Pramāṇa · Search · About · API

The Cambridge History of India, Vol. III: Turks and Afghans v3.c30.s1: Provincial Styles

The Cambridge History of India, Vol. III: Turks and Afghans v3.c30.s1

Language
English

Contents

Provincial Styles

v3.c30.s1.1

When, in a subsequent volume of this history, we come to deal with the sumptuous monuments of the Mughuls, we shall see what a profound influence the work of the Lodīs exerted on the shaping of their style. But before we follow up the further progress of this architecture at the Imperial capital, we must hark back for a while and consider how it had meanwhile been developing in the outlying provinces of the Empire and in the various independent kingdoms that came into being between the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries. Of these lesser centres of Indo-Muslim power, the first to claim attention is Multān; not because its few surviving monuments are either as ancient or as magnificent as many elsewhere, but because it was one of the earliest cities to be occupied by the Muhammadans and for this and other reasons was relatively little under the influence of Hinduism.

v3.c30.s1.2.1

Thrice conquered by the Arabs in the eighth and ninth centuries, Multān never again reverted into Indian hands. For a hundred years (a.d. 879–980) it was the capital of an independent Arab State, and from the Arabs it passed in turn to the Karmatians, the Ghaznavids, a second time to the Karmatians, and then to the Ghūrids; after which it was incorporated in the principality of Nāsir-ud-dīn Qabācha and was finally annexed by Iltutmish. From that time onwards it remained feudatory to Delhi, reasserting its independence only between the years 1457 and 1525, when the Langāhs were in power. During these several centuries of continuous Muslim rule, many monuments of note must have been erected in the city. As early, indeed, as A.D. 712 a mosque with minarets is said to have been built by Muhammad ibn Qāsim, and in 985 we hear of the far-famed temple of Āditya, the Sun-God, being demolished by the Karmatians and of another mosque being reared on its ruins. But of these early structures no vestige is now left, and, strangely enough, Multān does not possess a single mosque that can be referred to pre-Mughul times. Such monuments—they are only five in number—as are reputed to have been founded before 1526, are all tombs of saints, and two out of the five have been so extensively renovated as to be little more than mere semblances of their former selves, while a third—the shrine of Shāh Yūsuf Gardīzī, said to date from A.D. 1152—has been wholly reconstructed and modernised.

v3.c30.s1.2.2

Yet in spite of their renovations, the two tombs in question are not devoid of interest. One is the resting-place of Bahāu-l-Haqq, who died in 1262, and according to popular belief was built by the saint himself, but it was seriously damaged during the siege of 1849 and since then has been completely restored. The other is the tomb of Shams-ud-dīn (dec. 1276), who is locally known as Shams-i-Tabrīzī, but is not to be confused with the more famous Persian saint of that name. The original structure is said to have been erected by his grandson a generation or more after his death, but having fallen into ruin it was rebuilt in A.D. 1780 by one Seṭh Mihr ‘Alī, a disciple of the family. Both monuments are designed on the same lines and consist of a square tomb chamber, with walls battering on the outside, surmounted by a lofty octagon and crowned by a hemispherical dome. Concealed as their fabrics are beneath modern plaster and glazed tilework, it is not possible to determine how much of them has been restored, but comparing them one with the other, and also with other tombs in the neighbourhood, it can hardly be doubted that their present form is substantially that of the originals and that they represent an earlier stage than the tomb of Shāh Rukn-i-‘Ālam in the development of the local Multān style. In this connexion, the tomb of Shādnā Shahīd, who died a martyr’s death in 1270, is particularly instructive; for though relatively insignificant (it is only 18 ft. 6 in.

v3.c30.s1.2.3

square inside), its original fabric has not been greatly interfered with, and, denuded as it now is of its plaster facing, it affords an excellent illustration of the methods of construction then in vogue. Here also the form of the structure is identical with that of the two tombs already described, though the dome, be it noted, is somewhat lower and more in accord with what we should expect at this period. On the other hand, the tomb of Rukn-i-‘Ālam, the grandson of Bahāu-l-Haqq, which Ghiyās-ud-dīn Tughluq caused to be built between the years 1320 and 1324, exhibits a marked advance on its predecessors. Taken all in all, indeed, this tomb of Rukn-i-‘Ālam is one of the most splendid memorials ever erected in honour of the dead. Its height, measured to the top of its crowning finial, is 115, its diameter 90 feet. Instead of being square, however, as the earlier examples were, the body of the tomb is an octagon—a feature which vastly enhances the symmetry of the whole, while any suggestion of weakness, to which the octagonal form might have given rise, is cleverly avoided by buttressing the outer quoins with engaged and tapering minarets.

v3.c30.s1.2.4

The superb surface decorations which distinguish this building have been widely renovated in the course of the centuries, but, though many of the details have undoubtedly been changed, there is no reason to suppose that their general character—the bands of carved timbering let into the walls, the elaborately chiselled brickwork, and the richly coloured tiling—is markedly different from the original. Compared with the memorials of the Sayyid and Lodī kings at Delhi, or with the still more magnificent tomb of Sher Shāh at Sahsarām, it must be conceded that in the matter of surface ornament and particularly of brilliant colour effects, the tomb of Rukn-i-‘Ālam has the advantage. On the other hand, what it gains in these respects it loses in rhythmic grace and in the poetry of composition. The difference between these monuments is the difference largely between the Persian and the Indian ideals. For despite the presence of many obviously Indian features in the tomb of Rukn-i-‘Ālam, and despite the local character of much of its craftsmanship, based on pre-Muslim traditions, the spirit underlying its design is largely Persian, while that of Sher Shāh's tomb has gone far to becoming Indian.

