A01=Mrinalini Rajagopalan
architectural camouflage
Author_Mrinalini Rajagopalan
burial
Category=ABQ
Category=AGA
Category=JBSF1
Catholicism
courtesans
Delhi
diplomacy
eq_art-fashion-photography
eq_bestseller
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_new_release
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics
gift-giving
history of empire
history of patronage
hospitality
palanquins
patronage and power
Portrait
procession
purdah
The Sardhana Mansion
tombs
urban spectacle
women and money
women and power
women city planners
women patrons
Product details
- ISBN 9781526187116
- Weight: 800g
- Dimensions: 156 x 234mm
- Publication Date: 31 Mar 2026
- Publisher: Manchester University Press
- Publication City/Country: GB
- Product Form: Hardback
Secure
checkout
Fast Shipping
Easy returns
Begum Samru (c.1750–1836) was a remarkable north Indian ruler who used art and architecture to consolidate her social, political, and financial power in early modern India. Rising from the courtesan households of Mughal Delhi, she became commander of her own mercenary army and later the sovereign of Sardhana, an independent territory near Delhi. A trusted ally of both the Mughal emperor and the English East India Company, she corresponded with two popes and with King Louis Philippe of France, exchanging portraits, letters, and architectural plans. Art and architecture were central to shaping her identity—as a powerful yet non-threatening ruler, a Catholic patron, and head of a cosmopolitan court. Her story illuminates how women outside hereditary privilege forged paths to recognition, authority, and even global visibility in nineteenth-century India.
Mrinalini Rajagopalan is Associate Professor in the Department of History of Art and Architecture at the University of Pittsburgh
