The city of Bijapur in north Karnataka is famous for its
historical monuments of Islamic architecture dating back to the Adil Shahi dynasty that ruled the Deccan
region of southern India during 1490 to 1686.
The most famous of these monuments is the world renowned Gol Gumbaz, comparable in grandeur and
size to a handful of such ancient edifices in the country. But for these monuments, most of which are
well looked after by the Archeological Survey of India, Bijapur is a dusty and
rusty old city with little else distinctive about it.
As mentioned in two of my recent blog posts, I had paid a
breezy visit to Bijapur in November last year as part of a family of seven
spanning three generations. We had
arrived at Bijapur on a bright sunny morning after a long overnight journey by
bus from Bangalore, spent some time in a local hotel, and set out on the
visit. We had hired a taxi for our various
visits that also included Badami, Pattadkal, and Aihole the next day as
narrated in my earlier blog posts.
I had first visited Bijapur about twenty years ago, but this
was before the days of digital photography and had nothing to show from the
visit. This time I have been able to put
together a short pictorial documentary, focusing on just a few of the sights of
this ancient city.
Gol Gumbaz
The following is typically the first view of the gigantic
monument as one enters the well- maintained quadrangle of the sprawling Gol
Gumbaz complex:
[As in my previous albums, all pictures are in high resolution and
can be blown up to their full size by clicking on a picture and opening it in a
separate window]
This is a rather deceptive view since the building in the
foreground, now housing a museum, appears to be an integral part of the
monument when in fact the domed structure is located well behind it as
subsequent pictures will show.
The next picture captures the building in the foreground from
some distance on the right side, with part of the domed structure barely
visible.
A close-up shot of the same building from the left side shows
it in its full glory, accentuated by the huge cannons on either side of the
entrance.
As one walks past this building further up on the left, a
fuller view of the Gol Gumbuz unfolds as in the next picture, highlighting one
of the four seven-storey octagonal corner towers:
The next picture is a frontal view of the whole of Gol Gumbaz
as visible from behind a second building that lies between the museum building and
Gol Gumbaz. This second building is seen
in an aerial view appearing later. Apart
from indicating how massive it really is (as can be made out from the rather
puny looking visitors in the foreground), it also shows how far behind it
really is from the unseen museum building in the foreground.
Completed in 1656, the Gol Gumbaz is a massive mausoleum
built in memory of Mohammed Adil Shah, Sultan of Bijapur. This cubical structure is about 48 meters on
each side and capped by a huge dome of 44 meters diameter. At each of the four
corners of the cube is a dome-capped octagonal tower seven stories high, as
seen in the previous picture, with a narrow roughhewn stone staircase inside. The dome is comparable in size to such
buildings as St Paul’s Cathedral in London and St Peter’s Basilica in Rome,
though architecturally and otherwise very different. Incidentally, I have been inside both.
The following picture gives a view of the interior of the
building showing the pleasing intersecting arches that give a distinctive look
to it, though it is devoid of the intricate carvings and inlay work
characteristic of similar buildings of Islamic architecture. The enclosed structure, seen at the centre of
the hall and dwarfed by the arches, surrounds the tomb of Adil Shah.
The Whispering Gallery
Running around the inside of the huge dome is the highly
popular and over abused ‘whispering gallery’, so called because even the
softest sound note generated at any point can be heard at other nodal points along
the interior wall very clearly. This is
because of the large circumference of the gallery with its smooth circular
interior that makes possible sound waves clinging to the surface and decreasing
in intensity with distance at a slower rate than they normally do because of
special acoustic conditions prevailing in the chamber. The somewhat complicated physics of this
phenomenon was first unraveled out by the great British physicist Lord Rayleigh
in reference to a similar phenomenon noticed in London’s famous St Paul’s
Cathedral.
Visitors to the whispering gallery in Gol Gumbaz almost
always shout rather than whisper, thus missing out on the wonderful effects
heard with soft sounds. They end up
hearing loud multiple echoes of their voices, often raucous, always eerie, something
that amounts to a desecration of the wonderful place.
When we visited the gallery, a thoughtful and helpful guard
took charge of the situation briefly and showed us the expected audio effects
without interference from other sounds.
Here is a picture of a small portion of the large gallery showing my
daughter and grandson listening to the whispers in enthralled admiration. Mercifully there was no shouting match.
Reaching the whispering gallery at the top (clearly visible
in the last picture) in Gol Gumbaz involves climbing up the very narrow
roughhewn and very irregular stone steps of a spiraling staircase built into
the octagonal corner towers. This can be
strenuous, particularly for the elderly, and I am glad to say I made it to the
top without too much effort, but with some assistance from the younger members
of the family. In between the floors I
rested a bit, looked around, and absorbed the scene both outside and along the
edges of the gigantic building, with camera in hand all the time.
Some sidelights
The view from the top can be spectacular as the next picture
shows. It captures the museum building
as well as the other building one has to pass through before reaching the
monument. The lawns and the greenery add
to the overall effect.
