Cunningham called it the Nachna-Kuthara temples in Volume 21 report of the Archaeological Survey of India, deriving it from the name of the district and another village in the region.

The nearest railway station is located in the city of Satna, while the closest major airport with daily services is Khajuraho (IATA: HJR).

[10] The site is deep inside a forest territory, at the entrance of a difficult to traverse valley within the Vindhya mountains.

She states that at least some of the 5th-century artisans building Buddhist, Hindu and Jain images in Nachna, Ajanta and Aurangabad regions may have come from the same guild or school, even though the sites are separated by a distance of about 1,000 kilometres (620 mi).

[15] The Chaumukhanatha temple shows signs of additions and reconstruction in later centuries which makes it difficult to place it chronologically.

[citation needed] The region has yielded many ruins in the form of foundation remains, sculpture and decorative parts from what Madhusudan Dhaky calls some ancient Hindu temples that are "now not extant".

[16] Most scholars such as Radhkumud Mookerji place the Parvati Nachna temple in the Gupta Empire era, more specifically the second half of the 5th century).

[17][18][19] Michael Meister, an art historian and professor specializing in Indian temple architecture, places it more specifically to 465 CE.

On top of the lintel of the doorway are seated men and women miniatures shown as if they are leaning in and peering into the center of the sanctum.

The style of sanctum door has stylistic similarities with those found in the Lakshmana Temple in the Sirpur Group of Monuments in Chhattisgarh.

[4][15][21] Two of the oldest trellises (jalis, perforated windows) of the Parvati temple show Ganas playing music, dancing or abstract decor.

[11] The five faces are believed to express the five aspects of Shiva, namely, creation (Vamadeva), maintenance (Tatpurusha), destruction (Aghora), beyond space (Isana) and introspection (Sadyojata).

It does not have the two-storey structure of the Parvati temple, but presents another style in the form of a spire (shikhara) instead symbolically mimicking Shiva's Kailash mountain.

[15] The interior of the small sanctum (garbhagriha) holds an approximately 4.67 feet (1.42 m) high Shiva-lingam with four faces (mukhalinga) with elaborate hair style, three of which exude calm with meditating closed eye, smiling posture.

They symbolize the creation (Vamadeva), maintenance (Tatpurusha), destruction (Aghora), and introspective subtle reflective Sadyojata aspects of Shiva as the metaphysical Brahman.

Its multi-layered composition and decorative figures are significantly more elaborate than the Jalis at Parvati Temple and more representative of the local adornments artistically-speaking.

The actual window panel consists of two shells with rich profiled—reminiscent of wooden model—lattices inside and three small arcades in the exterior, formed as horseshoe arches.

The polygonal broken pillars standing on a cubic base have a pumpkin-shaped pinnacle (amalaka) and end in a block-like attachment with abaco panel.

An old stone window from the 5th century with horseshoe-shaped keyhole openings and several sculptures found were set up in the immediate vicinity of the Main Zone.

Among the stone reliefs are some of the earliest known Ramayana friezes, such as the scene where Ravana appears in front of Sita pretending to be a recluse monk begging for food, while in reality seeking that she cross the protective Lakshmana Rekha so that he can kidnap her.

[8] Other Ramayana scenes depicted in Nachna site panels are among the most sustained ancient visual narratives of the epic,[note 2] comparable in significance to those found in the Vishnu temple in Deogarh.