Muhyi-ud-Din AURANGZEB ALAMGIR (r.1658-1707)
	Prince Dara Shikoh, Aurangzeb's oldest brother, was temperamentally better suited to translating the Upanishads into Persian than to ruling the empire; after his execution, he was buried in Humayun's tomb
	Prince Shah Shuja, governor of Bengal, had a lovely palace on the Ganges in *Rajmahal*-- before he tangled with Aurangzeb
	The luckless Prince Murad Bakhsh sought to claim the throne in 1657; hopelessly outmaneuvered, he was executed in 1658; his name lives on in *Moradabad*
*AGRA FORT*	Shah Jahan himself lived till 1666, kept in luxurious captivity within the Agra Fort; his presence was a source of continuing embarrassment to his allegedly devoted son
	When push came to shove, Aurangzeb was more than a match for his brothers, and for the East India Company as well-- though not for *the Marathas*, even after Shivaji himself died in 1680
	Some portraits of Aurangzeb; despite his anti-artistic bias, he also created the new *Moti Masjid* inside the Red Fort, and added the Badshahi Masjid to the *Lahore Fort*
	Aurangzeb with Shaistah Khan and other nobles, in a scene painted perhaps by Bichitra
	Aurangzeb minted some truly lovely coins
	Raja Karan Singh of Bikaner, who during his long reign was Aurangzeb's enemy, then ally, then enemy; and an image of a "courtier in the Deccan"
	The often-rebellious Azam Shah, Aurangzeb's third son, did not outlive him
	In 1681 Aurangzeb set off to pacify the Deccan once and for all; as his headquarters there he built up the city of AURANGABAD, near the old headquarters fort of *Daulatabad*
	In Aurangabad, the "Bibi ka Maqbara" entombs his wife Rabia Daurani (it was built by his son Prince Azam Shah)
	Aurangzeb was buried in a (relatively) simple tomb in Khuldabad, near Aurangabad; even in death, he never came back from the Deccan
	Contemporary European depictions of the *Mughals*and their realm were not always very helpful
	And here's a contemporary Deccani depiction of a young European
	From the 1700's, we have depictions by *PREVOST* of some of the important figures in Aurangzeb's life
	Aurangzeb became the hero of *a tragedy by Dryden*, and father of the imaginary princess *Lalla Rookh*; modern "Mughal" images of him are still being painted

 

== INDIAN ROUTES index == sitemap == Glossary == FWP's main page ==