Photo 1000/31(3179)

Genre: Architectural Photography

Close view of triple-arched window, with a stone lattice-work of calligraphic motifs in the fanlight above. India Museum no. 1421. Received from Captain Lyon, 7 February 1871. Duplicate print at Photo 1001 (3179) and variant at Photo 1001 (3179a).

530. - To form any idea of the beauty of this tomb, it will be necessary, to imagine each compartment with the whole of the carved letters both on the wall and window here shown, as well as on the ceiling above, to have been gilt while the ground work was a most brilliant azure, the grey stone forming an admirable frame around each compartment. The Lattice work is Arabic sentences cut out of stone slabs, the space between each letter admitting the light. Inside the window is the principal apartment of the tomb. It is a square of 40ft each way covered by a stone roof perfectly flat in the centre, and supported only by a cove projecting 10 ft from the walls on every side, but on what rests the dome is a mystery which has not yet been solved.

The plan of perforating stone to admit light, was used at Bailoor and Hallabeed in Mysore, as will be seen by referring to the Photographs of those places, as well as in Ahmedabad see Photo. No. 576 of this series, but in both these instances the carving has been simply ornamental, while here alone the much more elaborate task has not only been undertaken, but also accomplished of cutting away the solid stone slabs, and at the same time shaping the delicate tracery thus left, into the arabic letters necessary to form the different sentences of the Koran.