Taj Mahal

The Taj Mahal (/ˌtɑːdʒ məˈhɑːl/, more often /ˈtɑːʒ/;[2] from Persian and Arabic, "crown of palaces", pronounced [ˈt&aːdʒ mɛˈɦɛl]) is a white marble mausoleum  located on the southern bank of the Yamuna River in the Indian city of Agra. It was commissioned in 1632 by the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan  (reigned 1628–1658) to house the tomb of his favorite wife of three, Mumtaz Mahal.

Construction of the mausoleum was essentially completed in 1643 but work continued on other phases of the project for an additional ten years. The Taj Mahal complex is believed to have been completed in its entirety in 1653 at a cost estimated at the time to be around 32 million Indian rupees, which in 2015 would be valued at around 52.8 billion Indian rupees ($827 million US). The construction project employed around 20,000 artisans under the guidance of a board of architects led by Ustad Ahmad Lahauri . The domed marble tomb is part of an integrated complex consisting of gardens and two red-sandstone buildings surrounded by a crenellated wall on three sides.

The Taj Mahal is regarded by many as the best example of Mughal architecture  and is widely recognized as "the jewel of Muslim art in India". It is one of the world’s most celebrated structures and a symbol of India’s rich history. Designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1983, the Taj Mahal attracts some 3 million visitors a year.

InspirationIn 1631, Shah Jahan, emperor during the Mughal empire 's period of greatest prosperity, was grief-stricken when his favorite of three wives and beloved companion, Mumtaz Mahal, a Persian princess, died during the birth of their 14th child, Gauhara Begum .[3] Construction of the Taj Mahal began in 1632.[4] The court chronicles of Shah Jahan's grief illustrate the love story traditionally held as an inspiration for Taj Mahal.[5][6] The principal mausoleum was completed in 1643[4] and the surrounding buildings and garden were finished about five years later.

Architecture and designMain article: Origins and architecture of the Taj Mahal

The Taj Mahal incorporates and expands on design traditions of Persian and earlier Mughal architecture. Specific inspiration came from successful Timurid and Mughal buildings including; the Gur -e Amir  (the tomb of Timur, progenitor of the Mughal dynasty, in Samarkand),[7] Humayun's Tomb, Itmad-Ud-Daulah's Tomb  (sometimes called the Baby Taj), and Shah Jahan's own Jama Masjid in Delhi. While earlier Mughal buildings were primarily constructed of redsandstone, Shah

Great Wall of China

The Great Wall of China is a series of fortifications made of stone, brick, tamped earth, wood, and other materials, generally built along an east-to-west line across the historical northern borders of China to protect the Chinese states and empires against the raids and invasions of the various nomadic groups of the Eurasian Steppe. Several walls were being built as early as the 7th century BCE;[3] these, later joined together and made bigger and stronger, are now collectively referred to as the Great Wall.[4] Especially famous is the wall built 220–206 BCE by Qin Shi Huang, the first Emperor of China. Little of that wall remains. Since then, the Great Wall has on and off been rebuilt, maintained, and enhanced; the majority of the existing wall is from the Ming Dynasty.

Other purposes of the Great Wall have included border controls, allowing the imposition of duties on goods transported along the Silk Road, regulation or encouragement of trade and the control of immigration and emigration. Furthermore, the defensive characteristics of the Great Wall were enhanced by the construction of watch towers, troop barracks, garrison stations, signaling capabilities through the means of smoke or fire, and the fact that the path of the Great Wall also served as a transportation corridor.

The Great Wall stretches from Dandong in the east, to Lop Lake in the west, along an arc that roughly delineates the southern edge of Inner Mongolia. A comprehensive archaeological survey, using advanced technologies, has concluded that the Ming walls measure 8,850 km (5,500 mi).[5] This is made up of 6,259 km (3,889 mi) sections of actual wall, 359 km (223 mi) of trenches and 2,232 km (1,387 mi) of natural defensive barriers such as hills and rivers.[5] Another archaeological survey found that the entire wall with all of its branches measure out to be 21,196 km (13,171 mi).[6]

NamesThe collection of fortifications now known as "The Great Wall of China" has historically had a number of different names in both Chinese and English.

In Chinese histories, the term "Long Wall(s)" (長城, changcheng) appears in Sima Qian 's Records of the Grand Historian, where it referred to both the separate great walls built between and north of the Warring States and to the more unified construction of the First Emperor.[7] TheChinese character 城 is a phono -semantic compound  of the "place" or "earth" radical 土 and 成, whose Old Chinese pronunciation has beenreconstructed as *deŋ.[8] It originally referred to the rampart which surrounded traditional Chinese cities and was used by extension for these walls around their respective states; today, however, it is much more often simply the Chinese word for "city". [9]

Christ the Redeemer (statue)

