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Jahaz Mahal
Jahaz Mahal (in Urdu language ‘Jahaz’ means "Ship" and ‘Mahal’ means "Palace", the "Ship Palace"), is located next to Hauz-i-Shamsi in Mehrauli, Delhi on its northeastern corner. It was so named, since its reflection (illusion) in the surrounding reservoir looked like a ship floating on a lake. It is inferred to have been built during the Lodi dynasty period (1452–1526) as a pleasure resort, Sarai or an inn. History One reason for building the Jahaj Mahal retreat was to provide transit accommodation as a Sarai or ( inn) to the large number of pilgrims from Afghanistan, Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Morocco and Turkey who came to Delhi to visit the many Muslim shrines. Another version is that it was built as a retreat for the emperors, Akbar Shah II and Bahadur Shah II and their families, during the summer months, away from the heat and dust of Delhi. Its construction is dated between 1451 AD and 1526 AD, before Babar's invasion and the beginning of Mughal rule in Delhi. ...
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Mandav
Mandav is a town and a nagar panchayat, near city of Dhar in Dhar district in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. Demographics India census, Mandav had a population of 8,545. Males constitute 51% of the population and females 49%. Mandav has an average literacy rate of 32%, lower than the national average of 59.5%: male literacy is 41%, and female literacy is 22%. In Mandav, 20% of the population is under 6 years of age. Mandva is situated in the Vindhyanchal Range at 2,000 feet above sea level. There is a deep ravine that separates it from the Malwa Plateau in Central India. Mandav is 100 km from Indore, the nearest airport. History The history of Mandav, also known as Mandu, is known from the Paramara period in the 8th century A.D. Later it was under Mughal rule. They called it Shadiabad, which means ‘The City of Joy’. The monuments are a mix of the Hindu and Afghan style of architecture. Mandu is a celebration in stone, of life and joy, of the love of the poe ...
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Morocco
Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to the east, and the disputed territory of Western Sahara to the south. Mauritania lies to the south of Western Sahara. Morocco also claims the Spanish exclaves of Ceuta, Melilla and Peñón de Vélez de la Gomera, and several small Spanish-controlled islands off its coast. It spans an area of or , with a population of roughly 37 million. Its official and predominant religion is Islam, and the official languages are Arabic and Berber; the Moroccan dialect of Arabic and French are also widely spoken. Moroccan identity and culture is a mix of Arab, Berber, and European cultures. Its capital is Rabat, while its largest city is Casablanca. In a region inhabited since the Paleolithic Era over 300,000 years ago, the first M ...
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Mihrab
Mihrab ( ar, محراب, ', pl. ') is a niche in the wall of a mosque that indicates the ''qibla'', the direction of the Kaaba in Mecca towards which Muslims should face when praying. The wall in which a ''mihrab'' appears is thus the "qibla wall". The ''minbar'', which is the raised platform from which an imam (leader of prayer) addresses the congregation, is located to the right of the mihrab. Etymology The origin of the word ''miḥrāb'' is complicated and multiple explanations have been proposed by different sources and scholars. It may come from Old South Arabian (possibly Sabaic) ''mḥrb'' meaning a certain part of a palace, as well as "part of a temple where ''tḥrb'' (a certain type of visions) is obtained," from the root word ''ḥrb'' "to perform a certain religious ritual (which is compared to combat or fighting and described as an overnight retreat) in the ''mḥrb'' of the temple." It may also possibly be related to Ethiopic ''məkʷrab'' "temple, sa ...
