The architecture of a Deccan sultanate: courtly practice and royal authority in late medieval India

The Deccan sultans left a grand architectural and artistic legacy.

They commissioned palaces, mosques, gardens and tombs as well as decorative paintings and coins.

Of these sultanates, the Nizam Shahs (r. 1490-1636) were particularly significant, being one of the first to emerge from the crumbling edifice of the Bahmani Empire (c. 1347-1527). Yet their rich material record remains largely unstudied in the scholarly literature, obscuring their cultural and historical importance.

This book provides an analysis of the architecture of the Nizam Shahs.

Pushkar Sohoni examines the critical relationship between architectural production, courtly practice and royal authority in a period when the aspirations and politics of the kingdom were articulated through architectural expression.