The Cambridge History of India, Vol. III: Turks and Afghans v3.c30.6

v3.c30.6

In the fusion of the two styles which followed, Muhammadan architecture absorbed or inherited manifold ideas and concepts from the Hindu—so many, indeed, that there is hardly a form or motif of Indian architecture which in some guise or other did not find its way into the buildings of the conquerors. But more important than these visible borrowings of outward and concrete features is the debt which Indo-Islamic architecture owes to the Hindu for two of its most vital qualities; the qualities of strength and grace. In other countries Islamic architecture has other merits. There is nothing in India, for instance, to match the green and gold mosaics of Jerusalem and Damascus, or the superb colouring of Persian tilework, or the wonderful fantasies of Spanish design; but in no other country are strength and grace united quite so perfectly as in India. These are the two qualities which India may justly claim for her own, and they are the two which in architecture count for more than all the rest.