Shah: Did you mean...?

A 19th-century illustration showing a seated Queen Mumtaz Mahal (1593-1631), wife of Shah Jahan (r. 1628-1658), emperor of the Mughal Empire. Shah Jahan famously built the Taj Mahal for Mumtaz Mahal.

Gold bracelet with miniature portraits of three Mughal emperors and their royal wives, watercolors on ivory by Indian Mughal miniaturists in Delhi (1860-1870). The third oval from the left is a portrait of the last Mughal emperor, Bahadur...

Admiral Zheng He (aka Cheng Ho, c. 1371-1433 CE) was a Chinese Muslim eunuch explorer who was sent by the Ming dynasty emperor Yongle (r. 1403-1424 CE) on seven diplomatic missions to increase trade and secure tribute from foreign powers...

The Cyrus Cylinder is a document issued by Cyrus the Great, consisting of a cylinder of clay inscribed in Akkadian cuneiform script. The cylinder was created in 539 BCE, surely by order of Cyrus the Great, when he took Babylon from Nabonidus...

Women in ancient Persia had more rights and greater freedom than any other ancient civilization including, according to some scholars, even ancient Egypt which is famous for its respect for the feminine principle in religion as well as daily...

Harappa is a large village presently in the province of Punjab in Pakistan. The modern town is a part of and lies next to the ancient city. The site of Harappa is important in that it has provided proof of not just the Indus Valley Civilization...

The spices clove, nutmeg, and mace originated on only a handful of tiny islands in the Indonesian archipelago but came to have a dramatic, far-reaching impact on world trade. In antiquity, they became popular in the medicines of India and...

Under the Seljuk rule, Persia gained a period of economic and cultural prosperity. The innovative techniques of the Seljuk period and style in architecture and the arts had a strong influence on later artistic developments. Seljuk art is...

A map illustrating the British Raj around 1930, a period of direct British rule over the Indian subcontinent that began in 1858. Following the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857, also known as the First War of Independence, the British Parliament passed...

Wazir Khan Mosque, Lahore, Pakistan, built between 1634 and 1641 under the reign of Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan and named after the renowned physician and later Viceroy of Punjab Hakim Ilmud Din Ansari, who was given the title "Wazir Khan"...