Forts and Palaces of Rajasthan: Builders and Key Facts

Rajasthan has more forts than any other state in India, and an examiner treats the whole subject as one chapter with four questions inside it: who built the fort, which hill or river it stands on, which district it falls in, and which monument inside it is famous. The forts grew out of the politics of the region. Mewar, Marwar, Amber, Bikaner and Jaisalmer were separate kingdoms that fought the Delhi Sultanate, the Mughals and one another, and every ruling house answered that danger with a stronghold on the highest ground it could hold. The palaces came later, when the fighting had stopped and the same families began to build for comfort and display, on lake islands and in open city squares.

How the forts are classified

Indian writing on statecraft grades a fort by whatever defends it, and the forts of Rajasthan are taught through that grading. A giri durg stands on a hill, a van durg is screened by forest, a jal durg is ringed by water and a dhanv durg is protected by sand and distance. The classification is a favourite one-mark question because each type has one obvious example in the state.

• Giri durg, the hill fort: Chittorgarh, Kumbhalgarh, Mehrangarh and the Taragarh of Ajmer.
• Van durg, the forest fort: Ranthambore, closed in by the forest of the tiger reserve that surrounds it today.
• Jal durg, the water fort: Gagron, with the Ahu and the Kali Sindh on three sides of it.
• Dhanv durg, the desert fort: Jaisalmer, whose best defence was the Thar itself.

The six hill forts on the World Heritage List

In 2013 UNESCO inscribed a single serial property called the Hill Forts of Rajasthan, made up of six forts of the Rajput houses. They are Chittorgarh, Kumbhalgarh, Ranthambore, Amer, Jaisalmer and Gagron. A question that asks how many forts of Rajasthan carry the World Heritage label wants the answer six, and the question that asks which fort is not in the list almost always offers Mehrangarh or Junagarh as the trap, because both are famous and neither is part of the inscription.

Chittorgarh and its three jauhars

Chittorgarh is the largest fort in India by area and the one most often asked about. Three sieges ended in jauhar, the self-immolation of the women of the fort, and the three dates are a standing question. The first came in 1303, when Alauddin Khilji took the fort and tradition links the jauhar with Rani Padmini. The second came in 1535, when Bahadur Shah of Gujarat attacked and Rani Karnavati led the women. The third came in 1568, when Akbar besieged Chittor and the defence was carried by Jaimal of Badnor and Patta of Kelwa, whose statues Akbar is said to have placed at Agra. Inside the fort the Vijay Stambh, a tower of nine storeys, was raised by Rana Kumbha to mark his victory over Mahmud Khilji of Malwa, while the older and smaller Kirti Stambh, of seven storeys, is a Jain tower of fame dedicated to Adinath. Padmini Palace, the Meera temple and the Gaumukh reservoir complete the list of named spots.

Mehrangarh, Junagarh, Lohagarh and the Jaipur ring

Mehrangarh at Jodhpur was founded in 1459 by Rao Jodha on the hill the chronicles call Bhakurcheeria. Its Chamunda Mata temple, its cannons and its painted halls, Moti Mahal, Phool Mahal and Sheesh Mahal, are the examinable details, and the white marble cenotaph of Jaswant Singh II, Jaswant Thada, stands just below it. Junagarh at Bikaner was built in 1589 under Raja Rai Singh and is the rare great fort of the state that stands on level ground rather than a hill. Lohagarh at Bharatpur was raised in the eighteenth century by Maharaja Suraj Mal of the Jat house and is called the iron fort because its wide earthen ramparts smothered cannon shot instead of cracking; Jawahar Burj and Fateh Burj inside it were built to mark victories. Around Jaipur, Jaigarh holds the Jaivana, among the largest wheeled cannons ever cast, and Nahargarh, built by Sawai Jai Singh II in 1734, guards the city from the north.

The palaces

The palace tradition begins at Udaipur, where Udai Singh II founded the city in 1559 and began the City Palace that his successors extended into the long facade above Lake Pichola. In the lake itself, Jag Niwas, now known as the Lake Palace, was built by Maharana Jagat Singh II in the 1740s, with Jag Mandir on the neighbouring island. At Jaipur, the Hawa Mahal was built in 1799 by Sawai Pratap Singh to a design by Lal Chand Ustad, five storeys of latticed windows through which the women of the household could watch the processions in the street, and Jal Mahal stands in the water of Man Sagar lake. The last of the great palaces is Umaid Bhawan at Jodhpur, built between 1929 and 1943 in Chittar sandstone to a design by Henry Vaughan Lanchester, begun as famine relief work and still among the largest private residences in the world.