v3.c30.s1.3

In India, as in Persia and ‘Irāq, brick had been used as a building material almost from time immemorial, and even as early as the Gupta period the art of chiselling wall surfaces and of beautifying them with carvings in relief had reached a high state of perfection. We need not wonder, therefore, at the exquisite craftsmanship which the early Muhammadan buildings of India exhibit in their brickwork. But there is one all-important feature, as we have already seen, in which the indigenous architecture of the Peninsula, whether of brick or stone, differed fundamentally from Islamic. Save on the rarest occasions it made no use of any other binding material for its masonry but mud, and as a consequence found itself unable to aspire to any of those spacious effects which the arch and vault and dome subsequently made possible. In Multān and Delhi, fortunately, and wherever else Islamic traditions established themselves in sufficient strength, these limitations of indigenous building made little or no impression upon the succeeding styles of the Muslims. But in the more distant parts of the Empire, where the conquerors were relatively few in number and little in touch with the outer world of Islam, their architecture took its character largely from the pre-existing monuments of the locality. This is a fact that comes out prominently if we turn our eyes from the plains of the Punjab to the far-off Province of Bengal, which was annexed by Muhammad Bakhtyār Khān as early as 1198–99, within five years, that is to say, of the conquest of Delhi itself. In this low-lying and tropical country, the destructive forces of nature and the still more destructive agency of man have spared few monuments of the Hindu period, but on the strength of such scanty remains as have survived and from the indications afforded by later examples it may safely be inferred that, although stone was freely employed wherever it could be procured, brick, timber and bamboo were the principal building materials in use; and that among the most salient features of this older Bengal architecture were a peculiar form of curvilinear roof, commonly known as Bengali, square brick pillars of stunted proportions as well as more slender ones of stone, and carved or moulded surface decorations of almost ultra-refined elegance. It is safe to infer also that pointed arches of small dimensions constructed on the corbel system were not unknown to the Bengalis in the pre-Muslim days. These were the main characteristics of the style which the Muhammadans found prevalent on their arrival, and which, with the help of their own traditions, they proceeded forthwith to develop and expand.

v3.c30.s1.4

Considering the almost unexampled opportunities which the riches of Bengal opened out to the conquerors, the inborn artistry and adaptability of its craftsmen, and the immense superiority of Islamic methods of construction, it might well have been thought that the resulting school of architecture would have been second to none in India. As a fact, it proved one of the least successful. Seen in the mass the wide-flung ruins of Gaur and Pāndua, where the Muhammadans successively established their capital, make an imposing array and convey an impressive idea of the wealth and luxury of their authors. But, with few exceptions, the individual buildings are disappointing. They lack the imagination necessary to adapt the form to the size; their component parts are often out of proportion; their pillars sometimes too cumbersome, sometimes unduly slight; and the form of their Bengali roofs, originally intended for bamboo and timber construction, shows less appropriately in brick or stone. The low relief work of their wall surfaces, too, though exquisite in itself and admirably adapted to interior details, is generally too delicate and hyper-refined for the decoration of exterior façades, while the designs and application of their enamelled tiles betray a singular poverty of imagination. Yet, in spite of its manifest shortcomings, there is an originality about this Bengal school—a certain spontaneous artistry and freedom from convention which can hardly fail to command admiration; and, though the style as a whole does not rise to the same high level as some other local styles, nevertheless it was capable on rare occasions of producing results, such as the Dākhil Darwāza, which are unsurpassed by anything of their kind in the East.

v3.c30.s1.5.1

It was at Gaur, or Lakhnāutī, the former capital of the rich Pāla and Sena dynasts, where the Muslims established their seat of government, that their first building operations in Bengal were started. Mosques, palaces and the like they must have provided for themselves immediately after their arrival, doubtless by appropriating and, if necessary, ruthlessly despoiling the buildings of the Hindus; and before twenty years had elapsed we hear of the Sultān Ghiyās-ud-dīn (Hisām-ud-dīn ‘Iwaz) constructing raised causeways across the low marshy country to serve as military roads, and erecting a madrasah, caravansarais and other edifices at his capital. Curiously enough, however, it is not at Gaur, but at Tribenī in the Hughlī District, that the oldest remains of Muslim buildings have survived. These are the tomb and mosque of Zafar Khān Ghāzī. The former is built largely out of the materials taken from a temple of Krishna, which formerly stood on the same spot, but is now so mutilated as to have lost most of its architectural value. The neighbouring mosque is reputed to have been built, at any rate in its present form, during the reign of Sultān ‘Alā-ud-dīn Husain Shāh (1493–1518)¹. Be this date correct or not, the mosque is certainly much later than the neighbouring tomb; but framing the central mihrāb, and obviously transferred here from some older monument, is a stone border bearing an Arabic inscription which records the conquest of Southern Bengal by Zafar Khān in A.D.

