ABSTRACT
Saadat Ali Khan died in 1814; he proved to be the last of the Oudh nabobs with any great ability for governing. He had given up some of his autonomy to the British East India Company, ceding territories to the British in exchange for promises of military aid, thus making Oudh essentially a British protectorate. He was a reasonably capable administra tor, however, in contrast to his successors, who were lazy and self-indulgent. Despite these shortcomings, the nabobs con tinued to erect many lavish buildings in Lucknow, among them the Chattar Manzil (Umbrella Palaces), royal pavilions built in the 1820s; the Moti Mahal (Pearl Palace), originally built by Saadat Ali Khan but expanded by his son Ghāzī-'udDīn Haidar; Ghāzī's tomb, the Shāh Najaf Imambara, noted for its extensive interior ornamentation; the Hussainabad Imambara, built in 1837 by Nabob Muhammad Alī Shāh as a mausoleum for himself and his family (like the Bara Im ambara, it also was a famine relief project); and the Kaisarbargh Palace, built between 1848 and 1850 for Nabob Wajid Alī Shāh.
