Jaisalmer

Jaisalmer (45 000 h. of which 2 000 in the walls) is a city of the the Rajasthan located at 100 km of the border of the Pakistan.

The town of Jaisalmer

History of the principality

The city is founded in 1156 by a rajâ Râjput of the clan of the Bhatti , named Deorâj and which takes on the occasion the name Rao Jaisal. The rajâ of Jaisalmer carry to its continuation the title of Râwal or Mahârâwal .

It owes its historical importance and its richness with its role of caravan stage on the road between India and the Perse, the Arabia and the Occident. The rise of the port of Bombay will carry a serious blow to its prosperity that the Partition of India, and the closing of the border, will finish completing.

Built on an eminence which overhangs the Désert of Thar and makes it possible to supervise it at a long distance, it is surrounded by a rampart of 5 km comprising 99 bastions and turns of angle.

At the 13th century, Jaisalmer is plundered by the sultan of Delhi Alâ ud-DIN to recover a caravan which the Bhatti had seized. It is however rebuilt at the next century.

In 1541, the city takes on the way the weapons against the emperor moghol Humâyûn for Ajmer. However the relationship between its leaders and Moghols were never bad, Akbar was even married with a princess of Jaisalmer.

Although located in the middle of Thar, the city knew a disastrous Mousson in 1993, destroying partially or completely some 250 historical buildings among which the oldest palate existing Râjput, the Rani-ka Mahal , or palate of Maharani. She also suffers from a tourist overexploitation.

Jaisalmer is called the gilded city. The princely state whose city was the capital was integrated into the India in 1949. The Conflicts indo-Pakistani of 1965 and 1971 revealed the strategic importance of the city and the the Rajasthan Canal which approaches it by north made there reverdir the desert.

Leaders: Mahârâwal

1530 - 1551: Lunkaran
1551 - 1562: Maldev
1562 - 1578: Harraj
1578 - 1624: Bhim Singh
1624 - 1634: Kalyan Das
1634 - 1648: Manohar Das
1648 - 1651: Ramchandra
1651 - 1661: Sabal Singh
1661 - 1707: Amar Singh
1707 : Jaswant Singh
1707 - 1721: Budh Singh
1721 - 1722: Tej Singh
1722 : Sawai Singh
1722 - 1762: Akhi Singh
1762 - 1820: Mulraj II
1820 - 1846: Guj Singh
1846 - Jun 1864: Ranjit Singh
1864 - 1891: Bairi Sal
1891 - 1914: Shyam Singh
1914 - 1947: Jawahir Singh

Inheritance

The city is famous for its Havelî , remarkable houses of Master, set up as from the 18th century by members of the Caste of the merchants Bâniyâ , decorated of a very fine work of the stone, speciality of the local craftsmen. Among those, one will note:

in the city:

the temples jaïns of the citadel,
Moti Mahal , Haveli Patwon and Haveli Nathmal , three Havelî in the low city.

in the surroundings:

Bara Bagh , the necropolis of the mahârâwal , a group of Cenotaph S or chhattrî ,
Amar Sagar , a temple jaïn restored,

Gallery

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