Art & Culture Quiz: Indo-Islamic Architecture

The correct answer is A, Karnataka. The Gol Gumbaz stands at Bijapur, now called Vijayapura, in Karnataka. It is the tomb of Muhammad Adil Shah of the Adil Shahi dynasty of Bijapur and was completed in the middle of the seventeenth century. Its dome is one of the largest masonry domes in the world and rests on interlocking arches without any supporting pillars inside, leaving a single vast chamber. The gallery running around the base of the dome is famous as the whispering gallery, where a low sound is repeated several times.

Option B, Tamil Nadu, is the land of Dravida temple building, not of the Deccan sultanates. Option C, Kerala, has its own timber and tiled roof tradition. Option D, Telangana, does hold Qutb Shahi work such as the Charminar and the Golconda fort, but the Adil Shahi capital was Bijapur in Karnataka, so D is the trap option here.

The correct answer is D, Shah Jahan. The Jama Masjid of Delhi, whose formal name is Masjid-i-Jahan-Numa, was built by Shah Jahan between 1650 and 1656 as the congregational mosque of his new capital Shahjahanabad. It is built of red sandstone and white marble, stands on a high plinth reached by broad flights of steps, and has two tall minarets and three domes. It is among the largest mosques in India.

Option A, Akbar, built in red sandstone at Fatehpur Sikri and Agra, but the Delhi Jama Masjid belongs to his grandson. Option B, Humayun, built the short lived Dinpanah and is remembered instead through the garden tomb raised for him after his death. Option C, Babur, ruled only from 1526 to 1530 and left very little building in India. The Jama Masjid belongs firmly to the marble and sandstone age of Shah Jahan, who also raised the Taj Mahal and the Red Fort.

The correct answer is C, 73. The Qutub Minar in Mehrauli, Delhi, rises to about 72.5 metres, which is taken as 73 metres in answer keys. It is the tallest brick minaret of its kind, tapering from a base diameter of roughly 14.3 metres to about 2.7 metres at the top, and it is climbed inside by a spiral staircase of around 379 steps. Qutb-ud-din Aibak began it, Iltutmish added storeys, and Firoz Shah Tughlaq repaired the upper part after lightning damage, which is why the material changes from red sandstone below to marble and sandstone above.

Options A, B and D give 75, 77 and 71 metres. All three are near misses put there to test whether the figure has been memorised rather than guessed. Examiners like this monument because it also carries the Iron Pillar of Delhi in the same complex, along with the Quwwat-ul-Islam mosque and the Alai Darwaza.

The correct answer is D, 1575. The Buland Darwaza, the lofty gateway on the south side of the Jama Masjid at Fatehpur Sikri, was raised by Akbar in 1575 to mark his conquest of Gujarat. It is built of red sandstone with white and black marble inlay, stands about 54 metres above the ground and is reached by a long flight of steps, which makes it one of the tallest gateways in the world. An inscription on it carries the saying that the world is a bridge, to be passed over and not built upon.

Option A, 1502, falls before the Mughals reached India at all. Option B, 1526, is the year of the first battle of Panipat, when Babur defeated Ibrahim Lodi, so it belongs to the founding of the empire, not to Akbar. Option C, 1534, falls in the reign of Humayun. Only 1575 fits Akbar and the Gujarat campaign.

The correct answer is D, Jahangir. The Shalimar Bagh on the bank of the Dal lake in Srinagar was laid out by Jahangir in 1619 for his queen Nur Jahan. It is a Mughal garden in the charbagh plan, built in rising terraces fed by a central water channel, with pavilions and cascades, and it shows how far the Mughals carried the Persian idea of a garden as a picture of paradise. Jahangir loved Kashmir and the Nishat Bagh nearby belongs to the same period.

Option A, Azam Shah, was a son of Aurangzeb and is linked with the Bibi ka Maqbara at Aurangabad, not with Kashmir. Option B, Akbar, annexed Kashmir in 1586 and built the Hari Parbat fort wall there, but not this garden. Option C, Humayun, spent his reign in war and exile and left no garden of this kind. The Shalimar Bagh belongs to Jahangir.

The correct answer is B, Alauddin Khalji. The Alai Darwaza was added in 1311 as the southern gateway to the Quwwat-ul-Islam mosque in the Qutub complex at Delhi. It is the first surviving building in India in which the arch and the dome are true, that is, built of wedge shaped stones that carry the load sideways, instead of being corbelled by laying flat stones one over another. Its red sandstone walls are inlaid with white marble and carry lotus bud fringes on the arches.

