Moghul architecture and the Taj Mahal

LESSON VII

The Architecture of a country is perhaps most greatly influenced by outsiders and conquerers, those who have come to a country in order to take over it.

• What examples can you think of?

Architecture is probably the greatest and most powerful way of showing that you have arrived and are here to stay. Think of examples in Hungary of who has come and built here

How does this connect with ideology and culture?• What makes a group of people believe they have the ‚right’ to come to a new place, and begin to change everything?• What makes people believe they have the ‚right’ to not only build new buildings in their own style, but to kill people who do not want it?• Why is architecture so important in this? How does a building ‚bring’ a culture to a country?• Why might it have been more difficult to ‚conquer’ or take over India with a new architectural and visual style and ideology?

Introducing…. The Moghuls

The Moghuls were a medieval Islamic tribe from Persia (modern Iran), who travelled to western Spain and Portugal, right across the world to India

• What can we say about their ‚style’? What seems to be important, or repeated?

What were they doing? Why did they use architecture so much in India…more than in any other country?

• Not only were they spreading the relatively new religion of Islam, but they were bringing important new technologies around the world, from new mathematical systems, to astrology, poetry, architectural technology and many, many more.• Moghul architecture became considered to be most beautiful in the world, and still influences our perception of what is beautiful in architecture.• The challenge must have been enormous – India has perhaps the most striking and famous visual culture in the world… what could you possibly create to ‚take over’ this culture with your own?• And did they succeed? Is the most iconic and famous building of India Muslim, or Hindu? ‚Indian’, or ‚Moghul’?

The Taj Mahal – most ‚perfect’ building?

Why is the Taj Mahal so famous?• One answer is obviously because of its beauty and size. But perhaps the fact it has a story connected to it which fits with both Eastern and Western ideas of Romance has something to do with it…• What was the function? What is the function now?• Worksheet 1

The Taj is a highly decorated building, but decorated in a way which is very, very different from what we have seen before on the Hindu and Buddhist buildings we have looked at.•Watch the short picture show, and think about how these buildings are ‚beautified’ – what did the moghuls do to make their buildings look special and unique? What shapes, forms and images get used over and over again? •Why might this be? Why are there no statues or paintings covering the walls, as we saw on the Meenakshi temple?• What techniques have been used to make this building ‚beautiful’?• Watch the beginning of the documentary and answer the questions about the decoration.

Symmetry was the great art of the Moghuls• What does it mean?• Where can we see symmetry on the Taj Mahal?• The answer…. EVERYWHERE

One horizontal line of symmetry is particularly fascinating and unusual… where is it?

And one form of decoration is particularly subtle, and especially wonderful…

The construction of a wonder• So how was this building built? And what about the single parts which come to together to make something special? Have a look at the final worksheet and think about the components and the materials

The Placement of the Taj Mahal• The Taj is in the city of Agra, not far from either Delhi or

Jaipur (which we looked at in the Desert lesson). It is especially close to the cities of Mathura and Vrindavan – the two most religiously important cities in India at the time it was built, the birthplace of Krishna, the most important deity at the time. It is also built on the banks of the Yamuna river, the second most sacred river for hindu people. What does all of this mean?