User talk:Joopercoopers/Taj Mahal

Facts removed[edit]

He had previously created the gardens and palaces of Shalimar in honor of his second wife, Mumtaz Mahal.

Links for inclusion[edit]

Images[edit]

Agra

class=notpageimage|

Location of the Taj Mahal within India

The Tomb of Humayun constructed in 1560 shares substantially the same pattern as the Taj Mahal

(craftsmanship is best seen in enlarged version -- click image to see enlargement)

Arch of jali, entry to cenotaphs
Delicate piercework
Inlay detail
Inlay detail

Shah Jahan, who commissionated the Taj Mahal

Shah Jehan's cenotaph, offset from center. Shah Jahan was interred at the tomb eight years after its completion.

Atmosphere swatch[edit]

overcast overcast hazy (fountains are on) morning sun dawn sun

great minaret photo main gate riverfront terrace tower mosque interior Khawasppuras

Text from Wetman's talk page[edit]

One question that isn't really dealt with in the article at the moment is the influence the Taj may have had on western architecture. Its fame travelled quickly after its construction completed in the late 1600's and by the early 1800's the British were effectively in control - the traditional conception of the Taj as a 'monument to love' presumably had some resonance with the romantic movement, but other than the Royal Pavilion (I assume), I wonder what buildings in Europe might trace a significant influence from the Taj.

You've got the main structure right there. Sezincote is the other English classic of what was in essence an offshoot of chinoiserie and was largely an influence in interior decoration and some textile design (paisley patterning). Though the British East India Company was in political control by c. 1800, British awareness of any of the authentic details of India was a product of the nineteenth century, transmitted by woodcuts and after mid-century through steel engravings: see this website. Indian architecture was reproduced as "picturesque": I wonder who made the first measured architectural drawings of an Indian building: might it have been as late as ca 1910 in connection with the 1911 Durbar? To what extent did the official structures built in India under the Raj present Indian details, I wonder?

The Taj may have had a daunting perfection that protected it from vulgarized copies. The Taj Mahal's reputation in the West had its start in the late nineteenth century, I think. My American grandmother had a little ivory Taj Mahal under glass on a chimneypiece.

Thomas Daniell's Oriental Views (1808) was a key work here, plus his other Indian watercolours and paintings, which were turned into etchings etc (but not woodcuts - wood engravings conceivably). He advised on Sezincote (but mainly re the gardens), which was visited by the Prince Regent in 1812, before he built Brighton. Later buildings, both more the interiors, and not necessarily particularly influenced by the Taj, were parts of Osbourne House for Q Victoria, and Elveden Hall in Suffolk, after Duleep Singh went to live there. I think soon after the "Mutiny" there was a proposal to demolish the Taj for the materials, the rejection of which may have marked a further turning-point in attitudes. Also Kuala Lumpur has a very fine Moghul railway station (called "Moorish" for political reasons I think), apart from the neo-Moghul buildings in India.

I'd not heard of the proposal to demolish the Taj Mahal: Northumberland House was pulled down for its materials in 1866-74. Your point about the style-designation "Moorish" concealing design vocabulary that was in fact Indian strikes the right note: Frederick Church's Olana, despite its Victorian picturesque massing.

There's a really interesting chapter in Ebba Koch's book "The complete Taj Mahal" called Everybody's Taj Mahal - Francois Bernier was there in 1659 and wrote about it - the 18th century, things become a little quiet, Josef Tieffenthaler, one of the last jesuits of the Mughal mission visited sometime after 1743, wrote an account. The British east india company got to agra in 1785 and from 1786-1798 Major William Palmers, when in agra would stay in the garden towers of the Taj. Apparently the first artist to arrive from europe was James Forbes (artist) in 1781 swiftly followed by Johan Zoffany in 1786. The first overall views of the Taj were made by William Hodges (1783)and Thomas Daniell and William Daniell who came in search of 'the sublime, picturesque and exotic'.

To what extent did the official structures built in India under the Raj present Indian details, I wonder? - that's an interesting lead -

New Delhi definitely - synthesis of Indian, including Mughal architecture and neo-classicism.

There are others; in Mumbai: Gateway of India - a bit half-hearted,Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus - Moghul-romanesque; nothing much in Calcutta. See Indo-Saracenic , the other thing they called the style. Lutyens certainly. Here is fun, but more stuff built by maharajahs etc.

The Mughal garden in India is pretty directly drawn from the Persian garden tradition via Babur. Lutyens' use of viewing pavilions, axes, narrow canals, fountains and geometrically articulated spaces, which he recognized in India, have a more convoluted cultural history: Persian bagh-> Islamic traditions-> twin Islamic traditions of Andalusia and Sicily-> Norman garden tradition inherited by Angevins in Naples-> seen by Louis XII and Charles VIII's courts-> formal C16-C17 French garden-> Le Nôtre-> Lutyens.

Thanks for your consideration Geogre, but It's quite hard to offend me in general and particularly by someone who I also hold in esteem (vive la diff etc.) I take a lot of your points - frankly it seems in the nature of things on-wiki for individuals to carve themselves little empires out and to offer all kinds of pontifications. But there are some pretty bad articles out there, often people's first, abandoned attempts at articles (Collateral_Warranty) or simply, about important subjects but forgotten about by their authors Weissenhof Estate. To have someone sift through articles and categorize them