The three main forts of Jaipur from its glorious past
Jaipur city, the capital of Indian state Rajasthan. The three main forts of Jaipur from its glorious past by Kurt993.
Amber Fort
Away from the hustle of the main Jaipur city is situated a beautiful late fifteenth century built fort, the Amber Fort. Adopting its name from the Amba Mata, Amber Fort is one of the most astonish attractions of the pink city. It is also referred as Amer Fort.
Amber Fort is a fortified palace harbor to countless courtyards, gardens, audience halls, temples and personal apartments. The fort offers numerous rich and beautiful views and displays splendid architecture to must admire.
Amber Fort unquestionably stands amongst the paramount forts of India. It is a must to see and to include in one’s Jaipur Itinerary.
The fort neighbors a famous lake known as maota lake. It fetches a magnificent, perplexing view to its watchers, reflecting the startling image of Amber fort on its waters. A huge fort rests just behind the lake, its reflection doesn’t remain untouched by the lake either.
Out of all the Rajput palaces and forts built-in Rajasthan, the Amber Palace is said to be the most romantic one.
One reason to notice is its peaking Indo-Islamic architecture. The fort carries many gates, but most striking gateway is the two-storey Ganesh Pol, decorated with the intricate colorful paintings. The Ganesh Pol also makes entrance way to the main palace.
The two-storey Ganesh Pol
The Amber Fort has many palaces within the Fort, but the most glorious one is the Sheesh Mahal. The Sheesh Mahal is also known as the Palace of the Mirrors. Even a single ray of light that enters the Sheesh Mahal enlightens the entire hall filling it with light. The bright light striking its surfaces revives the lost days of the Amber Fort as it re-breathes into life of thousand glimmers of reflection.
Inside the Amber Fort has a marble carved flower known as “the magic flower” by the foot of most of the pillars of the Sheesh Mahal. If you look carefully at the marble carved flower, you will see it has some unique designs of a fishtail, lotus, hooded cobra, an elephant trunk, a lion’s tail, a cob of corn and a scorpion.
One of the grand attraction at the Amber Fort is the elephant ride available right at the foot of this fort. You can hire an elephant that will be directed by a man. These men are called mahavats. The elephant ride will take you directly to the main courtyard of the fort. This courtyard is known as the Naubatkhane.
The Amber Fort gleams like a jewel at night. The various lights casted on the magnificent fort make sight worth enjoying, especially if you are accompanied by your partner. Visiting Amer Fort in the evening when the sun goes down and under the moonlight to feel the romance in the air.
Jaigarh Fort
Overlooking the Amber Fort, built by H.H. Jai Singh II in the mid-1720s on the Cheel ka Teela also known as Hill of Eagles of the Aravalli range as if it is guarding the Amber Fort inside its unending walls, is Jaigarh Fort. Connecting itself by many secret underground passages leading to the Amber Fort.
One can approach from Amber Fort to the Jaigarh Fort through one such underground passage.
The Jaigarh Fort has massive walls made up of red sandstone. These walls cover an area range up to 3 kilometers by 1 kilometer.
The fort contains several beautiful palaces named as the Lalit Mandir, Laxmi Vilas, Aram Mandir and the Vilas Mandir. These palaces have courtrooms and halls with screened windows. You will enter the main courtyard through the main gate, known as the Dungar Darwaza. There is this square garden within the courtyard of the Aram Mandir on the northern side of the Jaigarh Fort is highly viewed. Here you’d also see a triple-arched entrance gate known as “The Awani Darwaza”.
One can get a magnificent view of this artificial lake known as Sagar Lake located just near the triple-arched gate. The Sagar lake is situated on the backside of this fort. During the time of maharaja’s, they used to fetch the water from this lake to the fort in pouches loaded over the elephant’s back, but the most attractive thing at the Jaigarh Fort is Jaivana cannon. Jaivana cannon is the world’s biggest cannon on the wheel during the time of its manufactured days. The locals say the cannon was only fired once with ammunition of around 100 kg for its testing and the cannonball covered 22 miles. The locals also say that four elephants were used to revolve the cannon around its axis.
The Jaigarh Fort has its own cannon foundry. The Jaivana cannon was also manufactured in this foundry only.
Nahargarh Fort
When I think of Rajasthan, its grand forts and majestic palaces start to soar into my mind. Nahargarh Fort is one such majestic and grand fort. Built by H.H. Maharaja Sawai Jai Singh II in mid-1730s. He was also the founder of the Jaipur city. This fort never came under any attacks in its history.
Demonstrating a mix of Indian and European architecture build at the edge of the Aravalli Hills and overlooking the beautiful pink city Jaipur, is the Nahargarh Fort. In earlier days the Nahargarh Fort was known as Sudarshangarh but with time and ruling, the abodes of tigers living on hills around the fort renamed it as Nahargarh.
You must consider to visit the Nahargarh Fort if you ever get a chance to travel Jaipur.
One can also get an astonishing view of the Jaipur City from the top of the Nahargarh Fort. It’s bliss to watch the sunrise from there. One must consider Nahargarh Fort as the best place to enjoy the sunset across the beautiful Jaipur City.
The Nahargarh Fort also contains a beautiful step well (baoli) which is on the right side when you enter the fort. On giving a careful look you’d notice that the architectural design of the step well stairs is quite different from a usual step well. This allows the rainwater to pass through the channels and directly collect into the step well. Which allow the rainwater to not to get collected in the higher areas of the hill.
You will also notice two beautiful cannons placed on both sides of the entrance of Madhavendra Bhawan palace. This palace was built by Maharaja Sawai Madho Singh. This is a two-storied palace, which has nine similar dormitories named as Suraj Prakash, Chand Prakash, Khushal Prakash, Anand Prakash, Jawahar Prakash, Laxmi Prakash, Ratna Prakash, Lalit Prakash and Basant Prakash.
The walls of the Madhavendra Bhawan palace are beautifully painted with some delicate frescoes. It is a visual treat to watch the splendid palace stand in its glory.
When it comes to eatery joints within the fort boundaries, a food court is available for the travelers. The food of this food court is a must to try. If one is willing to try some Rajasthani cuisine, some of my suggestions would be, kadi kachori and daal baati from this food court’s menu.
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