes, is no less significant during the later phase of activity for which Aurangabad is best known. During the sixth century the Huns served as a catalyst for reinvigorating commercial routes connecting the western Deccan with the Northwest and Central Asia, which explains similarities, such as the use of stucco and central-pillar cave layout, between Aurangabad and Gandharan and Chinese monuments of this period.

Much of the discussion of Aurangabad’s renaissance during the fifth to sixth century presupposes that royal patronage motivated by a need for dynastic legitimation was a sine qua non for the production of major caves and sculptural achievements. One wonders why, when all the evidence Brancaccio provides points to increased mercantile activities in international trade with the Sassanians and Huns, merchants and laypeople could not have been responsible for the revitalization of the later caves. Must the Aśmakas and Kalacuris—local feudal dyansties who displaced the Vākāṭakas in the western Deccan in the late fifth century—be invoked as patrons of this site, when no inscriptional evidence indicates their involvement? Must royally attired worshippers be identified with actual royal patrons, when all Indian monuments historically are adorned with royally dressed ideal devotees that are not identified as portraits of donor kings or queens? These suggestions, which, in contrast to her work on the early period, do not seem to be founded on actual evidence, but instead appear to follow the work of preceding scholars on other monuments, such as the extensive publications by Walter Spink on Ajanta and its royal sponsors or Padma Kaimal’s discussions of donor portraiture in Pallava cave temples. Brancaccio often mentions the theories of other scholars, such as Spink on Ajanta, in her study of Aurangabad, but the reader is sometimes unclear as to whether she agrees or disagrees with them and whether or not the theories pertaining to Ajanta or Ellora are applicable to Aurangabad.

The final chapter brings out the evident interactions between the Buddhist communities of Aurangabad and the Paśupata sect of Śaivism, who were increasingly influential in western India throughout the sixth century. These interactions can be discerned through a study of imagery at Aurangabad, such as the merging of iconographic features normally associated with Śiva into icons of the bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara and the enfolding of Ganeśa, four-armed Śiva, and the codified group of seven mother goddesses into the sculptural program of one of the caves. The sculptures at Aurangabad thus stand as important early documents of the Buddhist practice of appropriating Brahmanical forms and divinities—a phenomenon usually associated with later medieval and tantric Buddhism of eastern India and the Himalayas.

This concern with the notions and practices of their non-Buddhist contemporaries has been documented in art-historical and textual records from the earliest times. Besides Brahmanical sects like the Paśupatas, Jain communities were an important presence in the western Deccan as well, but they find scarce mention in Brancaccio’s book. Perhaps further research into Jain narratives and imagery of this period would shed more light on some of the remaining mysteries among the carvings at Aurangabad. The glorious tableau of the dancer and musicians in Cave 7—probably the single most recognized sculpture from the site for its tour-de-force carving of intense movement and emotion—is not identified with confident finality. Brancaccio links it with new Buddhist responses to Paśupata Śaiva rituals that emphasize dance and music, but a scene of a dancer with musicians is hardly an innovation of the sixth century. The intensity of this sculpted group recalls Jain depictions dating back to the first two centuries BCE of the frenzied final dance of Nīlāñjanā, whose heartbreaking performance propelled the king Ṛṣabha to enter the ascetical life and become the first enlightened Jina of the world cycle. It is possible that the Buddhists of Aurangabad included their version of this kind of compelling story that fit appropriately in the cave’s iconographic program. Alternatively, the dancer and musicians could be performing to honor the Buddha with entertainments fit for a king; this interpretation would further underscore the royal nature of the Buddha at Aurangabad that Brancaccio so convincingly demonstrates throughout the later chapters.

The cave temples at Aurangabad challenge scholars to understand and interpret their structures and carvings without being able to rely on inscriptions or directly associated texts. The carvings alone provide the information and clues that lead to insights concerning patronage, religious ideologies, communal interrelationships, and socio-economic contexts. When she takes the site on its own terms, unaffected by previous scholars’ presuppositions about other monuments, Brancaccio meets the challenge and turns a bright light onto some of the most difficult passages of India’s art history while offering cogent explanations to some of the toughest problems in the field.