Wikimedia CommonsMumtaz Mahal’s death inspired the Taj Mahal. India’s Mughal Empire was one of the largest and most powerful empires in the world. Emperor Shah Jahan, who ruled from 1628 to 1658, poured his empire’s wealth into building the stunning Taj Mahal, a gleaming white monument that looms over the city of Agra. Visited by millions every year, the towering marble structure was constructed for one reason: to remember the emperor’s lost love, his wife, Mumtaz Mahal. So who was Mumtaz Mahal, the woman who inspired the construction of the Taj Mahal — one of the Seven Wonders of the World? Born a Persian princess, Mumtaz Mahal married her husband in 1612. Trusted by the emperor and loved by the people, she became an important figure in the empire. Mahal served as the patron for humanitarian programs that supported the needy, and was her husband’s loyal advisor. Tragically, the empress died during childbirth at the age of 38. And Shah Jahan built the Taj Mahal to honor her memory. Who Was Mumtaz Mahal? The Life Of The Empress Consort Born Arjumand Banu Begum on April 27, 1593, Mumtaz Mahal came from a powerful Persian family. Her grandfather had become a trusted advisor of Mughal emperor Akbar (1556 to 1605), and her aunt married Mughal emperor Jahāngīr (1605 to 1627) in 1611, intertwining the family with royalty. When she was around the age of 14 years old, the princess crossed paths with Prince Khurram, Jahangir’s son and heir, at a bazaar. The two quickly fell in love and, in 1607, were betrothed. Wikimedia CommonsBefore marrying into royalty, Mumtaz Mahal had many family connections with power. Her grandfather, aunt, and father were all connected to Mughal Emperors. Five years later, on a date selected by court astrologers, the two wed. And Arjumand Banu Begum’s husband gave her a new name: Mumtaz Mahal, which meant “Chosen One of the Palace.” When he became emperor Shah Jahan in 1628, Mahal became the empress consort of Mughal Empire. While many royal marriages were meant to cement political alliances, the union between Shah Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal was a love match. And though the emperor had two other wives, Muhal remained his favorite. She traveled across the empire with her husband, serving as his loyal advisor. In return, Jahan gave her his imperial seal, the highest possible honor. As empress, Mumtaz Mahal also won the hearts of the people. She served as a patron of the arts and a champion of the poor. She sent food to widows and orphans and spent her free time writing Persian poetry, as well as enjoying the beauty of a riverside garden in Agra. Public DomainThough Shah Jahan had three wives, Mumtaz Mahal was his favorite. She and her husband also had 14 children together – but sadly, childbirth would eventually lead to Mumtaz Mahal’s death. The Tragic Death Of Mumtaz Mahal In Childbirth — And The Intense Mourning Of Her Husband Shortly after Shah Jahan became emperor, he led a military campaign in the Deccan Plateau. Mumtaz Mahal traveled with her husband to Burhanpur, in spite of the fact that she was heavily pregnant with her 14th child. Wikimedia CommonsShah Jahan, a prince of the Mughal Empire met Mumtaz Mahal at a royal bazaar. After traveling more than 400 miles with her husband and his army, Mahal went into labor. She struggled through a 30 hour labor, finally giving birth to a daughter. But Mahal then suffered from postpartum hemorrhage and, despite the efforts of her lady-in-waiting, her doctor, and the many midwives summoned to help, Mahal was beyond saving. The emperor rushed to his wife’s side, but there was nothing to be done. Mumtaz Mahal died in his arms on Jan. 17, 1631. She was 38 years old. Shah Jahan was devastated. The emperor purportedly wept for eight days and went into seclusion for a year. He stopped listening to music, gave up his luxurious clothes and jewelry, and emerged from seclusion with his black hair suddenly stark white. Because Mumtaz Mahal died on a Wednesday, the emperor also banned any entertainment on that day. Metropolitan Museum of ArtShah Jahan ruled over one of the richest empires in the world. Mahal’s body was temporarily buried in a walled garden near the military encampment in Burhanpur. But soon after her death, the emperor ordered his wife’s body disinterred. Encased in a gold casket and escorted by one of her sons, the body of Mumtaz Mahal returned to Agra. Then, Shah Jahan began to plan a monument that would encapsulate his love for Mumtaz Mahal for all time. The Woman Who Inspired The Taj Mahal, One Of The Seven Wonders Of The World After putting down the rebellion that had brought him to Burhanpur, Shah Jahan returned to Agra with a plan to memorialize his lost love. Shah Jahan vowed to build a tomb fit for the empress. Public DomainThe Taj Mahal in the 1860s. According to the Taj Mahal website, the emperor put together a group of architects to build a mausoleum like no other (though the names of the monument’s designer are sadly lost to time). Ultimately, the magnificent monument would take 22 years and 20,000 workers to construct. Over more than two decades, workers transported white marble from a quarry 200 miles away. A thousand elephants carried the marble to Agra, where a 10-mile ramp was constructed to move marble upward. Inside the imposing structure, a master calligrapher