The Remains of a Haveli
Garden in Lahore
The Remains of a Haveli Garden in Lahore

Haveli Garden
Haveli Garden

The walled city has changed as dramatically as the suburbs of Lahore since Mughal times. When Akbar rebuilt the walls of the city in the sixteenth century, it is likely that he extended them to include areas less densely settled in the eastern part of the city (Lahore Development Authority, 1982; Dar, 1993; Quraeshi, 1988). And those areas may have had gardens. Subsequent development and redevelopment have obscured the open spaces and Mughal period gardens of the walled city and its immediate surroundings. We have little more than textual references to haveli gardens, which, it should be noted, represent a distinct residential garden type with interior courtyard wells, vines, and potted plants.

Delhi Gate Exterior Wall
Delhi Gate Exterior Wall

 

Following the processional approach, it is useful to begin at a spot just outside the city walls, near the Delhi gate, and to move in towards the center of the Mughal city. The suburbs immediately east of Delhi Gate had Mughal gardens built from the time of Mirza (Prince) Kamran in the early sixteenth century to that of Prince Dara Shikoh in the mid-seventeenth century. Kamran probably built his earliest gardens in the Naulakha area, just east of the walled city; the area was later extensively developed by Asaf Khan and expanded by Dara Shikoh, from whom a part of it acquired the name Mohalla Dara Shikoh (Parihar, 1984). Although it is well known that many structures were torn down for bricks, the remains of at least one Mughal hammam (bath) remain below ground in Mohalla Dara Shikoh.
Wazir Khan's Mosque
Wazir Khan's Mosque

Delhi gate was rebuilt by the British and restored again in the 1990s, as were the Mughal baths just inside the gate. As was common in Mughal town planning, baths figured prominently immediately within and outside the city walls. A narrow lane of shops line the bazaar from Delhi gate to the chowk (crossing) of Wazir Khan's mosque (built in 1634). Although no gardens are recorded along this particular path, some were recorded in nearby havelis. Haveli Mian Khan near Rang Mahal, for example, had extensive courtyards and fountains. It also allegedly had an underground tunnel connecting it to the fort.
Detail from the
Wazir Khan Mosque
Detail from the Wazir Khan Mosque

Wazir Khan's Mosque
Wazir Khan's Mosque

Proceeding above ground from Wazir Khan's mosque toward the fort, there are two old Mughal period havelis that had large garden courtyards in the Chuna Mandi area. These havelis have a long record of modification from Sikh times to the 1990s, the most recent restoration being completed in 1993. A new garden has been added in front of the main haveli, but no excavations have been made in either of the interior garden courtyards. There is some speculation that these havelis belonged to Asaf Khan, but no concrete evidence has been produced to date.

Mosque of Maryam Zamani
Mosque of Maryam Zamani

Detail from Mosque
of Maryam Zamani
Detail from Mosque of Maryam Zamani

Mosque of Maryam Zamani
Mosque of Maryam Zamani

Just beyond the Chuna Mandi haveli is the mosque of Maryam Zamani, also known as the Begum Shahi mosque. Maryam Zamani was the sister of Raja Bhagwan Das and the mother of the fourth Mughal ruler, Jahangir. Her mosque, completed in 1614, is the oldest surviving mosque of the Mughal period in Lahore. It is compared with paradise in an inscription on its northern gateway (Latif, 1892, 131). Like other Mughal mosques in Lahore, it has no garden courtyard, but it does have fine floral fresco decorations that remind one of the vegetal imagery associated with paradise and paradise gardens.

These days, shoe shops block one's view back up the hill toward the haveli gardens, and iron wheel shops block one's view in the opposite direction to the Masti (Masjidi) gate on the east side of Lahore Fort. A few trees remain in haveli and mosque courtyards, but the principal garden remnants now lie either outside the walled city or within Lahore Fort.