The Rathores and the land of the desert
The loyal general Durgadas Rathore smuggled the infant Ajit Singh to safety and fought for nearly thirty years, until Ajit Singh took back Jodhpur in 1707. Every Jodhpur schoolchild knows Durgadas, and his memorial stands on the city's edge.
Where the clan began: the Rathores trace their arrival in Marwar to Rao Siha in the thirteenth century. For generations they were one clan among many, holding villages and grazing land in scrub and sand.
A dowry capital: their first real capital was Mandore. Rao Chunda received its fort as a dowry when he married a Pratihara princess at the end of the fourteenth century.
- Kingdom
- Marwar, from maru, the desert
- Clan
- The Rathores, ruling some five centuries
- Founded
- 12 May 1459, by Rao Jodha
- First capital
- Mandore, a few km north
- Joined Rajasthan
- 1949
- A new ridge: Mandore sat low and was hard to defend. In 1459 Rao Jodha, Chunda's grandson, began a new fort on a lone red sandstone ridge to the south, on 12 May.
- The city of Jodha: he named the town at its foot after himself.
- Sons who spread out: Rao Bika founded Bikaner in 1488. Rao Duda took Merta, and his granddaughter was the poet-saint Meera Bai. Rao Karamsji, the eighth son, built the fort at Khimsar in 1523.
- Mughal in-laws: the Rathores made peace with the Mughals in the sixteenth century. A Jodhpur princess, Jagat Gosain, married the future emperor Jahangir and was the mother of Shah Jahan, who built the Taj Mahal.
- The break with Aurangzeb: when Maharaja Jaswant Singh died in 1678 on the north-west frontier, the emperor tried to seize Marwar and the infant heir, Ajit Singh.
- British treaty: later rulers signed one in 1818, and the princely state grew rich on railways and trade.
- Jodhpur breeches: Sir Pratap Singh, a regent and a polo-mad soldier, gave his name to the breeches riders still wear around the world.
- The last great palace: Maharaja Umaid Singh built it here in the 1930s. Jodhpur joined the Indian Union in 1947 and Rajasthan in 1949.
- Bapji: the present head of the family, Maharaja Gaj Singh II, came to the title in 1952 aged four, after his father died in an air crash. Many institutions here, including the trust that runs Mehrangarh, were set up under his care.
- The longer story: in our journal on the Jodhpur royal family.
Mehrangarh, gate by gate
Rock and rampart: Mehrangarh rises straight from the cliff edge, so the two are hard to tell apart. Rudyard Kipling thought it might have been built by Titans.
The hermit's curse: the hill was home to a hermit, Cheeria Nathji, who did not want to leave. The story goes that he cursed the new fort with a shortage of water.
- Height
- About 122 m above the plain
- Gates
- Seven
- Run by
- Mehrangarh Museum Trust, since the early 1970s
- Museum
- Allow at least two hours
- Rock park
- Opened 2006, best after sunrise
- The quieter story: a Meghwal man named Raja Ram is said to have been buried in the foundations to make the site auspicious, and his family was given land in return. Jodhpur keeps both stories alive.
- Mostly seventeenth century on: most of what you see today dates from then onward.
- The family goddess: Rao Jodha brought the image of Chamunda from Mandore in 1460. Her temple at the fort's southern end is still the family's own.
- Beautifully kept: the trust makes it one of the best-run historic sites in India, with clear labels, good audio guides and staff who clearly love the place.
The climb through seven gates
History in stone: each of the seven gates records a moment in the clan's history.
Jai Pol: built by Maharaja Man Singh in 1806 after victories over Jaipur and Bikaner.
- Fateh Pol: marks the 1707 return from the Mughals.
- Dedh Kangra Pol: you can still see the scars of cannon fire.
- Loha Pol, the iron gate: just inside, small handprints are set into the wall, left by royal widows on their way to sati. Families still touch them and leave vermilion. We stop here for a moment of quiet.
The palaces inside
Beyond the last gate: carved sandstone courtyards and screened windows.
Moti Mahal, the pearl palace: a hall of audience.
- Phool Mahal, the flower palace: it glows with gold leaf and painted ragas.
- Sheesha Mahal: a mirrored bedchamber.
