Place · Sultanate reservoir · India
Hauz-i-Shamsi
Also known as Hauz-i-Shamsi, Shamsi Talab, Hauz-i Shamsi
A square tank Iltutmish built at Mehrauli in 1230 to hold the catchment of the Mehrauli ridge and supply the Qutb complex and the walled city below it. Tradition from Ibn Battuta onward holds that Iltutmish laid out the tank on the spot where a dream of the Prophet mounted on al-Buraq had come to him — the Jahaz Mahal pavilion on its north edge is said to mark the dream site. The tank is one of the earliest substantial Islamic hydraulic works in the subcontinent and the single largest Delhi water body of the thirteenth century; it still holds water in the monsoon.
- Date
- 1230–None
- Function
- Water & infrastructure
- Patron dynasty
- Mamluk
- Tradition
- Ibn Battuta, Rihla; ASI records; INTACH Delhi water body surveys.
- Confidence
- Established / referenced
- Location
- 28.509, 77.179
Worth knowing
The Jahaz Mahal — Ship Palace — on the tank's north edge is a Lodi-period caravanserai that lies half-submerged when the tank is full, which is where its name comes from. Ibn Battuta describes passing the tank in 1333 and records the tradition of the Prophet's hoofprint. The tank's catchment has been built over since the twentieth century and the water body shrunk to a third of its original size.
Connections (2)
- Built byShams-ud-Din Iltutmish
Iltutmish built the Hauz-i-Shamsi at Mehrauli in 1230 to hold the catchment of the Mehrauli ridge and supply the Qutb complex and the walled city below it. The tank was one of the earliest substantial Islamic hydraulic works in the subcontinent and the single largest Delhi water body of the thirteenth century. Tradition from Ibn Battuta's 1333 visit onward holds that Iltutmish laid out the tank on the spot where a dream of the Prophet mounted on al-Buraq had come to him.
- Site adjacencyQutb complex, Delhi
The Hauz-i-Shamsi lies about a kilometre south of the Qutb complex, holding the water supply for the Mehrauli ridge settlement that the complex anchored. The tank and the complex together — monumental mosque, royal tomb, water body — are the three elements of thirteenth-century Islamic Mehrauli, each dependent on the others for the walled city to function.