Located in the town of Patan in Gujarat, on the banks of Saraswati River, Rani-ki-vav (Queen's step well) is an intricately constructed stepwell built as a memorial to an 11th century AD king Bhimdev I. Stepwells are a distinctive form of subterranean water resource and storage systems on the Indian subcontinent, consisting in ponds in which the water is reached by descending a set of steps, and have been constructed since the third millennium BC. The construction of stepwells is mainly utilitarian, though they may include embellishments of architectural significance.
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