ABSTRACT
From the fifteenth to the seventeenth century, Bijāpur was the capital of the independent Islamic state of Bijāpur, one of the five states in the Deccan, the western Islamic provinces of India. Eventually, Bijāpur came to rule over a large area of central India spanning both coasts, and is said to have con tained nearly 1 million inhabitants and some 1,600 mosques. Throughout the city's long reign as a capital city, its sultans built an array of mosques, gardens, palaces, battlements, and mausoleums. Accordingly, it is well known today for its impressive range of late medieval Islamic architecture, in cluding more than fifty mosques, twenty tombs, and twenty palaces.
