Once upon a time in a kingdom far, far away, there was a man who would someday become king. His name was Shah Jahan. As a young man he was a prince whose father sat upon the throne of the Mughal kingdom. As fairy tales often do, our story has a wicked stepmother, the chief wife of Shah Jahan’s father. She was a powerful woman and was determined to have Shah Jahan marry her daughter so that she would retain her power after her husband died and Shah Jahan began his rule. Shah Jahan, however, had a different wife in mind for himself. He had heard stories of the beauty of his stepmother’s niece, Mumtaz, and he was determined to meet her. His stepmother, knowing this, did everything in her power to keep them apart; however, Shah Jahan was a clever man and devised a plan to meet her. To accomplish this, he dressed himself up in a burqa and masqueraded as a woman and entered the ladies’ market where he knew Mumtaz would be. He searched for her and when he found her he removed his veil and revealed himself to her. This created a huge scandal at the time, but this did not deter the young couple. They arranged secret meetings, getting to know one another and falling more and more deeply in love. When Shah Jahan’s stepmother caught wind of this, she was furious. She could see her daughter’s chances of becoming queen slipping away, so in typical wicked stepmother fashion, she decided to solver this problem by having Shah Jahan sent to lead the army in the southern part of the country where a war was raging on in the hope that one of two things would happen: (1) he would be killed in action and the second son would inherit the throne and marry her daughter or (2) he would fail miserably, lose the war and return in disgrace, thus losing his right to the throne and being replaced by the second son who would marry her daughter. As evil plans go, it was a pretty good one. The war wasn’t going well and her odds for success seemed high. But as in all good fairy tales, the wicked stepmother can never prevail and love conquers all, and this tale does not disappoint. Shah Jahan returned from the war victorious. His father was so proud and pleased with his son that he allowed him to choose his own wife and made him co-ruler of the kingdom, effective immediately. Thus, Shah Jahan married the beautiful Mumtaz, the true love of his life and during the 18 years of their happy marriage, they had 14 children.
And now comes the tragic portion of our story. Unlike most fairy tales, ours does not end with “And they lived happily ever after.” While giving birth to their 14th child, Mumtaz began to die. When the doctors realized that they could not save her, they sent for her husband. He arrived at her bedside in time to share her final moments with her. She told him that she loved him and did not want him to be sad. He told her that he loved her and asked what he could do for her. She said, “Always remember me.” He promised her that he would and then she died. Shah Jahan was devastated by her loss. He had other wives, as rulers in those days did, but she was his favorite, his beloved. So great was his devastation at her loss, he didn’t emerge from his quarters for a month, and when he did finally emerge, all of his hair and beard had changed from black to white. Shah Jahan had spent that month of deep sorrow thinking about what he could do to honor the memory of his beloved, to never forget her. He remembered that he had promised to build her her own marble palace to live in but now he would never be able to fulfill that promise. Instead, he would build her a marble palace where she would reside forever in death. And thus the Taj Mahal was born. The word "Taj" is a term of endearment, like "honey" or "my love." "Mahal" means "palace." Hence, the name Taj Mahal literally means "the palace of my beloved."
It took 20,000 people working around the clock for 22 years to complete what has come to be known as the ultimate monument to love and the most beautiful building in the world. And it does not disappoint. The Taj Mahal is exquisitely beautiful, perfect in its symmetry, a perfect jewel of Mughal architecture and artistry. Words cannot express how beautiful it is and how much I loved it. I literally couldn’t get it out of my mind. When I closed my eyes last night, it was like a slide show of Taj Mahal elements. My obsession is real!!!! Every inch of the Taj is magnificently carved or inlaid with semi-precious stones using the pieta dura technique to create exquisitely intricate patterns of flowers and islamic script. Depending on the lighting conditions, the white marble of the Taj glows either white or gold. When we arrived, it was quite foggy/smoggy. Even through the haze, the Taj was sublimely lovely, glowing like a white pearl in the mist. Fortunately, the smog/fog did lift a little and the Taj did become clearer and clearer the closer we got to it. The lovely Taj is also larger than you think. She stands 27 stories tall. The copper finial on top of her dome is three stories tall all by itself. But enough yammering on from me. I’ll let the Taj Mahal do the talking from here.
No comments:
Post a Comment