etched Quran verses into the white marble. Stonecutters chipped away at the marble to create floral designs in which they embedded dozens of different kinds of precious stones, including jade from China, turquoise from Tibet, and malachite from Russia. The Taj Mahal also glitters with the color and light of carnelian, agates, chalcedonies, lapis lazuli, bloodstone, and garnet. In a nod to how “Paradise” in Islam is described as a garden, the Taj Mahal was designed to look like heaven on earth. It includes a garden divided by rivers which flow into a central pool. Philip Nalangan/Wikimedia CommonsThe Taj Mahal was built to resemble “Paradise,” which, in Islam, is depicted as a garden. At the core of the mausoleum complex, under the majestic dome, rests the cenotaph tomb of Mumtaz Mahal. But it stands empty – the empress’ body was interred beneath the Taj Mahal in a crypt. The Taj Mahal: A Tomb For Mumtaz Mahal And Shah Jahan Shortly after the Taj Mahal was completed, Shah Jahan fell ill. His weakness led his sons to fight amongst themselves and his third son, Aurangzeb, eventually seized power. Aurangzeb then confined his father in Agra Fort, where the aging emperor could see the Taj Mahal from his window. Then, in 1666, Shah Jahan died. Though the emperor had once dreamed of building his own mausoleum, a black version of the Taj Mahal, his son Aurangzeb instead ordered that Shah Jahan be buried in the original Taj Mahal. Today, Shah Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal are the only people buried in the mausoleum. Asitjain/Wikimedia CommonsDetails, including calligraphy, on the outside walls of the Taj Mahal. But after Aurangzeb died in 1707 the Mughal Empire began to decline. The British soon swept into India, carving precious stones from the walls of the mausoleum. However, the Taj Mahal has since been preserved. After an early 20th-century restoration project, the monument gained world renown and a spot on the UNESCO World Heritage list. Today, it’s considered one of the Seven Wonders of the World. Yet while the Taj Mahal’s architectural brilliance captures the wealth and culture of the Mughal Empire, few know the story of the woman who inspired it. The gleaming white monument is a mausoleum, but it’s also an eternal symbol of the love of Shah Jahan for one person — his beloved wife, Mumtaz Mahal. After reading about Mumtaz Mahal, the woman who inspired the Taj Mahal, discover the incredible stories of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Or, learn about the Koh-I-Noor Diamond which Shah Jahan placed atop his Peacock Throne — and which is now part of England’s Crown Jewels. The post The Tragic Story Of Mumtaz Mahal, The Woman Whose Death Inspired The Taj Mahal appeared first on All That's Interesting.

In Myths of the Civil War: The Fact, Fiction, and Science Behind the Civil War’s Most Told Stories, Professor Scott Hippensteel brings a unique perspective, applying science and skepticism to common claims about the rifled musket.Here, Jeb Smith looks at the rifled musket. Springfield Model 1861 rifled musket. Scott Hippensteel begins with “snipers,” pointing out that no such unit existed during the Civil War; the term and function came much later. Instead, those in the role were better described as sharpshooters and acted as skirmishers. He challenges the various claims of kills at 500 yards or greater, demonstrating some of the most famous supposed long-range killings to be inconceivable as actually happening, and suggesting they were in all likelihood from friendly fire, artillery shrapnel, or at best, from numerous skirmishers who would aim in a general direction and one happened to get lucky and strike an officer. He writes, “It was hopeless for a Civil War sharpshooter to aim at and attempt to kill a single specific officer at more than a few hundred yards; the exterior ballistics and accuracy of the available weapons made this task nearly impossible, regardless of the shooting talent of the soldier.”Very few rifles were equipped with scopes, and fewer still were the trained individuals who could accurately hit a long-distance target even in training. Imperfections in powder, bullets, the rifle, the scope, and more made long-distance shots extraordinarily difficult. The weather, moisture in the air, wind (which can change the landing spot by a few feet even if VERY light), and other factors impacted long-range shots. Furthermore, the precision required to estimate the target’s distance and account for the bullet’s trajectory makes it unlikely that genuine long-distance kills occurred. Some sharpshooters needed to aim 14 feet above the target’s head and precisely measure the distance from hundreds of yards using old glass scopes that themselves impeded long-range shots. Hippensteel wrote, “Additionally, the front sight of these muzzleloaders was broader than any human-size target at five hundred yards. Between the required holdover and the width of the front sight, any view of the intended victim of the sharpshooter is completely obscured at this range.” To say it would be a shot in the dark is an understatement. ConditionsFurther, ideal conditions, perfect weather timing, etc., would not be the same as battle conditions with fog, smoke, and imperfect visibility. As a straight shot in the open was usually never beyond 125 yards, the eye could not accurately estimate a single target’s distance so as to calculate the trajectory for long-range shots. The enemy was rarely visible due to obscuring terrain, smoke and more at more than 100-150 yards.  