BIJAPUR, or Bi Jaipur, in Southern India, the ancient capital of an independent sovereignty of the same name, and once an extensive, splendid, and opulent city, but now retaining only the vestiges of its former grandeur. It is situated in a fertile plain, in 16° 50' N. lat. and 75° 48' E. long., and is a place of great extent, consisting of three distinct portions—the citadel, the fort, and the remains of the city. The citadel, a mile in circuit, is a place of great strength, well built of the most massive materials, and encompassed by a ditch 100 yards wide, formerly supplied with water, but now nearly filled up with rubbish, so that its original depth cannot be discovered. It was built in 1489, by Yusaf Adil Shâh, the founder of the dynasty of Bijâpur. The fort consists of a rampart flanked by numerous towers, a ditch, and a covered way. Its defences, which are not less than six miles in circumference, were completed by Ali Adil Shâh. in 1566. The interior formerly contained the king’s palace, the houses of the nobility, large magazines, and extensive gardens. At present, though considerable portions of the area are covered with buildings or ruins, there is room for corn-fields and extensive enclosures. Outside the fort are remains of a vast city, now for the most part in ruins, but the innumerable tombs, mosques, caravanserais, and other edifices, which have resisted the havoc of time, afford abundant evidence of the ancient splendour of the place. It is asserted by the natives that Bijâpur contained, according to authentic records, 1600 mosques and nearly 1,000,000 houses. The number of houses is certainly overrated; that of the mosques, in the opinion of recent travellers, is no exaggeration. The outer wall of the city on the western side runs nearly ...south and north, and is of great extent. It is built of stone, is of prodigious thickness, and is about 20 feet in height, with a ditch and rampart; and at intervals of 100 yards are capacious towers, built of large hewn stones. The whole is now in a ruinous condition,—the wall and the towers having in many places fallen into the ditch, and in other parts being covered with rubbish. Several mosques and mausoleums, adorned with all the embellishments of Eastern architecture, are still to be seen in Bijâpur. The fort in the interior is adorned with many of these edifices, in rather better preservation than the outworks. Among these is the great mosque, which is 97 yards long by 55 broad. The wings, which are 15 yards broad, project 73 yards from the north and south ends, enclosing on three sides, with the body of the mosque, a large reservoir of water and a fountain. The mausoleum of Sultan Muhammad Shah is a plain building, 153 feet square, over which is reared a dome 117 feet in diameter at its greatest concavity, and called by the natives the grand cupola. The mosque and mausoleum of Ibrahim Adil Shâh, king of Bijâpur, which was probably completed about the year 1620, is said to have cost £1,700,000, and to have occupied thirty-six years in its construction. It is built on a basement 130 yards in length by 52 in breadth, and raised 15 feet. On this is a plain building, 115 feet by 76, covered by an immense dome raised on arches. The mausoleum is a room 57 feet square, enclosed by two verandahs, 13 feet in breadth and 22 feet in height. There are, besides, many other public buildings more or less injured by time and the violence of the Marhattâs. Almost all the buildings, the palaces of the fort excepted, are of massive stone, and in the most durable style; and at the same time the workmanship is minutely elegant. Among the curiosities of the capital is the celebrated monster gun, stated to be the largest piece of cast brass ordnance in the world. It was captured from the king of Ahmadnagar by the king of Bijâpur about the middle of the 17th century. An inscription on the gun recording that fact was erazed by Aurangzeb, who substituted the present inscription, stating that he conquered Bijâpur in 1685. The city is well watered, having, besides numerous wells, several rivulets running through it.
After the dissolution of the great Bâhmani dynasty of the Deccan in 1489, a race of independent sovereigns arose, who ruled over the new kingdom of Bijâpur, extending on the east from the confluence of the Bhimâ and the Krishnâ to the sea-coast, on the west from Goa to Bombay. Their rule endured through several generations, until at length, in 1650, Shâh Jahân compelled them to become tributary to the empire; and shortly after, their monarchy was totally subverted by his successor Aurangzeb. The city and territory of Bijâpur remained annexed to Dehli till 1724, when the Nizâm established his independence in the Deccan, and included Bijâpur within his dominions. His sway over this portion of his acquisitions, was, however, of brief duration; for, being defeated by the Peshwâ in 1760, lie was constrained to purchase peace by its cession to the Marhattâs. Upon the fall of the Peshwâ in 1818, Bijâpur passed into the hands of the British, and was by them included in the territory assigned to the Râjâ of Satârâ.
The place, as already intimated, is rich in monuments of the bygone period when Bijâpur was the capital of a powerful and flourishing Mahometan kingdom. Such traces of the past it is always desirable to preserve to the greatest possible extent, as they furnish the best commentary upon the history of the times in which they were raised, and, indeed, constitute their history, so far as manners are concerned. It is fortunate that their value was duly appreciated by the late Râjâ of Satârâ, who took great pains to preserve them; and that the British Government, participating in the same feeling, has, since the country passed into its possession, manifested great zeal in rescuing these magnificent relics from the ravages of time. Bijâpur is distant 130 miles S.E. of Satara, and 245 S.E. of Bombay.
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