v3.c30.s1.5.2

1298 during the reign of Sultān Rukn-ud-dīn Kai-kāūs. Slightly later than these remains at Tribenī is the Sālik mosque at Basīrhāt in the Twenty Four Parganas, which was founded originally in A.D. 1305, but has been completely renovated in modern times. With these unimportant exceptions, however, the history of this Bengal style is a blank until we come to the reign of Sikandar Shāh (1358–89), and by a strange coincidence the first monument that we then meet—the far-famed Ādīna *Masjid* which the Emperor erected in the new capital of Pāndua—was also the most ambitious structure of its kind ever essayed in Eastern India. In area, this *masjid* was almost as big as the Great Mosque of Damascus¹: 507½ feet from north to south by 285½ from east to west. But though it was regarded in Bengal as one of the ‘Wonders of the World,’ its design was far from being worthy of its size. Imagine an immense open quadrangle, more than twice as long as it was broad, bounded on its four sides by arched screens, every archway (and there were 88 in all visible from the court) identical with its fellows and every one surmounted by an identical dome, with nothing to relieve the monotony of the whole save a single archway which, rising higher and wider than the rest, fronted the vaulted *līwān* in the middle of the western side.

v3.c30.s1.5.3

Even the domed gateways, which usually interrupt the long lines of cloisters, are absent, the only entrances into this remarkable masjid being two small doorways in the back wall for the use of the king, a small arched opening for the public in the middle of the east side, and another public entrance, probably added as an afterthought, at the south-east corner. Imagine, too, the interior of the cloisters divided into 375 bays—five deep on the western and three deep on the other sides—each a replica of its neighbour and each roofed by a precisely similar dome, with no variation whatsoever except where a royal gallery (*bādshāh-kā-takht*) extending over eighteen bays in the northern wing of the prayer chamber is carried on ponderous pillars of Hindu pattern. Surely no place of worship was ever devised of such magnitude and with so little sense for the beautiful! Considered by themselves, the several parts and the details are admirable enough: the arcaded aisles, for instance, are dignified; the vaulted *līwān* is well proportioned and pleasing and the mihrāb is as exquisite a piece of carving as can be found in India. But no amount of perfection in its parts can compensate for the lack of organic composition and due proportion in the economy of the whole. Its design, as Cunningham rightly observed, is more suitable for a caravansarai than a mosque. It is monotonous and commonplace.

v3.c30.s1.5.4

Fortunately for the Bengal school, the experiment of building on so gigantic a scale was not afterwards repeated, and though the charge of monotony could legitimately be brought against some other members of the same group, the defect is never so glaringly apparent as it is in the Ādīna *Masjid*.

v3.c30.s1.6

¹ The mosque has been wrongly thought by some writers to be contemporary with the inscription of A.D. 1298; cf. *J.A.S.B.*, vol. VI, 1910, p. 23.

v3.c30.s1.7

¹ Fergusson was incorrect in stating that the dimensions and ground plan of the two mosques were identical.

v3.c30.s1.8

To the reign of Sikandar Shāh are also ascribed several other monuments including the mosque and minar at Chhotā Pāndua in the Hughli District and the mosque and tomb of Akhī Sirāj-ud-dīn at Gaur. But though the two former are supposed to have been erected by Shāh Saif-ud-dīn, a nephew of Fīrūz Shāh Tughluq, it is obvious that their style belongs to the fifteenth rather than the fourteenth century; while the two latter were so extensively restored in 1510 as to have lost practically all value as examples of fourteenth-century work.

v3.c30.s1.9

Whatever buildings may have been erected under the short-lived dynasty of Rāja Kāns, which interrupted the Iliyās Shāh succession between the years 1409 and 1438, the only one of note now generally assigned to it is the Eklākhī tomb at Pāndua. According to tradition, as recorded in the *Riyāz-us-Salātīn*, this is the tomb of Jalāl-ud-dīn Muhammad Shāh, the proselyte son of Rāja Kāns, who was converted to Islam by the Saint Nūr Qutb-i-ʻĀlam. Be this tradition correct or not, the tomb is one of the finest in Bengal and peculiarly interesting as the prototype on which, strange to say, many mosques in this part of India were subsequently modelled. Its design is simple: a square, rather low structure 75 feet each way, with gently curving cornice and octagonal turret at each corner—the whole surmounted by a single dome, which is carried on squinch arches and supported besides by pillars. The fabric is of brick, helped out with slabs of dark hornblende taken from Hindu temples; and, as usual, the decoration of the exterior is executed in moulded terracotta or carved brick, glazed tiles being employed only in the overhanging cornices. The interior was originally decorated with painted flowers and other devices, but only faint traces of this ornamentation are now visible. Compared with the tomb of Rukn-i-ʻĀlam at Multān, or the contemporary monuments of the Sayyid kings of Delhi, the Eklākhī tomb cannot be pronounced a great achievement. Its general lines are not unpleasing; there is merit in the treatment of the curved, overhanging cornice; the corner turrets are effective; and there is great beauty and variety in the low terracotta relief work. It fails, however, because it lacks the height and dignity so essential to monuments of this kind, and—more important still—because too much thought has been given to surface decoration, too little to structural formative beauty. This is a weakness common to most buildings of the Bengal school, and one which they share with the generality of the monuments of Eastern Persia. In both places the architects were apt to regard the fabric of a structure rather as a vehicle for ornament than as a thing of beauty in itself; and as often as not they seem incapable of thinking freely of three dimensions. In the few rare instances in Bengal, such as the *Dākhil Darwāza* at Gaur, where structural and decorative beauty went hand in hand, the result was as perfect an example of brick architecture as can be found anywhere in the world.