- Takhat Vilas: Maharaja Takht Singh's private room, painted floor to ceiling, with glass baubles hanging from the beams.
- The jharokhas: latticed stone windows that let the women of the zenana watch the courtyards unseen.
The museum galleries
One of Rajasthan's finest: silver and gilt elephant howdahs, palanquins once carried by royal women, and miniature paintings of the Jodhpur school.
- More to see: turbans, textiles and an armoury with swords associated with Rao Jodha and with Akbar.
- Allow time: at least two hours.
The ramparts and the rock park
The classic view: walk the ramparts past the old cannon, with the blue city below.
- Rao Jodha Desert Rock Park: created in 2006 on the volcanic rock around the fort.
- Native again: under the ecologist Pradip Krishen it was cleared of invasive thorn and replanted with native desert plants.
- When: the first hour after sunrise, when the birds are busy and the fort above turns pink.
The blue city on foot
Brahmpuri: the bluest quarter climbs the slope directly below the fort, and was traditionally home to Brahmin families.
Why blue, theory one: Brahmin households painted their homes to set them apart.
Why blue, theory two: the old lime wash mixed with indigo, and later copper sulphate, kept termites out of the walls and rooms a little cooler in summer.
- Bluest quarter
- Brahmpuri, below the fort
- Old city wall
- About 10 km long
- Gates
- Sojati, Jalori, Nagori, Merti
- Getting around
- On foot, the lanes are too narrow for cars
- Blue for everyone now: plenty of families who aren't Brahmin paint their homes blue simply because it is Jodhpur's colour. Our piece on why Jodhpur is blue gathers the theories.
- Gates that point the way: each gate faced the road to the town it was named after, and still names its neighbourhood.
- Our morning route: from below the fort, down through Brahmpuri and Navchokiya, past small shrines and carved doorways, ending at the stepwell and the clock tower.
- Walk well: wear soft shoes, and keep to the side when a motorbike sounds its horn.
- Crafts at home: tie-dyers with stained fingers, a family making brass utensils, tailors stitching bandhgala jackets, and kitchens where women roll the day's bajra rotis.
- Who leads you: our heritage walks are led by guides who grew up here and know which doors are open to visitors.
The sights below the fort, and the hour for each
- Jaswant Thada
- Late afternoon
- Umaid Bhawan Museum
- Before lunch
- Clock tower
- Dusk
- Toorji ka Jhalra
- Early morning
- Mandore
- About 9 km north, winter afternoon
- Kaylana Lake
- Last light
Jaswant Thada, in the late afternoon
What it is: a white marble memorial on a rocky rise below Mehrangarh, commissioned in 1899 by Maharaja Sardar Singh for his father, Maharaja Jaswant Singh II, and completed in 1906.
The glow: the Makrana marble is cut so thin in places that it glows when the low sun comes through it.
- Inside: portraits of the Rathore rulers.
- The view: from the terraced garden and little lake, one of the best looks back up to the fort.
- Its other names: locals call it the Taj Mahal of Marwar. It is also the royal family's cremation ground.
Umaid Bhawan Palace Museum, before lunch
What's inside: twentieth-century royal life, with Art Deco furniture, clocks, photographs and vintage cars near the entrance.
- Why go: a short, enjoyable visit that explains how a desert kingdom met the modern world.
- The rest: the palace is the family's home and a hotel.
The clock tower and Sardar Market, at dusk
Its name: the Ghanta Ghar was built in the reign of Maharaja Sardar Singh, who ruled from 1895 to 1911, and the market carries his name.
- By day: spices, bangles, textiles, vegetables and cheap plastic in equal measure.
- As the light goes: the tower is lit, the stalls fill with families and the smell of frying chillies drifts across the square.
- How long: an hour of watching, then eat.
Toorji ka Jhalra, early in the morning
Built: around 1740 by a queen of Maharaja Abhay Singh.
Brought back: for decades it lay silted up and full of rubbish, until a careful restoration revealed carved elephants, lions and niches for deities.
- The look: rose-red steps zigzagging down to the water.
- When: early, before the cafés around it open.
- More stepwells: our stepwells guide covers the other great baoris of Rajasthan.
