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Updated: June 25, 2025
The family ties of Itmâd-ud-daulah and his daughter, the Empress, were closely connected with Persia and Central Asia; and no doubt the fashion set by Jahangir's court led to the Saracenic element becoming predominant in the Mogul style, both in construction and in decoration.
Elephants were so commonly placed in front of Indian palaces and fortresses that, except for this story, there would be no need to suppose any connection between those at Agra and those at Delhi. Purchas, quoting William Finch who visited Agra in Jahangir's time, describes the elephants at the Hathi Pol, but gives a different origin to the statues.
One of Jahangir's wives, a Hindu princess of Jodhpur, hence known as Jodh Bai, lived in this part of the palace, and the room on the west side of the quadrangle, surrounded by a number of oblong niches, is said to have been her temple, in which the images of Hanuman and other Hindu deities were kept.
On the rising ground behind the courtyard of the Dîwan-i-âm there formerly existed a palace called the Salîmgarh. Before Jahangir's accession he was known as Prince Salîm, and tradition associates this palace with him. Fergusson, however, states that in his time an exquisite fragment of a palace built by Shere Shah, or his son Salîm, existed here.
She even succeeded to some extent in controlling Jahangir's drunken habits. She was a great patroness of the arts, and it is said that the Samman Burj, her apartments in the Agra palace, was decorated after her own designs. Her charity was boundless; she was the especial protectress of orphan girls, and provided marriage portions for no less than 500 from her private purse.
Edward Terry, who accompanied Sir Thomas Roe, James the First's ambassador at Jahangir's Court, describes "the long walk of four hundred miles, shaded by great trees on both sides," and adds, "this is looked upon by the travellers who have found the comfort of that cool shade as one of the rarest and most beneficial works in the whole world." II. Humayun.
In any case, it is easy to see how a confusion might have arisen between Jahangir's mother and his wife, both Hindus and Rajputs.
She herself retired to Lahore, and, though she lived till 1648, ceased to take any part in state affairs after his death. She was buried by her husband's side at Shahdara. Jahangir's connection with Agra. Jahangir for a great part of his reign held his court at Lahore, or at Kabul.
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