Day 14: The multicultural Taj 1/6/14

Day 15 and Cultures Homework

Thursday

                I am standing outside Indian’s most famous building. The Taj Mahal is piece of artheture to be reckoned with. The marble building was made in the 1630s by a man who really just wanted to do something nice for his favorite deceased wife, Mahal. Mahal and Shah Janal had fourteen children together in a span of only __ months. Although Shah had several wives, none of them bore him any children. For this reason, Mahal was Shah’s favorite wife.

                But then, Mahal died in labor bearing one of Shah’s kids (it was bound to happen sometimeJ). Shah was devastated. So he wanted to build the best tomb that one could ever build. Hence the Taj Mahal (or tomb Mahal).

                If you ask, many people will tell you that the Taj is the quintessential Indian building. It portrays only Indian architecture and if you want to know what Indian architecture looks like, Google the Taj Mahal.

                However, in my eyes, what I see isn’t something that is purely one culture. I see a little bit of Egyptian, European, African; a whole medley of cultures.

Egyptian:

                First of all, the Pyramids are tombs that took a tone of time to build. The reason for the Pyramids were to protect the pharos in the afterlife and also to show how powerful the pharaoh was. The reason for the Taj Mahal was to protect a wife queen and to show how important the queen is.

                The exterior was made a majority by one rock (stone in the case of the pyramids and marble in the case of the Taj). This stone had to be imported from miles and miles away on small carts. This back breaking work was the job of the peasants.

                Both the Taj and the Pyramid are symmetrical.

European:

                Many European architecture is extremely ornate even to the point of being over the top. The inside of the Taj make you realize that all this money and all this work really went to one person’s tomb. The gold. The opulence goes to those that have it and those that have it are able to assert their power on anyone to get what they want.

African:

                All around the Taj, the decoration consist of African rocks that are laid into the stone. A majority of the gems are imported from Africa, giving the Taj a very exotic feel.

More on the Taj Mahal

Are these similarities nothing but coincidence? I have no idea. But if I had to guess, I would say that what you thought was original Indian architecture is a combination of styles that have been used by many different religions/beliefs and that Shah was more multicultural then you thought.
The Taj Mahal Google+ page!