Rani ki Vav

Rani Ki Vav (lit. 'The Queen's Stepwell') is a stepwell situated in the town of Patan in Gujarat, India. It is located on the banks of the Saraswati River. Its construction is attributed to Udayamati, the spouse of the 11th-century Chaulukya king Bhima I. Silted over, it was rediscovered in the 1940s and restored in the 1980s by the Archaeological Survey of India. It has been listed as one of the UNESCO World Heritage Sites in India since 2014. The stepwell is designed as an underground shrine or inverted temple; representing the sanctity of water, with the sculptures in the stepwell depicting numerous Hindu deities. It is divided into seven levels of stairs with sculptural panels. These panels have more than 500 principal sculptures and over a thousand minor ones that combine religious, secular and symbolic imagery.