Throwback Thursday: Mumtaz Mausoleum 1631
Wikipedia
Mumtaz Mahal (exalted one of the palace), born Arjumand Banu Begum, was the Empress consort of the Mughal Empire, from January 19, 1628 to June 17, 1631, [and] chief consort of the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan.
[Born] to a family of Persian nobility, [she] was the daughter of Abu’l-Hasan Asaf Khan […]. She was married at the age of 19 [in 1612] to Prince Khurram, [later named] Jahan, [becoming] his second wife. [They] had fourteen children, including Jahanara Begum […] and the Crown prince Dara Shikoh [..]. Shikoh was, eventually, deposed by younger sibling Aurangzeb.
Three hundred, ninety years ago, today, Mumtaz Mahal died [from a postpartum hemorrhage] in Burhanpur, Deccan (present-day Madhya Pradesh), during the birth of her fourteenth child, a daughter named Gauhar Ara Begum. Her body was temporarily buried at Burhanpur in a walled pleasure garden known as Zainabad […].
[The] emperor was reportedly inconsolable. Apparently, after her death, he went into secluded mourning for a year. When he appeared again, his hair had turned white, his back was bent and his face worn. Mumtaz’s eldest daughter, Jahanara […], gradually brought her father out of grief and took her mother’s place at court.
[Shah Jahan] began planning the design and construction of a suitable mausoleum and funerary garden in Agra for his wife. It was a task that would take 22 years to complete: The Taj Mahal.
Wikipedia Summaries
Additional Reading:
The Myth of the Taj Mahal and a New Theory of It’s Symbolic Meaning (College Art/Wayne E. Begley/PDF)
June 28, 2021 at 12:04 AM
14 friggin children….14…wow. I never knew that about the The Taj Mahal…damn no wonder.
June 28, 2021 at 4:51 AM
Yeah. Fourteen. I’m thinking to myself “Oh, HELL, no!” Get off and stay off.
June 28, 2021 at 8:47 AM
Yea time to get the mace ol Chasity belt out and on. No wonder she was honored…she should get honored for not killing him.
June 28, 2021 at 5:54 PM
LOL! “Go forth and multiply” was taken literally.
He was a busy dude, too. He had more than one wife. She was number 2.
June 28, 2021 at 7:05 PM
Yea…no thank you…. nagging in stereo….I’ll pass
June 28, 2021 at 8:55 PM
LOL! What? You don’t want a harem?
June 28, 2021 at 8:56 PM
Hell no….one is all I can/will handle. If anything I’d live by myself with a giant tv with Dodger baseball and close to a pizza place.
June 28, 2021 at 9:41 PM
LOL!