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Mosque
A mosque (; from ar, مَسْجِد, masjid, ; literally "place of ritual prostration"), also called masjid, is a place of prayer for Muslims. Mosques are usually covered buildings, but can be any place where prayers ( sujud) are performed, including outdoor courtyards. The first mosques were simple places of prayer for Muslims, and may have been open spaces rather than buildings. In the first stage of Islamic architecture, 650-750 CE, early mosques comprised open and closed covered spaces enclosed by walls, often with minarets from which calls to prayer were issued. Mosque buildings typically contain an ornamental niche ('' mihrab'') set into the wall that indicates the direction of Mecca (''qiblah''), Wudu, ablution facilities. The pulpit (''minbar''), from which the Friday (jumu'ah) sermon (''khutba'') is delivered, was in earlier times characteristic of the central city mosque, but has since become common in smaller mosques. Mosques typically have Islam and gender se ...
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Squinches
In architecture, a squinch is a triangular corner that supports the base of a dome. Its visual purpose is to translate a rectangle into an octagon. See also: pendentive. Construction A squinch is typically formed by a masonry arch that spans a square corner. History in the Middle East The dome chamber in the Palace of Ardashir, the Sassanid king, in Firuzabad, Iran is the earliest surviving example of the use of the squinch, suggesting that the squinch may have been invented in Persia. After the rise of Islam, it was used in the Middle East in both eastern Romanesque and Islamic architecture. It remained a feature of Islamic architecture, especially in Iran, and was often covered by corbelled stalactite-like structures known as muqarnas. History in Western Europe It spread to the Romanesque architecture of western Europe, one example being the Normans' 12th-century church of San Cataldo, Palermo in Sicily. This has three domes, each supported by four doubled squinches. ...
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Tower
A tower is a tall structure, taller than it is wide, often by a significant factor. Towers are distinguished from masts by their lack of guy-wires and are therefore, along with tall buildings, self-supporting structures. Towers are specifically distinguished from buildings in that they are built not to be habitable but to serve other functions using the height of the tower. For example, the height of a clock tower improves the visibility of the clock, and the height of a tower in a fortified building such as a castle increases the visibility of the surroundings for defensive purposes. Towers may also be built for observation, leisure, or telecommunication purposes. A tower can stand alone or be supported by adjacent buildings, or it may be a feature on top of a larger structure or building. Etymology Old English ''torr'' is from Latin ''turris'' via Old French ''tor''. The Latin term together with Greek τύρσις was loaned from a pre-Indo-European Mediterranean lang ...
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Chhatris
''Chhatri'' are elevated, dome-shaped pavilions used as an element in Indo-Islamic architecture and Indian architecture. Originating as a canopy above tombs, they serve as decorative elements. The earliest example of chhatri being used in the Indian Subcontinent were found in the Shrine of Ibrahim in Bhadreswar, constructed between 1159 and 1175 AD. Chhatri are found particularly within Mughal architecture. The most notable surviving examples today are to be found at Humayun's Tomb in Delhi and the Taj Mahal in Agra. The Berar Sultanate in the Deccan added chhatris on buildings in its various capitals. Chhatri have also been used in Rajasthan and other parts of the Indian Subcontinent by both Muslim and Hindu rulers. Its origins are, however, Indo-Islamic. While chhatri in Shekhawati may consist of a simple structure of one dome raised by four pillars to a building containing many domes and a basement with several rooms. In some places, the interior of the chhatri is painte ...
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Mughal Empire
The Mughal Empire was an early-modern empire that controlled much of South Asia between the 16th and 19th centuries. Quote: "Although the first two Timurid emperors and many of their noblemen were recent migrants to the subcontinent, the dynasty and the empire itself became indisputably Indian. The interests and futures of all concerned were in India, not in ancestral homelands in the Middle East or Central Asia. Furthermore, the Mughal empire emerged from the Indian historical experience. It was the end product of a millennium of Muslim conquest, colonization, and state-building in the Indian subcontinent." For some two hundred years, the empire stretched from the outer fringes of the Indus river basin in the west, northern Afghanistan in the northwest, and Kashmir in the north, to the highlands of present-day Assam and Bangladesh in the east, and the uplands of the Deccan Plateau in South India. Quote: "The realm so defined and governed was a vast territory of some , rang ...