v3.c30.s1.10.1

After the expulsion of Rāja Kāns’s House in 1438, the buildings of the restored Ilyās Shāh dynasty become more numerous. Besides other monuments of lesser note, there are the *Sāth Gumbad* mosque and tomb of Khān-i-Jahān ‘Alī at Bagerhāt, both dating from about 1459; while at Gaur there is the Dākhil Gateway, believed to have been built by Bārbak Shāh (1459–74), the Tāntīpāra, Daras Bārī and Lotan *masjids* ascribed to his son, Yūsuf Shāh (1474–81), and the Gunmant mosque erected probably a few years later. Of these the first mentioned—the *Sāth Gumbad* mosque—is noteworthy for its corner turrets, which are strongly reminiscent of Tughluq architecture, and for the unusual treatment of its frontal cornice, which instead of being curvilinear, slopes away in straight lines from a small triangular pediment over the central bay. The interior is a fine spacious apartment albeit somewhat marred by the exaggerated slenderness of its stone pillars. The *Dākhil Darwāza*—the most striking of several gateways at Gaur—is a superb example of what can be achieved in brick and terracotta. Sixty feet in height by 113 feet from back to front, it consists of a central arched passage with guard rooms on either side. At each of its four corners is a five-storeyed tapering turret, once crowned by a dome.

v3.c30.s1.10.2

Walls and turrets alike are relieved by string courses and mouldings, and adorned further with sunk panels, niches and rosettes and other motifs of Hindu origin, among which the chain and bell, battlement and quatrefoil are conspicuous. But the outstanding merit of this gateway is the surprising boldness of its design and the masterly skill with which its façades have been broken up and diversified by alternating effects of light and shade. Between the Dākhil Gateway and the Tāntīpāra *masjid* erected (if we may accept the traditional dates) only ten years later, there is a marked divergence of style. The latter—an oblong brick structure of two aisles divided by stone pillars down the centre—has suffered sadly from the effects of time. Its roof has gone entirely and large sections of its walls have collapsed. Yet, even in its ruin, it is still an object of beauty. Cunningham considered it the finest edifice of all in Gaur, and if perfection of detail were the criterion of good architecture, his opinion would be fully justified. In the matter of superficial ornament, indeed, the Tāntīpāra *masjid* marks the zenith of the Bengal school. In other respects, however, it shows signs of incipient decadence. Where the Dākhil Gateway is virile, the *masjid* is effeminate; where the former is free and spontaneous, the latter is mannered and formal; and even its lace-like ornamentation, beautiful as it is in itself, must be admitted to be verging on the meretricious.

v3.c30.s1.10.3

The same remarks apply also to the decoration of the Daras Bārī mosque which belongs to about the same age but is even more sorely battered than the Tāntīpāra. The Lotan *masjid* which is another of the monuments ascribed to Yūsuf Shāh is the best surviving example of a type of mosque peculiar to Bengal. It is said to take its name (otherwise Lattan or Nattan) from Nattu, a favourite dancing girl of the Emperor. Like the Chamkhan *masjid*, which appears from its style to be somewhat older but is neither so large nor so well preserved, it is constructed of brick and consists of a square prayer chamber—manifestly built on the model of the Eklākhī tomb—with an arched verandah added on to its eastern side, the whole structure measuring 72½ feet long by 52 feet wide. Inside and out, the brickwork was once covered with glazed tiles of blue, white, yellow and green. Much of this tilework has now perished, but what remains of it does not suggest that it could ever have been very attractive. Here and there were a few effective ornaments, such as blue and white lotus medallions in the spandrels, but most of the decoration took the form of narrow alternating bands of colour, which are merely restless and bewildering to the eye. Such decoration has little to commend it.

v3.c30.s1.10.4

It misses the picturesque and imaginative colouring of the tile-enamelled buildings of Persia, and equally it misses the charm of reticence and restraint which characterise the use of coloured tilework at Multān and Delhi. That it could have appealed much to the taste of artists who were capable of designing the Dākhil Gateway or the Tāntīpāra *masjid* is *primâ facie* unlikely, and its presence can only be accounted for on the supposition that coloured tiling was considered the fashionable thing at the moment for mosques, and that no better tiles than these were obtainable in Bengal. Glazed tilework was used also in the Gunmant mosque at Gaur, but here the coloured decoration was supplemented by reliefs on stone or plaster, and it is significant that the latter was employed in the most conspicuous part of the building, i.e. in the main hall of the prayer chamber, whereas the tilework was relegated to a subordinate position in the wings. The ground plan of this masjid is not unlike that of the Ādīna. It consists, that is to say, of a central vaulted hall (51 × 17 feet) flanked to right and left by an arcaded wing, each wing divided into twelve bays (viz. three aisles with four openings to the front) and roofed with as many domes. The wings are in no way remarkable, but the central hall, with its stone masonry and decorative reliefs embossed on the soffit of the vaulted roof, is a fresh departure inaugurating, as we shall see, a new phase in the history of this school.

v3.c30.s1.10.5

Both stonework and reliefs, to be sure, had long before been anticipated in the Ādīna *Masjid*; but in those early days the stone had been stripped from Hindu temples, and when the supply from this source had failed, its place had been taken by brick. From now onwards stone again comes into fashion, being specially quarried in the distant Balasore and Rājmahal Hills and conveyed to Gaur by water. Although, too, the reliefs in the Gunmant mosque were doubtless inspired by those in the Ādīna, the new work was very different from the old. This will be apparent at a glance if the reader will compare the illustrations of the Ādīna *Masjid* carvings (Figs. 33 and 34) with those of the Gunmant and Chhotā Sonā masjids (Figs. 38 and 41). Technically and artistically the former are far superior. They exhibit all the refinement and natural spontaneity of the old Hindu school of Eastern India which for five centuries and more had been producing carving of this kind in stone. The latter are careful, painstaking efforts and by no means unattractive, but in a great measure imitative of the terracotta relief work which for some generations had supplanted stone sculpture, and which being moulded out of soft clay was little adapted for reproduction in the harder material.

