A Handbook to Agra and the Taj, Sikandra, Fatehpur-Sikri and the Neighbourhood Part 4

The two mosques of red sandstone on either side of the Taj are in the same style as the entrance gateway, the interiors being decorated with fresco and fine cut plaster-work. The one towards the west was intended for prayers only; the floor is panelled into separate s.p.a.ces for each wors.h.i.+pper. The opposite mosque was known, as the _Jamaat Khana_, or meeting-place for the congregation before prayers, and on the occasion of the great anniversary service. Standing on the platform in front of this mosque, one has a splendid view of the Taj, the river, and the distant Fort.

As the garden is now arranged; a full view of the magnificent platform, with its two mosques, and the Taj itself, can only be obtained from the opposite side of the river, which is not very accessible except by boat. When the traveller leaves Agra by rail, going east, the Taj in all its glory can be seen in the distance, floating like the mirage of some wondrous fairy palace over the waving tufts of the pampas gra.s.s, until at last it sinks into the pale horizon.

NOTE.--A small museum has been established lately by the Archaeological Department, in the western half of the Taj main gateway. It contains an interesting collection of photographs and drawings of the Taj at different periods, and specimens of the stones used in the _pietra dura_, or inlay work of the building. There are also samples ill.u.s.trating the technique of _pietra dura_, and the tools used by native workmen.

Itmad-ud-daulah's Tomb

The tomb of Itmad-ud-daulah, "the Lord High Treasurer," is on the east or left bank of the river, and is reached by crossing the pontoon bridge. It was built by Nur Mahal, the favourite wife of Jahangir, as a mausoleum for her father, Mirza Ghias Beg, who, according to one account, was a Persian from Teheran, and by another a native of Western Tartary.

A story is told of the Mirza's early life, of which it can only be said, _Se non e vero e ben trovato_. He left his home, accompanied by his wife and children, to seek his fortune in India, where he had some relatives at Akbar's court. His slender provision for the journey was exhausted in crossing the Great Desert, and they were all in danger of peris.h.i.+ng from hunger. In this extremity his wife gave birth to a daughter. The unhappy parents, distracted by hunger and fatigue, left the infant under a solitary shrub. With the father supporting his wife and children on the one bullock which remained to them, they pushed on in the hope of finding relief; but as the tiny landmark where the infant lay disappeared in the distance, the mother, in a paroxysm of grief, threw herself to the ground, crying, "My child! my child!" The piteous appeal forced the father to return to restore the babe to her mother, and soon afterwards a caravan appeared in sight and rescued the whole party.

The child born under these romantic circ.u.mstances became the Empress Nur Mahal, who built this mausoleum. Her father reached Lah.o.r.e, where Akbar then held his court, and through the influence of his friends attracted the Emperor's attention. His talents won for him speedy promotion, and under Jahangir he became first Lord High Treasurer, and afterwards Wazir, or Prime Minister. Jahangir, in his memoirs, candidly discusses the character of his father-in-law. He was a good scholar, with a pretty taste for poetry, possessed many social qualities and a genial disposition. His accounts were always in perfect order, but "he liked bribes, and showed much boldness in demanding them." On his death his son, Asaf Khan, the father of Mumtaz Mahal, was appointed to succeed him.

Itmad-ad-daulah and his wife are buried in the central chamber; his brother and sister and other members of his family occupy the four corners. The pavilion on the roof, enclosed by beautiful marble tracery (Plate IX.), contains only replicas of the real tombs beneath. The mausoleum was commenced in 1622 and completed in 1628. As a composition it may lack inspiration, but it is exceedingly elegant, and scholarly like the Lord High Treasurer himself. In construction it marks the transition from the style of Akbar to that of Shah Jahan; from the Jahangiri Mahal to the Diwan-i-khas, the Muti Masjid, and the Taj. The towers at the four corners might be the first suggestion of the detached minarets of the Taj. The Hindu feeling which is so characteristic of most of Akbar's buildings is here only shown in the roof of the central chamber over the tomb; in pure Saracenic architecture a tomb is always covered by a dome.

This change in style greatly influenced the architecture of the whole of the north of India, Hindu and Jain as well as Muhammadan. It must be remembered that comparatively few of the master-builders who actually constructed the most famous examples of Mogul architecture were Muhammadans. The remarkable decline of the Mogul style which set in under Aurangzib was largely due to his bigotry in refusing to employ any but true believers.

