ing, and was hence called the Sonahra Makan,
or "Golden House." The frescoes are supposed to illustrate Firdousi's
great epic, the Shahnama, or history of the Kings of Persia. As in the
Kwabgah, the fragments which remain have been covered with varnish as
a preservative, which has had the effect of destroying all the charm
of colour they once possessed; and will eventually, when the varnish
turns brown with age, obliterate them altogether. The paintings are
all in the style of the Persian artists who were employed by Akbar to
illustrate his books and to paint the portraits of his Court. Over
the doorway in the north-west angle of the building is a painting
which the guides, perhaps misled by the suggestion of some uninformed
traveller, point out as "the Annunciation."

There would be nothing _prima facie_ improbable that Akbar should have
caused some events of Biblical history to be painted on the walls
of his palaces; but on the other hand, there is nothing whatever to
connect this fresco with the Annunciation. The winged figures here
represented are of the type commonly found in paintings of stories
from Persian mythology.

Perhaps the most interesting of all the paintings is a portrait in
a panel in one of the rooms. One would like to know whether this was
the lady of the house; but there seems to be no tradition connected
with it.

Judging from the style of the frescoes, it would seem probable that
this was not the residence of Mariam Zamani, but of one of Akbar's
first two wives, whose connections were mostly with Persia.

Jodh Bai's Palace.

Though "Miriam's House" is generally regarded as the abode of Mariam
Zamani, there is a great deal to support the view that the spacious
palace known as Jodh Bai's Mahal, or Jahangiri Mahal, was really her
residence. It is undoubtedly one of the oldest buildings in Fatehpur.

We know that Akbar went there on Mariam's account; and, after
Jahangir's birth, Akbar's first care would be to build a palace
for the mother and her child, his long-wished-for heir. Mariam was
a Hindu, and this palace in all its construction and nearly all its
ornamentation belongs to the Hindu and Jaina styles of Mariam's native
country, Rajputana. It even contains a Hindu temple. [15] It is also
the most important of all the palaces, and Mariam, as mother of the
heir-apparent, would take precedence of all the other wives.

On the left of the entrance is a small guard-house. A simple but
finel