SAWAI

This maharajah of Jaipur
Made his kingom purr.
There's been no monarch finer
As a city designer,
Mathematician and astronomer.

Perhaps you may have heard
The title on him conferred.
It was a pretty tall order
Living up to one and a quarter,
But passions in Sawai stirred.

He designed the city of Jaipur,
With wide streets, you can be sure.
Sawai didn't fool around
But relocated into town.
His new palace there he preferred.

Sawai built the Jantar Martar.
For this he had no mentor.
Perhaps his crowning glory,
This astronomy observatory
Aids astrology summer and winter.

Sawai was a lady's man.
Understand it not I can,
But ten were the wives he had.
Was this a maharajah fad?
They helped him grow his clan.

He visited each wife in her chamber

In the Palace Amber.

He came through a secret passage

And delivered a loving message

Once into bed they clambered.

The wife of whom he was most fond -- oh,

She had the nicest condo.

Keeping it was an art.

A small mistake on her part

Could her status undue.

His system worked out fine

And was never undermined.

Guarded by Sawai's eunuch,

Who always wore a tunic,

Were his wives and concubines.

Maharajah "Sawai Jai Singh II, remarkable Monarch of Jaipur, was a mathematician, an astronomer, and a town planner par excellence." He founded and designed the layout of the city of Jaipur with its wide streets, built a new palace there, and in 1727 moved to it from the nearby Amber Fort Palace.

He built the Jantar Mantar obervatory in Jaipur in 1728. This observatory does not contain a telescope. It contains very accurate "instruments" including sundials, useful under clear skies. These stationary instruments are more or less house-size. Because of the importance of astrology, it was very important to know precisely the timing of certain astronomical events.

Maharajah Jai Singh II was given the title "Sawai," meaning one and a quarter, by the Mughal emperor, who said he was worth one and a quarter of any other maharajah.

Concerning a small detail, it is by way of poetic license and not bad memory that I have attributed certain features of the new palace in Jaipur to the old Amber (or Amer) Fort Palace. These are (1) the secret passageways from the maharajah's apartment to the apartments of his wives, and (2) the nicer apartment for the favorite wife as compared to the apartments for the other nine wives. Perhaps similar features also applied to the Amber Fort Palace, but I don't know that.