The family ties of Itmad-ud-daulah and his daughter, the Empress, were closely connected with Persia and Central Asia; and no doubt the fas.h.i.+on set by Jahangir's court led to the Saracenic element becoming predominant in the Mogul style, both in construction and in decoration. Many authorities have connected the marked difference between Itmad-ud-daulah's tomb and Akbar's buildings to Italian influence, only on the ground that Jahangir is known to have been partial to Europeans, and allowed them free access to his palace. There is not, however, a trace of Italian art in any detail of the building; there is not a form or decorative idea which had not been used in India or in Central Asia for centuries. The use of marble inlaid work on so extensive a scale was a novelty, but it was only an imitation, or adaptation, of the splendid tile-mosaic and painted tile-work which were the commonest kinds of decoration employed in Persia: Wazir Khan's mosque at Lah.o.r.e, built in Jahangir's time, is a fine Indian example of the latter.

The art of inlaying stone had been practised in India for many years before this building; but here, for the first time, do we find the inlayers making attempts at direct imitation of Persian pottery decoration. All the familiar _motifs_ of Persian art, the tree of life and other floral types, the cypress tree, the flower-vases, fruits, wine-cups, and rose-water vessels are here reproduced exactly as they are found in Persian mosaic tiles. In Shah Jahan's palace and in the Taj they went a step further, and imitated the more naturalistic treatment of Persian fresco painting and other pictorial art; but there is never the slightest suggestion of European design in the decoration of these buildings.

It is quite possible that some Italians may have shown the native inlayers specimens of Florentine _pietra dura_, and suggested to them this naturalistic treatment, but if Italians or other Europeans had been engaged to instruct or supervise in the decoration of these buildings they would certainly have left some traces of their handiwork. In the technical part of the process the Indian workmen had nothing to learn, and in the design they made no attempt to follow European forms, except in the one solitary instance of the decoration of the throne-chamber of the Delhi Palace, which is much later in date than Itmad-ud-daulah's tomb. [13]

The whole scheme of the exterior decoration is so finely carried out, both in arrangement and colour, that its extreme elaboration produces no effect of unquietness. At a distance it only gives a suggestion of a soft bloom or iridescence on the surface of the marble. The soffits of the doorways are carved with extraordinary delicacy. Inside the building there are remains of fresco and other painted decoration.

Beautifully placed on the river bank, there is a fine little mosque, which at sunset makes a charming picture. The boldness and greater simplicity of the decoration contrast well with the richness of that of the mausoleum.

The Chini-ka-Rauza

Beyond Itmad-ud-daulah's tomb, on the same side of the river, is a beautiful ruin, once entirely covered with the same Persian mosaic tile-work, which suggested the more costly style of decoration in inlaid marble. It is called Chini-ka-Rauza, or the China Tomb, and is supposed to be the mausoleum of Afzal Khan, a Persian poet, who entered the service of Jahangir, and afterwards became Prime Minister to Shah Jahan. He died in Lah.o.r.e in 1639. The weather and ill-treatment of various kinds have removed a great deal of the exquisite enamel colours from the tiles, but enough remains to indicate how rich and magnificent the effect must have been originally. A part of the south facade which has fallen in shows how the builders employed earthen pots to lessen the weight of the concrete filling, a practice followed in the ancient dome construction of Egypt and Rome.

The Ram Bagh

Among a number of more or less ruined garden-houses on this bank of the river, there is one, a little beyond the Chini-ka-Rauza, of especial interest, on account of the tradition which a.s.sociates it with the Emperor Babar. It is called the Ram Bagh, and is believed to have been one of the "elegant and regularly planned pleasure-grounds"

which Babar laid out and planted with fruit trees and flowers, as he has described in his memoirs.

No doubt this was the scene of many imperial picnics; not the drunken revels of Babar's Kabul days--for just before the great battle with the Rajputs in 1527 he smashed all his gold and silver drinking-cups and took a vow of total abstinence, which he kept faithfully--but the more sane and temperate pleasures which music, poetry, and his intense delight in the beauties of nature could furnish. Here is a charming picture he has given of another garden he laid out in the Istalif district of Kabul:--

"On the outside of the garden are large and beautiful spreading plane-trees, under the shade of which there are agreeable spots, finely sheltered. A perennial stream, large enough to turn a mill, runs through the garden, and on its banks are planted plane and other trees. Formerly this stream flowed in a winding and crooked course, but I ordered its course to be altered according to a plan which added greatly to the beauty of the place. Lower down ... on the lower skirts of the hills is a fountain, named Kwajeh-seh-yaran (Kwajeh three friends), around which are three species of trees; above the fountain are many beautiful plane trees, which yield a pleasant shade. On the two sides of the fountain, on small eminences at the bottom of the hills, there are a number of oak trees. Except on these two spots, where there are groves of oak, there is not an oak to be met with on the hills of the west of Kabul. In front of this fountain, towards the plain, there are many spots covered with the flowering arghwan tree, and, besides these arghwan plots, there are none else in the whole country. It is said that these three kinds of trees were bestowed on it by the power of these three holy men, beloved of G.o.d; and that is the origin of the name Sej-Yaran. I directed this fountain to be built round with stone, and formed a cistern of lime and mortar ten yez by ten. On the four sides of the fountain a fine level platform for resting was constructed on a very neat plan. At the time when the arghwan flowers begin to blow, I do not know of any place in the world to be compared with it. The yellow arghwan is here very abundant, and the yellow arghwan blossom mingles with the red."