v3.c30.s1.11

The obscurity which envelops the authorship of most of the buildings described above extends also to the single important monument, which on the authority of the *Riyāz-us-Salātīn* is commonly accredited to the short-lived Habashī dynasty (1487–93). This is the Fīrūza (or *Chirāgh*) minar at Gaur, which, like the minars at the Qutb and at Daulatābād, was designed perhaps to do duty both as a Tower of Victory and the *ma’zina* of a mosque that has since disappeared. It was a five-storeyed tower about 84 feet in height—excluding a high masonry plinth on which it formerly stood—and ascended by a spiral staircase within. The three lower storeys were twelve-sided and of equal dimensions, separated one from the other by bands of simple ornament. Then came a projecting balcony and above it two circular storeys diminishing in size, the topmost being pierced with four arched openings and surmounted by a dome, like the crowning cupolas of Tughluq buildings. Besides its surface decorations in brick and terracotta, the body of the tower was also embellished with blue and white tiles, many of which were found in the débris at its foot. According to the *Riyāz-us-Salātīn*, the author of the minar was Saif-ud-dīn Fīrūz Shāh (a.d. 1487–89) and this date is probably correct. On grounds of style Cunningham was in favour of placing it nearly a century earlier, ascribing it to Saif-ud-dīn Hamza Shāh (1396–1406). As a fact, however, the style of the minar accords far better with the close of the fifteenth rather than of the fourteenth century, and this date is confirmed both by other details of its decoration and by the presence of the glazed and coloured tiling referred to above which had not been introduced into Bengal at the time proposed by Cunningham.

v3.c30.s1.12

With the monuments of the Husain Shāh period (1493–1552) we are on firmer ground, the dates of the most important among them being established by the presence of inscriptions. These monuments include the *Chhotā Sonā Masjid* (Small Golden mosque) at Gaur, built by Walī Muhammad during the reign of Husain Shāh (a.d. 1493–1519); a mosque at Bāghā in the Rājshāhī district dating from 1523; the *Barā Sonā Masjid* (Great Golden mosque) at Gaur, completed by Nusrat Shāh in 1526; and the *Qadam Rasūl* mosque, completed by the same Emperor in 1530. Of these the mosque at Bāghā and the *Qadam Rasūl* are of brick and terracotta, and mainly interesting as illustrating the progressive decadence of buildings of that class, which become more and more flamboyant as time goes on, until eventually they are smothered in a medley of mechanical and tasteless patterns. The other two monuments are of brick, faced on the outside entirely, and on the inside partially with stone. Both derive their name of ‘golden’ from the gilding which once enriched their domes, and they resemble one another in other features too; notably, in the half stone, half brick arcading of the interior, in their multi-domed roofs, and in the schematic treatment of the mouldings on their exterior façades. There, however, the correspondence between them ends. The older mosque, though far the smaller, is the more elaborate of the two. Its length is less than half that of the other, and it possesses only five arched openings in front against the other’s eleven; but the mouldings of its cornice are duplicated and enriched, the monotony of the domes is broken by the insertion of a Bengali roof in their middle and the bareness of the stone walls is relieved by a wealth of foliate patterns carved in low relief. It must be confessed, however, that the effect produced by the addition of the Bengali roof is not a happy one, and the rich relief work, albeit in itself exquisitely executed, is too flat and characterless to redeem the design from mediocrity. The *Barā Sonā Masjid* has the merit of greater simplicity and impressiveness (Fergusson, indeed, calls it ‘perhaps the finest memorial now left in Gaur’) but the architect has made the mistake so commonly met with in Dravidian architecture of supposing that increased grandeur in a fabric can be produced by the mere reiteration of its parts; and, though the interior is not lacking in dignity, the building as a whole will not bear comparison with the great mosques in Hindūstān and Western India. Let it be added that the quadrangle in front of this mosque was some 200 feet square and was entered through arched gateways on its north, south and east sides, the stone facing of which was sparingly adorned, as was the masjid proper, with glazed tiles of various colours—green and blue, white and yellow and orange.

v3.c30.s1.13.1

It will help us better to appreciate the merits and faults of this Bengal architecture, if we betake ourselves directly from the eastern to the western side of India, and consider the instructive analogies and contrasts presented by the provincial architecture of Gujarāt, where traditions of a pre-existing school were equally strong but strikingly dissimilar from those prevailing in Bengal. When the armies of ‘Alā-ud-dīn Khaljī overran Gujarāt and annexed it to the Delhi Sultanate, they found still flourishing there a singularly beautiful style of architecture. The history of this style—conveniently designated ‘the style of Western India’—has already been told in the second volume of this history. Its zenith had been reached some two centuries before the coming of the Muhammadans, but at the close of the thirteenth century the school of Western India was still full of vitality and the Indian architects and craftsmen whom the conquerors pressed into their service were hardly less gifted than their forefathers who designed the far-famed temples at Somnāth and Siddhāpur, at Modhera and Mount Ābū. The particular style which they favoured was distinguished by a breadth and spaciousness unusual in pre-Muhammadan India, and with these qualities it combined a chaste and graceful elegance that could not fail to appeal strongly to Muslim taste.