Even under perfect conditions, with no human error, “perfectly aimed” shots still would often miss. In addition, the number of steps that need to be done correctly to load the rifled musket, in the correct order, and the right way to fire a shot amid the noise, screams, adrenaline rush, shouting, smoke, confusion, fear, death and fatigue made getting off an accurate shot near-impossible and the performance in battle staggeringly poor. The best commanders could do with these citizen volunteers was often to maintain a steady fire aimed in the general direction of the opposing side, in order to cause enough damage to hold their position or push the others back over time, often due to the latter running out of ammo. After Gettysburg, 32-43% of the rifled muskets found were loaded with multiple bullets and discarded. Many soldiers whose gun malfunctioned picked up other random discarded ones, weapons they might never have fired before. Using ammo that was not meant for the new musket, that alone can cause mishaps.Hippensteel conducted an in-depth analysis of weapons used in the U.S. military from 1770 to 2000, determining the “total firepower” and the overall killing ability, particularly in the range of up to 150 yards, the “killing zone” where the vast majority of kills occur. Evaluating bullet size, velocity, reload time, and other factors, he discovered that the lowest point occurred when the United States Army first adopted the rifled musket, and that the smoothbore actually puts out more firepower than the rifled musket. No wonder many commanders rejected the latter. Hippensteel wrote, “When the army adopted the rifled musket, the hitting power of the US infantrymen hit an all-time low. This seems strange for a weapon that was about to ‘revolutionize’ warfare…compared to its predecessor, the smoothbore musket, the rifled musket is 15-25 percent slower to load and has a muzzle velocity of only 950-1050 feet per second, compared with the 1,400-1,500 feet per second of the smoothbore.” Meaning that within the range of non-skirmishing Civil War combat, the smoothbore outperformed the rifled musket. Almost all fire occurred at under 200 yards, the enemy was often not visible beyond. And beyond 200 yards, special training was required to account for the low velocity of the weapon. DifferencesNoting the difference between what the rifled musket could do at distance in target practice vs in Civil War battles, he points out that because “Rifled muskets were much more precise …they could produce smaller groups (‘hits’ in target practice within a specific range or distance), because their rifling guided all the bullets to a more localized space downrange. However, this precision did not necessarily make the rifle more accurate in reality, the tight grouping might have been falling short (bullet has a high rate of drop) or long of the intended target because of the difficulty introduced by the parabolic flight path of the bullets.” He continues, “A precision weapon is only useful in combat if it is also accurate, and low muzzle velocity makes accuracy a challenge.” In other words, in actual combat, where you are not simply shooting at an unmoving target, your adjusted total accuracy equals out even if the rifle is more precise in practice. Unless you could allow for the difference, and the vast majority of soldiers could not, you lost the advantages.In the end, smoothbore is similar overall to rifled for ranges of 75 yards and under, and is even preferred due to the lethality of buck and ball. At ranges of 250 yards or more, rifled is a waste of ammunition, so it is only between 75-250 yards where it has a hypothetical advantage for the typical soldier. But the smoke, terrain, and other effects of battle largely negated that, meaning that most commanders would not have their men fire until 100-150 yards, seeing shooting at longer distances as a waste of ammunition, or attempting to “shock” the enemy with a deadly volley from around 60 yards or under. So very little combat occurred at distances or under conditions to give the rifle musket an edge. Hippensteel summarizes “So the rifled musket had a limited advantage over the smoothbore on some battlegrounds, in some circumstances; it was, for example a better gun for skirmishers.”Without machine guns or artillery, a company in Vietnam produced the same firepower as a Civil War corps. A brigade in WW1 did the same, also without artillery or machine guns. Further, modern weapons are smokeless and do not decrease visibility as black powder weapons did. The Civil War was not the first modern war. Hippensteel quotes Allen Guelzo: “Whatever the gains bestowed by the technology of the rifled musket…those improvements were only apparent under ideal conditions (which is to say, not in the middle of a firefight).” David Ward wrote, “The rifled musket did not revolutionize civil war operations because the weapon was not used at long range.” Further, diseases were the leading cause of death among Civil War soldiers, not what one considers “modern” weaponry. Did you find that piece interesting? If so, join us for free by clicking here.

