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Jahangir Mahal
Undoubtedly,
the most noteworthy building inside Agra Fort is the Jahangir Mahal (Jahangir's
Palace), which was the principal zenana palace (palace for women belonging to
the royal household), used mainly by the Rajput wives of Akbar.
A splendid gateway leads to an interior courtyard surrounded by grand halls
covered with profuse carvings on stone, heavily fashioned brackets, piers, and
crossbeams.
One can still spot remnants of decoration in gold and blue done in the prevalent
Persian style. Jahangiri Mahal mixes Transoxanian (Central Asian) features,
such as the verandah on the east front with its high slender columns (a translation
into stone of the timber iwan of vernacular Transoxanian architecture), with
courtyard halls styled in the broader Gujarat-Malwa-Rajasthan tradition as it
had been passed onto the Mughals by the early 16th-century architecture of Raja
Man Singh of Gwalior.
This exotic medley and adventurous eclecticism suggests a daring approach in
architecture. The typically Gujarati brackets-fabulously carved animal and floral
motifs-register a dominating effect on the few Islamic features such as the
verandah on the eastern front with exquisitely slender pillars facing the riverfront.
Jahangiri Mahal is the most important building of the Akbari period in the Agra
Fort.
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