The Ram Bagh was the temporary resting-place of the body of Babar before it was taken to Kabul for interment in another of the gardens he loved so much. The old Mogul style of gardening is a lost art, and one misses in the Ram Bagh the stately rows of cypress, interspersed with flowering trees, the formal flower-beds glowing with colour like a living carpet, which were planted by Babar; but the terraces, the fountain, the water-channels, and the little stone water-shoots--cunningly carved so that the water breaks over them with a pleasant gurgling sound--which may have recalled to him the murmurings of his native mountain-streams--the old well from which the water of the Jumna is lifted into the channels, can still be seen, as well as the pavilions on the river-bank, now modernized with modern bad taste.

In later times the Ram Bagh was the garden-house of the Empress Nur Mahal. It was kept up by all succeeding Governments, and it is said to have obtained its name of Ram Bagh from the Mahrattas in the eighteenth century.

THE ZUHARA BAGH.--Between the Chini-ka-Rauza and the Ram Bagh there is another great walled enclosure, which contained the garden-house of Zuhara, one of Babar's daughters, and is named after her the Zuhara, or Zohra Bagh. This formerly contained the largest garden-palace at Agra, and is said to have possessed no less than sixty wells. A great well, just outside the enclosure, 220 feet in circ.u.mference, and of enormous depth, was filled up some years ago.

Sikandra

Sikandra, a village about five miles from Agra, and the burial-place of Akbar, is reached by two roads. The older one follows, to some extent, the alignment of the great military road to Lah.o.r.e and Kashmir, planned by Babar and completed by his successors. A few of the _kos-minars_, pillars which marked off the _kos_--a distance of about two and a half miles--can still be seen along the road, or in the adjoining fields.

Numerous remains of archaeological interest are pa.s.sed on the way of the old road. First the Delhi gate of the old city walls. About a mile further on the right-hand side, is a great walled enclosure, named after Ladli Begam, the sister of Abul Fazl, Akbar's famous Prime Minister and biographer. It formerly contained her tomb, as well as that of Sheikh Mubarak, her father, and of Faizi, her eldest brother. Many years ago the whole enclosure was sold by Government. The purchasers, some wealthy Hindu merchants of Muttra, promptly pulled down the mausoleum, realized the materials, and built a pavilion on the site. In front of the great gateway was a splendid _baoli_, or well-house, the largest in the neighbourhood of Agra. This was filled up about five years ago.

Not far from Ladli Begam's garden is the Kandahari Bagh, where the first wife of Shah Jahan, a daughter of Mozaffar Husein, who was the great-grandson of Shah Ismail Safvi, King of Persia, is buried.

About a mile further along the road, on the left-hand side, is a curious statue of a horse in red sandstone, which, tradition says, was put up by a n.o.bleman whose favourite horse was killed at this spot; the syce who was killed at the same time has his tomb close by.

Nearly opposite to this is a large dried-up tank, called the Guru-ka-Tal, which, with the adjacent ruined buildings, are attributed to Sikandar Lodi, one of the Afghan predecessors of the Mogul Emperors, who has given his name to Sikandra.

Akbar's Tomb.

Akbar's tomb stands in the midst of a vast garden, enclosed by four high battlemented walls. In the centre of each wall is an imposing gateway seventy feet high. The princ.i.p.al one, on the west side, has an inscription in Persian, which states that the mausoleum was completed by the Emperor Jahangir, in the seventh year of his reign, or 1613 A.D. It is elaborately ornamented with bold but rather disjointed inlaid patterns, which seem to show that the designers were unaccustomed to this method of decoration. Neither are the four minarets at the corners of the roof, which are said to have been broken by the Jats, contrived with the usual skill of the Mogul architects. Above the gateway is the Nakkar Khana, an arcaded chamber with a balcony, where at dawn and one watch after sunrise the drums and pipes sounded in honour of the dead.

The mausoleum was commenced by Akbar himself. It is different in plan from any other Mogul monument, and, contrary to the usual Muhammadan custom, the head of the tomb of Akbar is turned towards the rising sun, and not towards Mecca. The whole structure gives the impression of a n.o.ble but incompleted idea; both in its greatness and in its incompleteness, it is typical of Akbar and his work.