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Babur
Babur ( fa, , lit= tiger, translit= Bābur; ; 14 February 148326 December 1530), born Mīrzā Zahīr ud-Dīn Muhammad, was the founder of the Mughal Empire in the Indian subcontinent. He was a descendant of Timur and Genghis Khan through his father and mother respectively.F. LehmannẒahīr-al-Dīn Moḥammad Bābor In Encyclopædia Iranica. Online Ed. December 1988 (updated August 2011). "Bābor, Ẓahīr-al-Dīn Moḥammad son of Umar Sheikh Mirza, (6 Moḥarram 886-6 Jomādā I 937/14 February 1483 – 26 December 1530), Timurid prince, military genius, and literary craftsman who escaped the bloody political arena of his Central Asian birthplace to found the Mughal Empire in India. His origin, milieu, training, and education were steeped in Muslim culture and so Bābor played significant role for the fostering of this culture by his descendants, the Mughals of India, and for the expansion of Islam in the Indian subcontinent, with brilliant literary, artistic, and hi ...
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The Hindu
''The Hindu'' is an Indian English-language daily newspaper owned by The Hindu Group, headquartered in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. It began as a weekly in 1878 and became a daily in 1889. It is one of the Indian newspapers of record and the second most circulated English-language newspaper in India, after '' The Times of India''. , ''The Hindu'' is published from 21 locations across 11 states of India. ''The Hindu'' has been a family-owned newspaper since 1905, when it was purchased by S. Kasturi Ranga Iyengar from the original founders. It is now jointly owned by Iyengar's descendants, referred to as the "Kasturi family", who serve as the directors of the holding company. The current chairperson of the group is Malini Parthasarathy, a great-granddaughter of Iyengar. Except for a period of about two years, when Siddharth Varadarajan, S. Varadarajan held the editorship of the newspaper, the editorial positions of the paper were always held by members of the family or held under t ...
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Bahadur Shah II
Bahadur Shah II, usually referred to by his poetic title Bahadur Shah ''Zafar'' (; ''Zafar'' Victory) was born Mirza Abu Zafar Siraj-ud-din Muhammad (24 October 1775 – 7 November 1862) and was the twentieth and last Mughal Emperor as well as an Urdu poet. He was the second son and the successor to his father, Akbar II, who died on 28 September 1837. He was a titular Emperor, as the Mughal Empire existed in name only and his authority was limited only to the walled city of Old Delhi (Shahjahanbad). Following his involvement in the Indian Mutiny of 1857, the British exiled him to Rangoon in British-controlled Burma in 1858, after convicting him on several charges. Bahadur Shah Zafar's father, Akbar II, had been imprisoned by the British and he was not his father's preferred choice as his successor. One of Akbar Shah's queens pressured him to declare her son, Mirza Jahangir, as his successor. However, The East India Company exiled Jahangir after he attacked their resident i ...
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Akbar Shah II
Akbar II (; 22 April 1760 – 28 September 1837), also known as Akbar Shah II, was the Nineteenth Mughal emperor of India. He reigned from 1806 to 1837. He was the second son of Shah Alam II and the father of Bahadur Shah II Akbar had little de facto power due to the increasing British influence in India through the East India Company. He sent Ram Mohan Roy as an ambassador to Britain and gave him the title of Raja. During his regime, in 1835, the East India Company discontinued calling itself subject of the Mughal Emperor and issuing coins in his name. The Persian lines in the company's coins to this effect were deleted. Akbar II is credited with starting the Hindu–Muslim unity festival Phool Walon Ki Sair. His grave lies next to the dargah of 13th-century Sufi saint Qutbuddin Bakhtiar Kaki at Mehrauli. Early life Prince Mirza Akbar was born on 22 April 1760 to Emperor Shah Alam II at Mukundpur, Satna, while his father was in exile. On 2 May 1781, at the Red Fort, t ...
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