Tipu Sultan's Summer Palace

En un regard

Le château en bref

In the heart of old Bengaluru, in the Kalasipalya neighbourhood, Tipu Sultan's Summer Palace is one of the few princely residences of the Kingdom of Mysore still standing in the city. Begun under Haidar Ali and completed by Tipu Sultan around 1791, it served as the sovereign's summer retreat, which he is said to have called "Rash-e-Jannat", the envy of paradise. The rectangular, two-storeyed building is almost entirely made of teak and rests on a raised platform some five feet high. Its plain façades, without a dome or monumental decoration, are pierced by arches in the Indo-Islamic style and two projecting balconies from which the durbar audiences were held. Inside, a large hall and small rooms reserved for women retain wooden ceilings painted with floral motifs and niches decorated with geometric patterns. The ground floor houses a small museum recalling Tipu's reign, with a replica of his tiger throne and the famous automaton "Tipu's Tiger", the original of which is in London. The palace is surrounded by a well-kept garden and is visited as a monument protected by the Archaeological Survey of India.