| • Science | • People | • Locations | • Timeline |
| It has been requested that this article be peer reviewed for more extensive collaborative editing. Please read the specific request and comments on that page, [ ṣlocalurl: : |action=edit}} edit this article] in any way that you see fit to make it better, and remove this notice once the article has been improved. |
Agra Fort is located in Agra near Delhi, India. The fort is also known as Lal Qila, Fort Rouge and Red Fort of Agra. It is about 2.5 km northwest of its much more famous sister monument, the Taj Mahal. The fort can be more accurately described as a walled palatial city.
By most estimates, the fort was taken over from the Lodi s by the Moghuls in the late 16th century, by Akbar the Great. During his reign, he shifted the government of his empire from Delhi to Agra. Because of this, much of Agra flourished and the site of the old Lodis fort began changing into more of a royal estate. Akbar tended to build from red sandstone, often inlaid with white marble and intricate decorations.
It was only during the reign of Akbar's grandson, Shah Jahan, that the site finally took on its current state. The same Shah Jahan, that built the beautiful Taj Mahal for his wife. Unlike his grandfather, Shah Jahan tended have buildings made from white marble, often inlaid with gold or semi-precious gems. He destroyed some of the earlier buildings inside the fort in order to make his own.
At the end of his life, Shah Jahan was imprisoned by his son, Aurangzeb, in the fort. A punishment which might not seem so harsh, considering the luxury of the fort. It is rumored that Shah Jahan died in Muasamman Burj, a tower with a marble balcony with an excellent view of the Taj Mahal.
This was also a site of one of the battles during the Indian rebellion of 1857, which caused the end of the British East India Company's rule in India, and led to a century of direct rule of India by Britain.
The entire site is crescent shaped, with 21 meter high walls, surrounded by a moat, facing out towards the Yamuna River. And the perimeter of the site measures out to about 2.4 kilometers of towering red sandstone walls.
The walls have two gates, the Delhi Gate, and the Lahore Gate (sometimes called Amar Singh Gate). The Delhi Gate is considered the grandest of the gates and leads into an inner gate called the Hathi Pol (Elephant Gate). Due to the fact that the Indian military (the 7th Rajputana Rifles in particular) is still using the northern portion of the Agra Fort, the Delhi Gate cannot be used by the public. Tourists enter via the Lahore Gate. Lahore Gate is named so because it faces LahoreLahore is a major city in Pakistan that is the capital of the province of Punjab. It is located near the river Ravi and the Indian border. Lahore has 6. 5 million inhabitants and thus is the second largest city in Pakistan ( Karachi being the largest)., now in PakistanIslami Jamhuria Pakistan ( In Detail) ( In Detail) National motto: Iman, Ittehad, Nazm( Urdu: "Faith, Unity, Discipline" Official Language(s) Urdu, English Capital Islamabad Largest City Karachi President General Pervez Musharraf Prime Minister Shaukat Az.
The site is very important in terms of architectural history. Some of the most historically interesting mixing of HindiThis article is about the Hindu religion; for other meanings of the word, see Hindu (disambiguation). Aum, the most sacred syllable and quintessential symbol of Hinduism, represents the first manifestation of the unmanifest Brahman. Hinduism Santana Dharm and IslamicCairo Egypt Islm (In Arabic: , "submission (to God)"; In Persian and Urdu: ) is a monotheistic faith and the world's second-largest religion. Followers of Islam, known as Muslims believe that God (or, in Arabic, Allh revealed His Will to Muhammad (c. architecture reside there. In fact, some of the decorations are Islamic and yet feature dragons, elephants and birds, instead of the patterns and calligraphyCalligraphy (from Greek καλλι calli "beauty" + γραφος graphos "writing") is the art of decorative writing. A particular style of calligraphy is described as a hand''. Calligraphy at every p, very much unheard of.