View from the walls of Krak des Chevaliers. Source: Wikimedia Commons   Medieval castles were essentially fortresses, and military defensive strategies. They were especially prevalent from the 11th to the 15th centuries. For many centuries, they provided immense strategic advantages in conflicts. While they were mostly used as the homes of leaders, they also allowed kings, counts, and lords to effectively control territories. Because the primary purpose of a castle was for defense, the location of a castle had to be selected with extreme care.   Medieval Castle Design The Edinburgh Castle view from the North. Source: Wikipedia   Castle architects typically built castles on high ground such as a hill or a cliff which offered a natural advantage. Edinburgh Castle in Scotland, for example, sits on a dormant volcano. Its positioning made a direct assault nearly impossible as attackers had to fight while moving uphill, which exhausted them before they reached its walls. Water was another key defensive element to consider when building castles. Many castles were built by waterbodies such as rivers and lakes. Some were also surrounded by man-made lakes called moats.    Image of Bodiam Castle, England. Wikipedia   The Bodiam Castle in England which was built in 1385, is a perfect example of this. It is surrounded by a wide artificial moat, which meant that an attacking army could not simply walk up to the walls. Instead, they had to cross the water under fire, a dangerous undertaking. In many instances, a moat would be over 39 feet wide and 13 feet deep. The design helped to counter siege fighting strategies such as towers and battering rams.   Medieval Castle Walls Photo of Harlech Castle. Source: Wikipedia   Castle walls also featured incredible feats of engineering. Early Norman castles, for example, were built using wood and were called motte-and-bailey castles. Many of them were built after the Norman conquest of 1066 when William the Conqueror sought to control England. Later castles were made of stone and offered far greater protection as the walls could at times be 3 to 6 metres thick. The walls of Harlech Castle, built between 1283 and 1289 during Edward I’s conquest of Wales are a prime example.    Some castle designers also added some features to the stone walls to allow archers to fire down on enemies at the base of the wall. The strategy was largely effective in slowing down invaders. However, early square towers had a weakness because they had blind spots at the corners. By the 12th century, round towers became more common as they offered a 360-degree view. They allowed defenders to shoot arrows through the gaps in the walls.   Murder holes at Bodiam Castle. Source: Wikipedia   The entrance was a castle’s weakest point and therefore heavily fortified. The entrances to High and Late Medieval castles were a complex structure of their own and often had multiple iron gates called portcullises. They had thick wooden doors and above the passage were holes called murder holes where defenders could drop projectiles like rocks at attackers. They also had arrowslits which were narrow vertical windows in the walls that allowed archers to shoot with great safety.   Medieval Castles and Offensive Strategies Edinburgh Castle, Scotland   That said, castles were not just passive forts but offensive bases. They allowed a ruler to project his power across the surrounding land from his castle. The surrounding area was known as a castellany. Because castles were a permanent base for a garrison of soldiers, they would be used to control the local population. The setup also allowed leaders to collect taxes and enforce the law. Castles also allowed rulers to control strategic routes including river crossings.    Krak des Chevaliers. Source: Wikimedia Commons   The Crusader castle, Krak des Chevaliers, in modern Syria is a famous example. Built by the Knights Hospitaller, it was used to control the Homs Gap, a vital passage that connected the Mediterranean coast to the Syrian interior. Its garrison of up to 2,000 soldiers could raid enemy territory for miles. As such, enemies were wary of the fortress because if they went past it, the castle’s garrison could attack and block their supply lines. Such an attempt could easily lead to sieges.   The ability to raid was another major strategic advantage provided by castles. A small force of mounted knights could leave the castle and attack enemy lines, burn villages loyal to the enemy, and disrupt the enemy army’s movements. The constant attacks would easily wear down enemies. The protection provided by castles also made it difficult for the enemies to launch large-scale counter-attacks.

For centuries, Native American leaders have stood resilient against federal policies that threatened their lands, cultures, and sovereignty. From the forced relocations of the 19th century to the challenges posed by the Dawes Act of 1887, these leaders have exemplified unwavering courage in the face of adversity. Their enduring legacies continue to inspire and remind ...