Jantar Mantar Jaipur

Next to the City Palace entrance is the Jantar - Mantar, begun in 1728 by Savaii Singh whose passion for astronomy was even more notable than his powers as a warrior. Before commencing Jantar Mantar, he sent scholars abroad to study foreign observatories. This observatory is the largest and best preserved of the five he built, with 13 different instruments for calculating the movement of celestial bodies. It was restored in1901. The others are in Delhi, Varanasi and Ujjain. The fifth observatory, at Mathura, has disappeared.

Jantar mantar (or 'instrument of calculation')is a curious if somewhat compelling collection of sculptures. In fact, each construction has a specific purpose, for example, measuring the positions of the stars, altitude and azimuth, and calculating eclipses.