Christ the Redeemer (Portuguese: Cristo Redentor, standard Brazilian Portuguese: [ˈkɾistu ʁedẽˈtoʁ], local

dialect: [ˈkɾiʃtu ɦedẽjˈtoɦ]) is an Art Decostatue of Jesus Christ in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, created by French sculptor Paul Landowski and built by the Brazilian engineer Heitor da Silva Costa, in collaboration with the French engineer Albert Caquot. The face was created by the Romanian artist Gheorghe Leonida. The statue is 30 metres (98 ft) tall, not including its 8-metre (26 ft) pedestal, and its arms stretch 28 metres (92 ft) wide.[1]

The statue weighs 635 metric tons (625 long, 700 short tons), and is located at the peak of the 700-metre (2,300 ft) Corcovado mountain in theTijuca Forest National Park overlooking the city of Rio. A symbol of Christianity across the world, the statue has also become a cultural icon of both Rio de Janeiro and Brazil.[2] It is made of reinforced concrete and soapstone, and was constructed between 1922 and 1931.[3][4][5]

History[edit]

The idea of building a large statue atop Corcovado was first suggested in the mid-1850s, whenVincentian priest, Pedro Maria Boss, suggested placing a Christian monument on Mount Corcovado to honour Princess Isabel, princess regent of Brazil and the daughter of Emperor Pedro   II , although the project was never approved.[1] In 1889, the country became a republic and, with the official separation of state and church, the idea was dismissed.[6]

The second proposal for a landmark statue on the mountain was made in 1920, by the Catholic Circle of Rio.[7] The group organized an event called Semana do Monumento ("Monument Week") to attract donations and collect signatures to support the building of the statue. What motivated the organization was what they perceived as 'Godlessness' in the society at the time. The donations came mostly fromBrazilian Catholics.[3] The designs considered for the "Statue of the Christ" included a representation of the Christian cross, a statue of Jesus with a globe in his hands, and a pedestal symbolizing the world.[8]The statue of Christ the Redeemer with open arms, a symbol of peace, was chosen.

Local engineer Heitor da Silva Costa  designed the statue; it was sculpted by Polish-French sculptor Paul Landowski.[9]

The face of the statue was created by Romanian sculptor Gheorghe Leonida, who was born in Galati, Romania, in 1893. He studied sculpture at the Fine Arts Conservatory in Bucharest, then, after three more years' study in Italy, he won a prize for the sculpture Reveil ("Awakening"). After that he moved to Paris, where his work, Le Diable ("The Devil"), was awarded the Grand Prix. Becoming famous in France as portraitist, he was included by Paul Landowski in the team that started working on Christ the Redeemer in 1922. Gheorghe Leonida contributed by portraying Jesus Christ's face on the statue, which made him famous.[10][better source needed]

Great Pyramid of Giza

The Great Pyramid of Giza (also known as the Pyramid of Khufu or the Pyramid of Cheops) is the oldest and largest of the threepyramids in the Giza Necropolis bordering what is now El Giza, Egypt. It is the oldest of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, and the only one to remain largely intact.

Based on a mark in an interior chamber naming the work gang and a reference to fourth dynasty Egyptian Pharaoh Khufu,[1] [2] Egyptologists  believe that the pyramid was built as a tomb over a 10 to 20-year period concluding around 2560 BC. Initially at 146.5 metres (481 feet), the Great Pyramid was the tallest man-made structure in the world for over 3,800 years. Originally, the Great Pyramid was covered by casing stones that formed a smooth outer surface; what is seen today is the underlying core structure. Some of the casing stones that once covered the structure can still be seen around the base. There have been varying scientific and alternative theories about the Great Pyramid's construction techniques. Most accepted construction hypotheses are based on the idea that it was built by moving huge stones from a quarry and dragging and lifting them into place.

There are three known chambers inside the Great Pyramid. The lowest chamber is cut into the bedrock upon which the pyramid was built and was unfinished. The so-called[3] Queen's Chamber and King's Chamber are higher up within the pyramid structure. The main part of the Giza complex is a setting of buildings that included two mortuary temples in honour of Khufu (one close to the pyramid and one near the Nile), three smaller pyramids for Khufu's wives, an even smaller "satellite" pyramid, a raised causeway connecting the two temples, and small mastaba tombs surrounding the pyramid for nobles.

History and descriptionIt is believed the pyramid was built as a tomb for Fourth Dynasty Egyptian pharaoh Khufu (often Hellenicised as "Cheops") and was constructed over a 20-year period. Khufu's vizier, Hemon, or Hemiunu, is believed by some to be the architect of the Great Pyramid.[4] It is thought that, at construction, the Great Pyramid was originally 280 Egyptian cubits tall (146.5 metres (480.6 ft)), but with erosion and absence of its pyramidion, its present height is 138.8 metres (455.4 ft). Each base side was 440 cubits, 230.4 metres (755.9 ft) long. The mass of the pyramid is estimated at 5.9 million tonnes. The volume, including an internal hillock, is roughly 2,500,000 cubic metres (88,000,000 cu ft).[5] Based on these estimates, building the pyramid in 20 years would involve installing approximately 800 tonnes of stone every day. Additionally, since it consists of an estimated 2.3 million blocks, completing the building in 20 years would involve moving an average of more than 12 of the blocks into place each hour, day and night. The first precision measurements of the