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Mandagapattu, Cave Temples
A series of remarkable rock-cut temples were built between the 7th and 9th centuries by the Pallavas in the Tondaimandalam region, around their capital Kanchipuram. These temples along with a similar group commissioned by the Chalukyas of Badami represent the earliest Hindu stone temples in southern India. They were also a significant architectural innovation as the first cave-temples in South India to be carved out of hard, granite rock. Earlier rock cut shrines, mostly Buddhist, were excavated into the softer rock in the Deccan.