MUGHAL GARDENS: MEANING AND SYMBOLISM

Gourishwar Choudhuri

doi:10.29121/shodhkosh.v2.i2.2021.6132

Authors

Gourishwar Choudhuri Assistant Professor, Department of Islamic History and Culture.

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.29121/shodhkosh.v2.i2.2021.6132

Keywords:

Charbagh, Mughal Garden, Babur- Nama, Legitimisation, Paradise Garden

Abstract [English]

The Mughals were a ruling dynasty of Central Asian origin that ruled portions of the Indian subcontinent from 1526 to 1857. It was founded by Babur (1526–30), a prince descended from Timur and Genghis Khan. Babur defeated Ibrahim Lodi in the First battle of Panipat in 1526 and thereby laid the foundations of the dynasty. The dynasty ruled in its full glory till the end of Aurangzeb’s reign in 1707. Babur and his successors were well-known in history because of their great interest in arts and arc
hitecture. In his memoirs, the Babur-Nama, Babur expressed his lifelong interest in horticulture and his attraction as a young man with the gardens of the Timurid capitals in Samarkand and Herat. Babur himself laid out gardens and built palaces after his conquest of India. Babur thus began the tradition which was continued by his successors as several gardens or Bagh were built by the Mughals. The traditional view was that most of these gardens were constructed from an utilitarian view-point of producing fruits and flowers directly for use of emperors, prince and nobles in their in their own establishments. The present paper is an attempt to argue that Mughal gardens served as centers of social life, positions of territorial control and loci of legitimization.

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