v3.c30.s1.13.2

Fortunately for the future of this school the annexation of Gujarāt took place at the very moment when the Imperial architecture of Delhi had reached its highest expression under ‘Alā-ud-dīn Khaljī, and the builders who came from Delhi to the new province must have been deeply imbued with the spirit of that architecture; indeed it is more than likely that some of them had personally participated in the building of the splendid structures erected by ‘Alā-ud-dīn at the *Dargāh* of Nizām-ud-dīn and the Qutb. This point which has hitherto escaped notice, had an intimate bearing on the subsequent development of the Gujarāt school. It meant that the sense for symmetry and proportion and the almost faultless taste which had characterised Khaljī architecture became, from the outset, the key-notes of the Gujarāt style also. The effect of this influence from Delhi is well evidenced in the noble façade of the *Jāmi‘ Masjid* at Cambay, which was erected as early as 1325, i.e. within fifteen or twenty years of the Jamā‘at Khāna at Nizām-ud-dīn; and it is also evident a little later (1333) in the mosque of Hilāl (or Buhlūl) Khān Qāzī at Dholka, which in spite of its insignificant minarets and other shortcomings, is imbued nevertheless with the same breadth of conception and purity of taste.

v3.c30.s1.13.3

Although, however, the foundations of this Gujarātī style were thus well and truly laid in the fourteenth century, the times were altogether too unsettled, and conditions under the provincial Government of Delhi in other respects too unpropitious for architecture to make much headway; and it was not until the establishment of independence under the Ahmad Shāhī dynasty that the greatness of this school really began. Like most Indian potentates the Ahmad Shāhī rulers sought to display their wealth and power in the magnificence of their buildings, each in turn endeavouring to outdo the efforts of his predecessors. Ahmad Shāh, from whom the dynasty takes its name, commemorated his accession by founding the city of Ahmadābād, and later on in his reign he built the forts of Songarh, Dohad and Ahmadnagar. Among the monuments with which he beautified his new capital were the Ahmad Shāh and *Jāmi‘ Masjids*, and to his reign also belong the fine gateway known as the *Tīn Darwāza* and the mosques of Haibat Khān and Sayyid ‘Ālam. Each and every one of these buildings, as well as a multitude of others erected by succeeding kings, is distinguished by some particular traits of its own. Space, however, would fail to tell of them all, and we must be content, therefore, to pick out a few of the most typical examples. Of Ahmad Shāh's buildings, the two most instructive are the *Tīn Darwāza* (Triple Gateway) and the *Jāmi‘ Masjid*. The former (Pl.

v3.c30.s1.13.4

XXIV) was the principal entrance to the outer court-yard of the palace, where feudatories and foreign ambassadors assembled before making their way to the Royal presence. It is 37 feet in thickness and pierced by three openings (the central one 17½ feet wide), connected one with the other by three cross passages. The charm of this gateway springs from its perfectly proportioned and delicately framed archways set off against highly ornate buttresses on the faces of the intervening piers, though the latter, be it said, are not entirely homogeneous in feeling with the rest of the design. The *Jāmi‘ Masjid* is a far more magnificent creation. By the collapse of its two minars in the earthquake of 1819 it has been shorn of a prominent feature, but it is questionable whether the minars ever added materially to its beauty. As it now stands, it is one of the most superb, as it is also one of the most imposing structures of its class, in the world. The defect of most mosques planned on a large scale is, as we have seen in connexion with the Ādīna *Masjid* at Pāndua, the dull monotony of their composition. In the *Jāmi‘ Masjid* at Ahmadābād there is no such weakness. The prayer chamber is 210 feet in width by 95 feet in depth, but its façade is so admirably composed, so broken up and diversified, and so well proportioned in its parts, that its vastness only serves to enhance the beauty and impressiveness of the whole.

v3.c30.s1.13.5

The low flanking wings on either side with their pseudo-arched fronts are unusual adjuncts, but the other features of the façade—its shapely expansive arches, its engaged minars blended more harmoniously than in the foregoing example with the rest of the design, its carved mouldings and string courses and battlements—all these are familiar characteristics of the Gujarātī style. The same is true also of the interior with its 260 graceful columns, now emerging into an established architectural order, its narrow aisles, its clerestory galleries, its symmetrically arranged domes built on the Hindu corbel system, its traceried windows and its rich arabesques. Most of these features are derived from the old pre-Muslim school, and all are repeated time and again in subsequent buildings, though seldom with better effect than here. The mode of lighting and ventilating the interior, which was an invention of the Gujarāt architects, is a specially happy solution of a well-known problem but one, strangely enough, that has never found favour in other parts of India. It consists in carrying the upper roof well beyond the one below it, the overlapping portion being supported on dwarf columns and the outside of the gallery thus formed being closed with perforated screens, the advantage of this arrangement being that all the light and air required can be admitted, while the direct rays of the sun and the rain are effectually excluded.