The next picture shows a view of the intricate sculptured
protrusions from one of the sides of Gol Gumbaz at one of the upper floors of
the octagonal tower. Similar sights,
though perhaps slightly less spectacular, greet the visitor at each floor.
My last picture of Gol Gumbaz presented in this album is
unusual by any standards. While climbing
up the stairs, I noticed an overhanging live beehive at some distance and
instinctively zoomed in on it and took a picture. The bees appeared to be so active and I was
so fascinated by what I saw that I tried a super zoom (hand-held) shot of the
bees and obtained several good pictures.
Here is a composite of the two pictures, the first showing the hive at a
distance and the second an ultra-close up of the busy bees in action. These are among the most treasured pictures
in my collection over the years. I also
captured a short HD video clip of the bees at work.
Before leaving the Gol Gumbaz complex we spent a little while
inside the impressive museum building, but my enthusiasm for the exhibits had
been deflated by the sight of the ubiquitous ‘No Photography’ or some such
stupid exhortation adorning most museums in the country, something that the
otherwise efficient Archaeological Survey of India is hard put to justify
considering that they ought to be promoting
tourism among other things.
Bara Kaman
Located in the heart of the city, Bara Kaman is like an unfinished, indeed barely begun, symphony. Apparently, Ali Adil Shah wanted
to build a mausoleum of unmatched architectural quality. Twelve great arches were planned to be placed
vertically as well as horizontally surrounding his future tomb. However, for reasons unknown, the work on the
structure was left grossly incomplete. One outlandishly incredible myth is that the
construction of the mausoleum was stopped because once completed its shadow
would touch the Gol Gombaz!
Though the site itself is well maintained, the entrance to it
through a busy side street is an absolute insult to such a heritage site (see
picture below). On one side of the
prominently displayed name board is an ice-cream parlor and on the other side a
poster (in Kannada) advertising non-surgical solutions for some nagging
physical ailments! Such ads are
generally found in public urinals and I had the feeling the entrance was not
very different from one.
Stepping inside, we were indeed greeted by a very impressive
sight as the next picture shows.
Incidentally, all humans seen in the picture belonged to my entourage;
only I was missing for obvious reasons.
The next picture of Bara Kaman shot from the elevated floor
level shows the raw and rugged beauty of the intended structure, without any
disturbing human presence.
Malik-e-Maidan
Located on the western
ramparts of the very extensive Bijapur Fort between two bastions is the Malik-e-Maidan, roughly translated as
the Master of the Battlefield, known to be one of the largest cannons in the
world. Being 4 m long, 1.5 m in diameter
and weighing 55 tons, this was transported from Ahmednagar in the 17th century as a war trophy
employing a huge convoy of oxen, elephants, and men. The next picture shows it amidst its
surroundings in its present location in Bijapur.
Here is a close-up view of the famed cannon on a platform
specially built for it. The
cannon's nozzle is fashioned into the shape of a lion's head with open jaws and
between the carved fangs is depicted an elephant being crushed to death.
When I saw this behemoth, I was reminded of the one in the Jaigharh Fort near Jaipur in
Rajasthan. It is displayed fully mounted
on its carriage within a covered enclosure [See my earlier blog post: 14) Jaipur the Pink City - Personal Photo Album Part 3 (Oct
10)]
Ibrahim Rouza
The Ibrahim-Rauza is a pair of beautifully symmetric
buildings with large central domes and tall narrow minarets facing each other,
built by Ibrahim Adil Shah II (1580-1627).
As one enters the complex through a long pathway in a large courtyard
with excellently maintained lawns, the building seen on the left is his tomb
and the one on the right is a mosque. The
two monuments are separated by a water tank containing a fountain, all on a
raised common platform. The complex is
captured in the next picture from just inside the main entrance. In sharp contrast to the green courtyard, the
buildings present a picture of decay and discoloration, even desolation, mainly
through ravages of harsh weather over a period of several centuries.
When we entered through the main gate without realizing we
had to buy entry tickets, we were harshly pulled up by the tickets clerk who
then went on to perform his job as if he was doing us a special favor.
The next picture is a close-up of the tomb with the empty
water tank in the foreground. Without
the rusty exterior, it would have been a great sight indeed.
The façade of intricately and superbly sculpted arches
embellishing the entrance to the mosque is captured in the following picture:
The arches and pillars inside the mosque present a pleasing
picture as seen in the next photograph despite the discoloration and decay.
I sign off with a very curious and interesting zoomed-in picture of an overhanging
‘key-chain’ of huge intersecting rings supporting what looks like the tip of a
gigantic ‘key’ near one of the upper sections of the mosque protruding outward.
I have no idea of what this signifies.
Epilogue
Because of paucity of time we had planned on seeing only four
of the numerous monuments dotting the city and regrettably missed out on some
that deserved as much attention as the ones filling these pages of my
album. After a quick lunch we hit the
road to the Alamatti Dam site near Bagalkot and other places. The dam site presented some unexpectedly
beautiful sights which I intend to feature in a future blog post.
