Arrange the following monuments in a chronological order and select the correct answer from the codes given below :
I. Rabia Daurani's Tomb, Aurangabad
II. Shershah Suri's Tomb, Sasaram
III. Humayun's

Question

Arrange the following monuments in a chronological order and select the correct answer from the codes given below :
I. Rabia Daurani's Tomb, Aurangabad
II. Shershah Suri's Tomb, Sasaram
III. Humayun's Tomb, Delhi
IV. Atala Mosque, Jaunpur
Codes :

UnlockIAS · Accepted Answer

Correct — B, IV, II, III, I. Put the four buildings on a time-line and the sequence is fixed. IV. The Atala Mosque at Jaunpur is the oldest: construction began around 1376 on the site of the Atala Devi temple and it was completed in 1408 under the Sharqi Sultanate of Jaunpur (conventionally attributed to Ibrahim Shah Sharqi). II. Sher Shah Suri's Tomb at Sasaram in Bihar was raised during his short reign (1540-1545) and finished about the time of his death in 1545. III. Humayun's Tomb in Delhi was commissioned by his widow Bega Begum (Haji Begum), begun in 1565 and completed by 1572. I. Rabia Daurani's Tomb — the Bibi Ka Maqbara at Aurangabad — is the youngest: Prince Azam Shah commissioned it in 1660 for his mother Dilras Banu Begum, Aurangzeb's chief consort, who was buried under the posthumous title Rabia-ud-Daurani, and the building is dated to about 1668-69. So the order is 1408 → 1545 → 1572 → 1660s, i.e. IV, II, III, I.

Why the other options are wrong — (a) This puts Rabia Daurani's Tomb (1660s) first when it is in fact the last of the four, and pushes the Atala Mosque (1408) — the oldest — into third place. Both ends of the sequence are inverted.  (c) It begins with Sher Shah's tomb (1545), which is early but not earliest — the Atala Mosque of 1408 predates it by well over a century — and it ends with the Atala Mosque, the very oldest building on the list. It also places Rabia Daurani's Tomb (1660s) before Humayun's Tomb (1572).  (d) It starts with Humayun's Tomb (completed 1572) and then places the Atala Mosque (1408) and Sher Shah's tomb (1545) after it. Only the last position — Rabia Daurani's Tomb — is right; the first three are out of order.

Concept: The four monuments are milestones in the growth of Indo-Islamic architecture in northern India. The Atala Mosque belongs to the provincial Sharqi style of Jaunpur, whose signature is a colossal sloping propylon (a tapering gateway screen) that masks the central dome and replaces the minaret. Sher Shah Suri's Tomb is the high point of the Indo-Afghan octagonal tomb tradition — an octagonal chamber on a stepped plinth set in the middle of an artificial lake. Humayun's Tomb marks the arrival of the Persianate Mughal idiom: the first great garden-tomb (charbagh) in India, red sandstone with white marble inlay, a double dome, designed by Mirak Mirza Ghiyas. Bibi Ka Maqbara, built a century later, is a scaled-down echo of the Taj Mahal, which is why it is nicknamed the 'Dakkhani Taj'.

State PCS 2019 Q56 — Art & Culture PYQ with Answer

State PCS 2019 Q56 — Art & Culture PYQ with Answer