Man Mandir Palace

    From the Hathi Paur gate, one goes to the highest point on the northern end of the hill and towards the fabulous Man Mandir, built by Man Singh between 1486 and 1516. It is also known as Chit Mandir or the painted palace because this entire stone palace is profusely adorned with painted tiles - ducks in a row, patterns of elephants, human figures, parrots, banana plants and flowers. Babur, the first Mughal Emperor to visit the palace about 20 years after it was built, described it at length, claiming that its stone walls were entirely whitewashed with lime, the domes covered with plates of copper gilt and the outer walls inlaid with painted tiles. The traditional craft of preparing ceramic tiles for architectural ornamentation was in Babur's time more popular in West Asia than in India. These remarkable tiles, and the style of their inlay are probably derived from Chanderi (200 kms. south) or Mandu. The sandstone today is without the whitewash but the brilliant colourful tile work still glows.

Inside the palace, the courtyards of Man Mandir and Vikram Mandir have small rooms around them. These chambers have fine jaalis (screens) through which the Royal ladies would learn music from the great masters. The rooms are on four levels, of which the two lower levels are underground with cool basements that were used as a refuge from the hot weather. There is an octagonal bath, which used to be filled with perfumed water that seeped up from the inlet holes in the floor, which are now blocked.

These same chambers were otherwise used as dungeons. It is said that here the Mughals had prisoners poisoned with the juice of poppies mixed with poisonous flowers. For the sake of the prisoners staying here, angled ventilation ducts allowed in fresh air, while pipes in the walls were used as speaking tubes. When Guru Har Gobind Singh, who was held captive here and freed at the behest of Nur Jahan, was permitted to take out any other captives who could touch his shawl, he attached 8 tassels to his shawl, which enabled 56 prisoners to be freed with him. On 24 June 1658, Emperor Aurangzeb had his elder brother Murad held captive here in Gwalior fort and he was executed in December that year.
                        At Man Mandir Palace, a poignant ambience of those days of chivalry and heroism still lingers in the silent chambers. A superbly mounted Son-et-Lumiere here brings it all alive every evening.