- Type
- Fortress
- Style
- Mughal architecture
- Commissioned by
- Akbar, Ismail Samani
- Heritage
- part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site (an old town or a valley, for example)
- Coordinates
- 31.5903°, 74.3097°
History
There were fortifications here as early as the Middle Ages, but the fort owes its present form to Emperor Akbar, who rebuilt it in brick in the second half of the 16th century and ruled his empire from here for more than a decade. Later rulers kept adding to it: under Jahangir and Shah Jahan came marble pavilions, audience halls and the Sheesh Mahal, and in 1674 Aurangzeb raised the monumental Alamgiri Gate facing the Badshahi Mosque. In the early 19th century the fort became the seat of the Sikh maharaja Ranjit Singh, and in 1849 it passed to the British. It was inscribed on the UNESCO list in 1981 together with the Shalimar Gardens.
What to see
You enter through the Alamgiri Gate, and within the walls survive the broad, shallow stairs that members of the imperial family climbed on elephant-back. The highlight is the Sheesh Mahal, a pavilion lined with thousands of mirrors and glass mosaics, with the curved-roofed marble Naulakha pavilion beside it. The outer walls carry the enormous Picture Wall, a glazed-tile mosaic of elephants, horsemen, animal fights and scenes of court life.
Wikipedia article Wikidata Q613720
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