v3.c30.s1.14

The excellent taste and originality displayed by the architects of Ahmad Shāh are equally evident in the few monuments left by his successor Muhammad Shāh II (1442–57), notably in the mausoleum of Sultān Ahmad, where he himself and his son Qutb-ud-dīn are interred, in the ‘Tombs of the Queens’ (*Rāṇī-kā-Hujra*), and in the mosque and tomb of Shaikh Ahmad Khattrī at Sarkhej. Of these the two last mentioned are by far the most important, not only because of their own intrinsic merit, but because the style they ushered in was subsequently adopted for the whole of this admirable group of monuments at Sarkhej. Both buildings were begun in 1446 by Muhammad Shāh and finished five years later by Qutb-ud-dīn. The mausoleum (104 feet square) is the largest of its kind in Gujarāt. It comprises a square central chamber, surmounted by a single large dome with four aisles of slender columns on each face, roofed by smaller domes. The aisles are closed from without by perforated screens of stone, and the central chamber is separated from the verandahs by panels of brass, fretted and chased and tooled into an infinite variety of patterns. The mosque, which has an area of rather less than half that of the *Jāmi‘ Masjid* at Ahmadābād, differs from its predecessors in that it possesses neither arched façade nor minars and that its roof is of the same uniform height throughout. Its beauty, like that of the tomb and of the exquisite little pavilion in front of it, is due to its chaste simplicity and classic restraint; and indeed, considered on its merits as a pillared hall, it is difficult to imagine how it could have been improved upon. But whether a hall such as this, constructed on purely Hindu principles, fulfils the Muslim ideal of a *masjid*, is open to question. Such a design may perhaps be admissible in a quasi-private mosque, such as this, attached to a *Dargāh*; it would certainly not be suitable for a public place of worship.

v3.c30.s1.15

Qutb-ud-dīn (1451–59) did not add much to the beauties or amenities of the capital. He built the Hauz-i-Qutb Tank at Kankariyā as well as the Qutb-ud-dīn mosque in Ahmadābād and he is said also to have been the author of the mosque and tomb in Rājāpur which was erected to the memory of the wife of Sayyid Buddhā bin Sayyid Yāqūt. The mosque which bears his name and which was completed in 1449 before his father’s death, is a dull soulless affair without any claim to distinction; and the Rājāpur mosque also, though one of the largest in the suburbs (it is 150 feet in length by 53½ feet in depth), is not in the best of taste, the central bay with its two heavy flanking minarets being out of all proportion to the long low wings, and the façade in other respects lacking unity and cohesion. If, however, the buildings associated with the name of the king are of little merit, there is one, erected by one of his nobles, that furnishes an important landmark in the history of the Gujarātī style. This is the tomb of Daryā Khān (1453) which, like the somewhat later mosque of Alaf Khān at Dholka, is permeated with a strong Persian spirit. It is an imposing square structure with a lofty central dome and lower domed verandahs on its four sides, and is constructed throughout on the arcuate principle, which was destined to play an increasingly prominent part in Gujarāt, the arch henceforth being employed not merely as a characteristic symbol of the Faith, but as a structural expedient more practicable than the horizontal beam in districts where stone was not easily procurable.

v3.c30.s1.16.1

With the accession of Mahmūd Begarha, the architecture of Gujarāt entered upon its most magnificent stage. In the course of his long reign, which lasted for more than half a century (1459–1511), this powerful Sultan founded the new cities of Mustafābād at Junāgadh, of Mahmūdābād near Khedā and of Muhammadābād at Chāmpānīr. Ahmadābād, his capital, he enclosed with additional lines of fortification and beautified with broad streets and a multitude of splendid edifices. For Chāmpānīr, which he captured in 1484, the Sultan seems to have conceived an especial fondness; for on the spot where his camp had stood he afterwards caused a city and a palace citadel to be built, and up to the time of his death this remained his favourite place of residence. Of the outer city, which once reached almost to Halol, 3½ miles away, little is now left; but the strong walls of the citadel with their bastions and happily proportioned gateways (Pl. XXV), the fine custom house, the imposing mosques and richly carved tombs—all bear eloquent witness to the grandeur of Mahmūd Begarha’s new capital, which at one time threatened almost to rival Ahmadābād itself. Outstanding amid these monuments of Chāmpānīr is the great *Jāmi‘ Masjid* (completed only two years before the death of the Sultan).

v3.c30.s1.16.2

It has been described as second to none of the mosques of Gujarāt, and undoubtedly it is a most striking edifice, a particularly fine effect being produced in the interior of the prayer chamber by three tiers of columns rising one above the other and supporting the dome, with richly carved balconies between the tiers and an equally rich frieze beneath the ribbed soffit of the ceiling. But, considered as an organic whole, it will not bear comparison with its older namesake in Ahmadābād. Its parts are neither so well proportioned nor so successfully co-ordinated. The elevation of the prayer chamber is too cramped; the minarets flanking the main archway overpoweringly heavy; and the transition from the side wings to the central hall altogether too abrupt. The truth is that by the end of the fifteenth century the faculty for composition on a grand scale which distinguished the architecture of Ahmad Shāh and which had come down as a legacy from Khaljī times had all but exhausted itself. For constructional purposes, it is true, the arch and dome were now playing an increasingly important part; but though the architects of Mahmūd Begarha and his successors made free use of these features, and could handle them, on occasion, with consummate skill and taste, still they were never so much at home with them as they were with their own traditional pillar and lintel system;

v3.c30.s1.16.3

nor could they bring themselves, as their predecessors had done, to design in the broader and bolder manner that the arch and dome rendered possible. For perfection of detail and sheer decorative beauty the *Jāmi‘ Masjid* and other mosques at Chāmpānīr can challenge comparison with almost any Muhammadan building in the East, but they fail conspicuously in point of synthetic unity. The same phenomenon is equally observable among the contemporary monuments at Ahmadābād as well as at Dholka, Mahmūdābād, and other less known centres; for though Chāmpānīr had become the favourite residence of Mahmūd Begarha, and though its population must have been largely recruited from Ahmadābād, its growing popularity does not seem to have greatly diminished the importance of the older capital, which at this period was reckoned among the foremost and wealthiest cities in Asia. If we consider, for example, the remains of the palace (it is but a skeleton now) which Mahmūd erected for himself on the banks of his great reservoir at Sarkhej, with its stepped *ghāts* and terraces, its pillared verandahs and balconied windows, we cannot but be struck by its uniform excellence. It is less pure in style, less elegant in its proportions than the earlier buildings of Muhammad Shāh II, but its parts nevertheless are entirely appropriate and in keeping with their fellows, and the whole is not only pleasing to look upon but admirably adapted to its purpose as a cool and refreshing dwelling house.

