300 years old but keeps perfect time



Tourists at Jantar Mantar Astronomy Park

Jantar Mantar of Jaipur in Rajasthan is the biggest stone observatory in the world still in working condition. It was built by Maharaja Jai Singh, the founder of Jaipur between 1724 and 1727.  

You can walk around what seem like large sculptures but are actually devices designed to probe the heavens. There are fourteen major devices for measuring time, predicting eclipses, tracking the location of stars and planets and other matters of astronomy. 

The world's largest sundial, Samrat Yantra -The Supreme Instrument - is here and it tells the time with amazing accuracy.


Jantar Mantar is World Heritage listed  as "an expression of the astronomical skills and cosmological concepts of the court of a scholarly prince at the end of the Mughal period".

Jantar Mantar also has religious significance as the ancient Indian astronomers were also Vedic masters and astrology is an important part of many Hindus lives today.

See more of this wonderful park at Architecture Science.

August 2005 PHOTO from Wikimedia Commons; Source originally posted to Flickr as Jaipur, India. Author Steve Evans