The original design was somewhat modified by Jahangir. He has stated in his memoirs that on his first visit to the tomb after his accession he was dissatisfied with the work which had been done, and ordered certain parts of it to be rebuilt. Fergusson supposes that the original intention was to cover the tombstone and raised platform of the uppermost story with a domed canopy, and in this he is supported by a statement of William Finch, who visited the mausoleum when it was being built, that it was to be "inarched over with the most curious white and speckled marble, to be ceiled all within with pure sheet gold richly inwrought." Such a canopy is just what is required by aesthetic considerations to complete the curiously truncated appearance of the top story, and there is nothing in the structural design to make it impossible or improbable.

The approach to the interior of the mausoleum is through the central archway of the lower story, which opens into a vestibule richly ornamented with raised stucco work, and coloured in blue and gold, somewhat in the style of the Alhambra. A part of this decoration has been lately restored. An inclined pa.s.sage, like the entrance to an Egyptian pyramid, leads down into a high vaulted chamber, dimly lighted from above, where a simple sarcophagus of white marble contains the mortal remains of the great Akbar. Whatever decoration there may have been on the walls is now covered with whitewash. The Emperor's armour, clothes, and books, which were placed beside the tomb, are said to have been carried off by those insatiable marauders, the Jats of Bharatpur.

Smaller chambers surrounding the central one, on the level of the platform, contain the tombs of two of Akbar's daughters and a son of the Emperor Shah Alam. These also have suffered much from neglect and whitewash, The whole of the facade of the lower story was originally faced with red sandstone, or perhaps with fine stucco decorated in fresco. The present coat of common plaster is modern work, which, except as a protection for the brickwork, would have been better left undone.

The lower story is 320 feet square. Above this are three others, diminis.h.i.+ng in size up to the highest, which is just half these dimensions. The roof of the topmost is surrounded by cloisters, the outer arches of which are filled with very fine marble tracery (Plate X.). In the centre, on a raised platform, is a solid block of pure white marble, delicately carved with flowers and sacred texts, representing the real tomb in the vault beneath. At the head is the inscription, "Allah-o-Akbar" (G.o.d is Great), and at the foot, "Jalli Jalalohu" (Magnificent is His Glory). These sentences were the formula of Akbar's new religion, which he called "The Divine Faith." On the sides the ninety-nine attributes of G.o.d are carved in the Arabic character. The carved marble pedestal at the end of the tomb was a stand for a golden censer.

THE KANCH MAHAL.--Outside the enclosure of Akbar's tomb, a little to the east of the princ.i.p.al entrance, is a rare and remarkably fine example of Mogul domestic architecture. This is a two-storied building, known as the Kanch Mahal, and supposed to have been built by Jahangir as a country seat. In its extremely elaborate ornamentation, inlaid stone and enamelled tiles have been most effectively combined with the carving. The repairs lately carried out under Lord Curzon's orders have been very carefully done, though it is easy to see the inferiority of the new work where the old carving had to be reproduced. Our fatuous policy of adopting European styles in all public buildings in India is bound to cause a deterioration in the native art handicrafts, for it closes the princ.i.p.al source from which they have sprung. Unless this policy is reversed, nothing will prevent the ultimate extinction of Indian art.

SURAJ-BHAN-KA BAGH.--This is another two-storied building of about the same period, but not quite so fine in style, facing the Agra road, at a little distance from the Kanch Mahal.

MARIAM ZaMaNI'S TOMB.--A short distance further on, in the direction of Muttra, is the building supposed to have been originally the garden house of Sikandar Lodi, in which Mariam Zamani, one of Akbar's wives, is said to have been buried. It has been used for many years as a printing establishment for a Mission Orphanage.

Other Buildings and Tombs at or near Agra

The tomb of Feroz Khan, opposite to the third milestone on the Gwalior road, is an interesting building of Akbar's time, richly carved and decorated with tile-work. Close by is the tomb of the Pahalwari, where a celebrated wrestler of Shah Jahan's time is buried. There are a considerable number of buildings and numerous ruins in Agra, and round about, which possess only historical or archaeological interest. In the town are the following:--

The KALI MASJID, or Black Mosque, otherwise called the Kalan Masjid, or Grand Mosque, is of the early Akbar style. It was built by the father of Shah Jahan's first wife, the Kandahari Begum. This is near to the Government dispensary.

In the Nai-ki-Mundi quarter is the mosque of Shah Ala-ud-din Majzub, commonly known as ALAWAL BILAWAL, a saint who lived at the time of Shere Shah. He established a school of Muhammadan law, and founded a monastery besides the mosque. The acc.u.mulations round the mosque have reached up to the springing of the arches, and tradition accounts for this by the following story: A camel-driver in Shere Shah's service stabled his beasts in the mosque, in spite of the protests of the saint Thereupon the building began to sink into the ground, and did not cease descending until the camels and their driver were crushed to death.