Buddhist stupaSatavahana, with earlier Sada and post-Mauryan phasesAmaravati (Andhra) school
Sacred since
300 BCE
first attestation / structure
Standing structure
3rd c. BCE – c. 250 CE (Satavahana)
Satavahana, with earlier Sada and post-Mauryan phases
History & significance
A great stupa on the Krishna, perhaps 73 metres tall at its height, raised in phases from the 3rd century BCE to about 250 CE and decorated in the Amaravati school of relief sculpture ranked beside Mathura and Gandhara. Abandoned as Buddhism declined, it was rediscovered by Colin Mackenzie in 1797 and stripped of much of its sculpture by 19th-century excavators.