The cave was discovered in 1981 during an archaeological reconnaissance. The inscriptions were made by monks of the Buddhist Sanjie (three stages) sect that has long fallen into oblivion. They in-clude works of Xin Xing the founder of the sect, which have never been encountered anywhere else. Clearing of the cave in recent years reveals that as many as eight Buddhist sutras of a total of 160,000 characters were engraved on its western and eastern walls, of which over 60,000 are still there. According to the inscriptions, the cave was first carved somewhere between the second years of the Longxiang reign period and the first year of the Xianheng reign period of Emperor Gaozong of the Tang Dynasty.
