Travels in India (Tavernier) 17.2.1

17.2.1

Jahánábád, like Delhi, is a great straggling town, and a simple wall separates them. All the houses of private persons are large enclosures, in the middle of which is the dwelling, so that no one can approach the place where the women are shut up. The greater part of the nobles do not live in the town, but have their houses outside, so as to be near the water. When entering Jahānābād from the Delhi side, a long and wide street is to be seen, where, on both sides, there are arches under which the merchants carry on their business, and overhead there is a kind of platform. This street leads to the great square, where the King’s palace is; and there is another very straight and wide one, which leads to the same square near another gate of the palace, in which there are the houses of the principal merchants who keep no shops. The King’s palace is a good half league in circuit. The walls are of fine cut stone, with battlements, and at every tenth battlement there is a tower. The fosses are full of water and are lined with cut stone. The principal gate of the palace has nothing magnificent about it, nor has the first court, where the nobles are permitted to enter on their elephants.