Taj and Baby Taj


Architecture must be experienced so here is entry to the Taj Mahal in the morning.
must be experienced

I have again no way of changing the sequence of these photos without losing most of them.

This is one of the towers at the corner of the Taj Mahal. It’s really incredible that they are so perfectly pristine after all these years.  It is a beautiful story. She Mumtaz Mahal was a childhood friend of Shah Jahan and they were about the same age. She gave him 14 children and died at the age of 38. If you do the math, most of her married life she was pregnant but then only 6 of her children survived.  Shah Jahan was devastated at her death after the 14 th child and made this mausoleum to her.  He later in life wanted to make a black Taj across the river for himself but his 3rd son wasn’t having it and cut off his two elder brothers heads and imprisoned his father Shah Jahan.  Aurangzeb became the new emporeur.  So goes it.


Here below is a detail of the beautiful marble work of inlayed semi precious stones. 


The Mughal architect was obsessed with symmetry and it is perfect after so many years. Apparently the columns lean to the outside to not fall on the main monument and to establish perfect aerial perspective like the columns of the Parthenon.
We went to a stone workshop and saw the craftsmen at work with archaic tools.  I can’t believe they don’t have electric tool in the back rooms.  The red is carnelian that absorbed the light.  This is a real deal here. Nobody does stonework at this price anywhere but you have to want it.
Another view of the Taj Mahal.
Agra fort.  Crocodiles and wild animals surrounded the fort.  This is the residence of Shah Jahan and where he was imprisoned by his son, Aurangzeb. 
The musicians would play music from the balconies over the courtyards



These reliefs of still life’s remind me of dutch still life’s

Sandstone columns from the fort very similar to columns that we saw in Ouzeistan.
This arch does not have a keystone but is made up of2 separate stones.

This is th “Baby Taj”. it was constructed before the Taj Mahal but was a precursor architecturally.
More beautiful floral art. I’m convinced that there is a dutch connection because not only was the art similar but in astronomy they traded knowledge on optics and other specialized subjects.
These are the quarters of Mumtaz Mahal and Shah Jahan.  Mirrors from Belgium were inlayed into the marble, dutch connection.  Also onyx from Belgium was used in the black colors of the facade of the Taj Mahal.


Taj Mahal again. A glorious day.

 A very unusual tile variation at the “Baby Taj” or Whateveer it is called in reality.  I’ll look it up.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Palms and the Empty Quarter

Image
As I said in the end of this post, we left the high mountains (the highest in Oman 3000 meters) to stay in the desert. We stopped in a village called, Misfat al Abriyyin.  It is a very old town with thousands of date palm irrigated by a gushing spring.  We had some coffee (arabica) and delicious dates.  The winding narrow streets reminded me of some villages on the french coast near us.   There were signs about the pest, the red palm beetle that is destroying soothe date palms and this is a real disaster when it is the only product you export. On the way to our next stop I was looking at the many minarets and admiring the variety of styles. Sunset of our first night on the dunes. I thought of Maria Muldar’s song “Midnight at the oasis”.  The sand was sand blasting because the wind was up. I do understand the wearing of veils for wind and sun only if you want to. A view from near the bottom of the dune. I couldn’t make it to the top. It was like walking on ball b...
Read more

Jaipur, the pink city

Image
 I’ve always wanted to see the Jantar Mantar in Jaipur, astronomical instruments to view celestial events.  But I didn’t realize the palaces here were so beautiful and extensive.  The fort above is perched on a hill with a fortress wall that surrounds it a little like a “Great wall of China”.  The city of Jaipur is called the “Pink City” because most of it was painted pink by à mataraja of the late 19th cen.  To get here we had to suffer the Indian highways which are calculated chaos.  Holy cows directing traffic , tuc tucs at every angle, a mess.  The lines on the road don’t mean anything the horn rules.  They don’t use their rear view mirrors because they are so busy looking at what’s happening in front of them so they all have signs on the back “blow horn” so they know you are in back of them. It seems the cows get high on the exhaust of cars that’s why they hang out near highways. We stopped along the way at a baoli or step well. I met these t...
Read more