Fatehpur Sikri
Fatehpur Sikri was the capital of Akbar, the third and greatest of the Moghul emperors from the second half of the 16th century. Akbar was unhappy because he did not have an heir and visited many holy men so that they would pray for a son. Sheikh Salim Chishti from the village of Sikri told the emperor that he would have three sons, and when the prophecy was fulfilled in 1570, Akbar was so impressed that he resolved to build an entirely new capital there in honour of the saint.
During the following 14 years a new city appeared on the hill where the sheikh lived - "Fatehpur" (town of victory) added to the name of the old village , "Sikri". Not long after the last finishing touches were made, the court left again, probably due to the failure of water supply. The city was abandoned by the early1600s, but its red sandstone buildings are perfectly preserved.
G.E. Kidder Smith , an American architectural writer and photographer, in an article in ‘Looking at Architecture’ describes Fatehpur Sikri as follows:
"The mere fact of Fatehpur's 'instant' completion is, of course, prodigious but more impressive to us today are the quality, scale, and diversity of its buildings and the spaces they define. For here is no routine grid of mindless squares, but a series of pulsating urban spaces defined by polite structures.
Yet Fatehpur is more successful as a series of vistas and specific spatial encounters than as an overall triumph of urbanism. Its parts are better than the whole: it lacks, for instance, an orienting spine.
"Fatehpur's fresh and innovative architecture, with its vast array of building types represents —like most Moghul building—a fusion of Indian and Islamic cultures. The underlying structure is generally of Hindu post-and-beams, in many cases roofed with Muslim vaults and domes. All is carried out here with cohesive and sympathetic scale." |