v3.c30.s1.16.4

It is the same also with the exquisitely carved sluice heads that emptied their waters into the lakes at Sarkhej and Kankariyā, insignificant structures in themselves but finished with that perfection of taste which can make the commonest things beautiful; and it is the same also with the impressive step-wells or *wāvs* such as that built in 1499–1500 by Bāī Harīr, the Superintendent of the royal haram, or the still more magnificent example in the village of Adālaj. Though larger and more elaborate, these step-wells are designed on essentially the same lines as the older step-wells of the Hindus, of which the finest extant specimen is that of Mātā Bhavanī, dating from about the eleventh century. They consist, that is to say, of a circular or octagonal well-shaft approached on one side by a broad stairway which descends flight upon flight to the water's edge; on the landings between the flights are pillared galleries, whose tiers are multiplied as the depth increases and which serve at once as supports to counteract the inward thrust of the long side walls and as cool resting-places in the heat of summer. There are no other wells in the world that, structurally and decoratively, can compare with these step-wells of Western India, and it was because their builders were content to keep to the established traditions of the country that they were able to attain such perfection. So long as the Muslims could do this, the ground was safe and their success assured.

v3.c30.s1.16.5

Their difficulties began when the customs of Islam or other considerations necessitated the introduction of alien and incongruous elements—a contingency which inevitably happened over their tombs and mosques. To the Muslim a tomb was indissolubly associated with the idea of dome and arch construction, but in Gujarāt the old trabeate system was much too deeply rooted in the soil to make way for the arcuate, and hence the builders generally insisted on following their own principles of design, modified by little more than the use of structural domes in place of the older corbelled roofs. Were it not for these domes and the increased spaciousness which they facilitated the tomb, for example, of Mahmūd Begarha at Sarkhej, of Sayyid ‘Usmān in Ahmadābād (1460), or of Bībī Achut Kūkī (1472) would show relatively little trace of Islamic influence. On the other hand, there are a few tombs in which greater size and dignity were achieved by adopting the arch and vault. Such are the tombs of Shāh ‘Ālam and of Mubārak Sayyid at Mahmūdābād; but even in these cases it is manifest that the architects were still working under the spell of their ancient tradition and still thinking more in terms of trabeate than of arcuate construction, with the result that their creations never attained the same sublimity and grandeur as the great tombs of Northern India and the Deccan.

v3.c30.s1.17.1

But if the difficulty of compromising with Islamic ideals was felt over their tombs, still more was it felt over the designing of their mosques, where an added stumbling-block was provided by the minaret—a feature which the Gujarātī architect never managed to handle with complete success. Even at the *Jāmi‘ Masjid* of Ahmad Shāh the minarets, when they existed, were in doubtful taste, and half a century later these features had become still heavier and more cumbersome in relation to the rest of the structure. This is a blemish that we have already noticed at Mahmūd Begarha’s great *masjid* at Chāmpānīr, but it is just as conspicuous in contemporary mosques at Ahmadābād, such as those of Miyān Khān Chishtī (1465), Bībī Achut Kūkī (1472) or Bāī Harīr (1500). In all of these, as well as in most other mosques of this period, the minarets were placed on either side of the central archway, as they had been in earlier examples; but in this position they so impaired the symmetry of the façade that in some later examples they were omitted altogether, while in others they were shifted from the centre to the front corners of the building. So long, however, as their old dimensions were preserved, this last solution was no better than the first; for whether the mosque took the form of a pillared hall like that of Sayyid ‘Usmān (1460) or an arched and vaulted one like that of Shāh ‘Ālam, the towering minars at the corners were bound to overpower the rest of the structure.

v3.c30.s1.17.2

The fact was that minars of such dimensions could not by any conceivable means be brought into harmony with the design of the prayer chamber, unless the latter was to be radically altered. This is the reason why in some of the later mosques, such as that of Muhāfiz Khān, we find the height of the minarets reduced and that of the prayer chamber increased—much to the advantage of the composition as a whole. It was not, however, until the minaret was transformed into a merely ornamental and symbolic appendage that the problem from an aesthetic standpoint was successfully solved and then only at the expense of utility. Mosques with this form of ornamental minaret first made their appearance at Ahmadābād in the opening years of the sixteenth century, the best example and one of the earliest being that of Rānī Sīparī (1514) which belongs to the reign of Muzaffar Shāh II, while another was the mosque of Shāh Khūb Sayyid (1538). The former was judged by Fergusson to be one of the most exquisite structures in the world, and his judgement was not exaggerated. East or West, it would be difficult to single out a building in which the parts are more harmoniously blended or in which balance, symmetry and decorative rhythm combine to produce a more perfect effect.

First 36 of 116 passages. Read on

Linked texts (9)