Gol Gumbaj

Gol Gumbaj, also known as Gol Gumbaz or Gol Gumbad is a mausoleum of Muhammad Adil Shah, the Sultan of Bijapur. The construction began in 1627 when the Sultan ascended the throne. It took 30 years to build the dome. The structure of Gol Gumbaz is quite similar to the Taj Mahal in Agra which gives it the name ‘the Black Taj Mahal’ due to the dark color of the stone.

What makes Gol Gumbad, one of the top historical monuments in Karnataka, special is the architecture. The dome of Gol Gumbaj has a diameter of 44 meters. It stands without the support of pillars. The gallery below the tomb is built in a way that a sound echoes 7 times.

Gol Gumbaj is the world’s second-largest dome, St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome is the first. The chamber inside the mausoleum is also the biggest single chamber in the world with an area of 1700 square meters. The architecture is a splendid work of Yakut of Dabul (Dabul was a small seaport in Ratnagiri, Maharashtra).

History of Gol Gumbaj

Situated in the small town of Bijapur in the state of Karnataka, Gol Gumbaz was constructed by Mohammed Adil Shah as his tomb to bury the mortal remains, right after he accedes to the throne in 1626. The ruler intended to build a mausoleum for himself, which would be grander than the tomb of his father, Ibrahim Adil Shah II.

The construction of this monument continued throughout Mohammed Adil Shah's regime and was not completely executed due to his sudden demise in 1656. Gol Gumbaz is the burial place for the Sultan along with his two wives- Taj Jahan Begum, Aroos Bibi, his mistress Rambha, his daughter and grandson. The Gol Gumbaz was planned as a single mammoth structure, and to date remains one of the biggest domes in the world. The foundation of the tomb is rested on the bedrock.

Architecture of Gol Gumbaj

Gol Gumbaz counts among the finest examples of Deccan Indo-Islamic architectural style. The colossal structure is made out of dark grey basalt. It reaches up to 51 meters in height while the giant dome has an external diameter of 44 meters, making it one of the largest domes ever built. Four dome-capped towers adorn the edifice on four sides. Each of these towers is seven stories high and has a staircase built inside it. A square podium with an intricately carved wooden canopy exists inside the main mausoleum hall. The cenotaph slab in the middle of the podium marks the location of the actual tomb of the Sultan, in the ground below.

The mausoleum hall boasts of an area of 18000 sq. ft., which marks it as one of the world’s largest single-chamber spaces. An interesting feature of Gol Gumbaz is that a whispering gallery runs around the dome’s inner periphery. Any sound made here gets echoed at least seven times or more. When you are inside the whispering gallery, you can hear even the softest of sounds from the other side of the monument. This phenomenon is attributed to the impressive acoustics of the structure.

Another impressive aspect of this structure is that there are no towers or pillars that provide support to the huge dome, which is an architectural marvel in itself. The dome, on the other hand, is held by eight intersecting arches from the inside.