Option A, Iltutmish, belongs to the earlier Slave dynasty and built his own tomb and the upper storeys of the Qutub Minar, still in the corbelled manner. Option C, Firoz Shah Tughlaq, came much later and is known for Firozabad, Hauz Khas and the repair of the Qutub Minar. Option D, Sikandar Lodi, is associated with the double dome and with Agra as a capital. Only Alauddin Khalji fits the date and the gateway.

The correct answer is B, Humayun tomb at Delhi. Built between 1565 and 1572 by his widow Hamida Banu Begum and designed by the Persian architect Mirak Mirza Ghiyas, it is the first tomb in India set in the middle of a charbagh, a square garden cut into four quarters by walkways and water channels. It also brought the high arched entrance, the double dome and the red sandstone with marble facing that the later Mughals repeated. It was the first Indian building of its kind to be placed on the UNESCO World Heritage list in 1993.

Option A, the tomb of Sher Shah Suri, is a magnificent octagonal tomb but it stands on a terrace in the middle of a lake, not a charbagh. Option C, the tomb of Akbar at Sikandra, is later and is indeed in a garden, but it follows Humayun tomb. Option D, the Bibi ka Maqbara, is from the reign of Aurangzeb and is a copy of the Taj.

The correct answer is C, Tomb of Itmad-ud-Daulah. Nur Jahan built it at Agra between 1622 and 1628 for her father Mirza Ghiyas Beg, who held the title Itmad-ud-Daulah. It is the first Mughal building covered wholly in white marble and the first in which pietra dura, the inlay of cut coloured stones into marble, is used on a large scale. Its small size and delicate finish have earned it the nickname the Baby Taj, because it marks the change from the red sandstone of Akbar to the marble of Shah Jahan.

Option A, the Taj Mahal, carries pietra dura to its highest point but comes later, from 1632. Option B, the Moti Masjid in Agra Fort, is also in marble but belongs to Shah Jahan. Option D, the Buland Darwaza, is of red sandstone with only marble inlay and was built by Akbar in 1575, before the marble phase began.

The correct answer is A, Ahmedabad. The Sidi Sayyid mosque in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, was built in 1573 in the last years of the Gujarat Sultanate. Its half circular windows carry jali screens cut from single slabs of stone, and the finest of them shows a palm and an intertwined creeper, known everywhere as the tree of life. The design has become a symbol of the city and of the Gujarat school of Indo-Islamic building, which is marked by fine stone carving borrowed from local temple craftsmen.

Option B, Jaunpur, is the seat of the Sharqi school, known for the Atala Masjid and its massive entrance screen. Option C, Mandu, is the capital of the Malwa school, known for the Jahaz Mahal and the marble tomb of Hoshang Shah. Option D, Bidar, is linked with the Bahmani sultans and the madrasa of Mahmud Gawan. Only Ahmedabad fits.

The correct answer is C, Tughlaq dynasty. Tughlaq building is the most austere phase of the Sultanate style. It uses local grey sandstone or rubble, keeps ornament to a minimum and gives its walls a pronounced batter, that is a slope inward as they rise, which makes even a tomb look like a fort. Tughlaqabad built by Ghiyas-ud-din Tughlaq, his tomb joined to the fort by a causeway, Firoz Shah Kotla and the Hauz Khas complex all show this manner.

Option A, the Slave dynasty, worked in red sandstone with rich carving taken from temple material, as at the Qutub complex. Option B, the Khalji dynasty, brought the true arch and the marble inlay of the Alai Darwaza, which is decorative rather than plain. Option D, the Lodi dynasty, is known for the double dome and for garden tombs on octagonal and square plans, with glazed tile work. The sloping wall belongs to the Tughlaqs.

The correct answer is A, Qutb-ud-din Aibak. He began the Quwwat-ul-Islam mosque at Delhi in 1192 after the second battle of Tarain, using the carved pillars and stones of temples that stood on the site, which is why its courtyard colonnade carries Indian bells, chains and foliage. Its arched screen was added in front of the prayer hall in the older corbelled manner, since the true arch had not yet arrived. Aibak also began the Qutub Minar beside it.

Option B, Balban, ruled later in the same Slave dynasty and is remembered for his tomb at Mehrauli, which shows an early experiment with the true arch. Option C, Muhammad bin Tughlaq, ruled in the fourteenth century and is known for Jahanpanah and the shifting of the capital to Daulatabad. Option D, Ibrahim Lodi, was the last Sultan of Delhi, defeated at Panipat in 1526. Only Aibak matches the date and the mosque.