Mandore, on a winter afternoon
Where: the old capital, about nine kilometres north, now a garden of cenotaphs.
The devals: the Rathore kings were cremated here until the nineteenth century. Their memorials are temple-like red sandstone devals, the largest Maharaja Ajit Singh's.
- Hall of Heroes: brightly painted folk heroes and gods carved from the rock face.
- Afternoon owners: langur monkeys.
- A legend: local tradition says Mandodari, the wife of Ravana, came from Mandore.
Kaylana Lake, for the last light
Where: a reservoir among low volcanic hills west of the city, where families drive on a Sunday evening.
- Nothing to see: no monument, which is exactly the point.
- What to do: sit on the bank with a flask of chai and watch the sun set over the water and the scrub.
Where to stay in Jodhpur
- Umaid Bhawan
- Built 1929-1943, 347 rooms
- Under the fort
- RAAS Jodhpur
- Family-run
- Ajit Bhawan
- Village forts
- Rohet, Mihir Garh, Chandelao, Khimsar
Umaid Bhawan Palace
Built: on Chittar Hill, from November 1929 to 1943.
Famine relief: Maharaja Umaid Singh partly meant it as work in years of drought, and some two to three thousand people built it.
- The design: by Henry Lanchester, with some of the finest Art Deco rooms in Asia, including murals by the Polish artist Stefan Norblin.
- The scale: 347 rooms under a dome about 31 metres high.
- Home and hotel: the family still lives in one wing, and part of the palace has been a hotel since 1971.
- Our request: ask us for a room facing the gardens and the fort on its far ridge.
RAAS Jodhpur
Choose it to: wake up inside the old city.
- The buildings: old haveli wings and crisp new red sandstone ones around a pool, directly under the walls of Mehrangarh.
- At night: the floodlit fort fills your window.
- On foot: Toorji ka Jhalra and the clock tower are a few minutes away.
Ajit Bhawan
Its story: built for Maharaj Ajit Singh, a younger brother of Maharaja Umaid Singh.
- A pioneer: one of the early heritage hotels of Rajasthan, and still family-run.
- The feel: like staying with an old Jodhpur family, which in a sense you are.
Bal Samand Lake Palace
Where: on the road to Mandore, above Balsamand Lake.
- The setting: a red sandstone summer palace with gardens and orchards running down to the water.
- Good for: families who want calm, green space to roam.
Village forts within an hour or two
By a lake: Rohet Garh is a family fort.
Among the dunes: Mihir Garh is its sister.
- Small and rural: Chandelao Garh.
- At the desert's edge: Khimsar Fort has stood there since the sixteenth century.
- Compare them all: in our guide to luxury hotels in Jodhpur.
What Jodhpur eats
Mirchi bada: a fat green chilli, milder than it looks, stuffed with spiced potato, dipped in gram-flour batter and fried until it blisters. Eat it hot from the pan with chai.
Mawa kachori: a pastry filled with reduced milk and dried fruit, fried and dipped in sugar syrup. One is enough for two.
Pyaaz kachori: filled with spiced onion, as good here as anywhere in Rajasthan.
- Signature snack
- Mirchi bada, hot in the morning
- Sweet
- Mawa kachori, one for two
- Lassi
- Shri Mishrilal Hotel, before noon
- Old favourite
- Janta Sweet Home, Nai Sarak
- Chillies
- Mathania, just outside the city
- Follow the queue: almost every lane has a halwai, a sweet-maker, with a queue outside at breakfast.
- Makhaniya lassi: at the clock tower, Shri Mishrilal Hotel has served it for generations, thick, sweet and saffron-scented under a lid of cream.
- Ker sangri: desert berries and beans our grandmothers dried in summer for the lean months. See our piece on ker sangri.
- Panchkuta: five desert ingredients, among them ker, sangri and kumat seeds.
- Gatte ki sabzi: gram-flour dumplings in yoghurt curry.
- A Jodhpur oddity: gulab jamun ki sabzi, the sweet dumplings cooked in a spicy gravy. Try it once.
- Laal maas: the fiery mutton of Rajput hunters, coloured by Mathania chillies. Palace kitchens soften it with yoghurt and smoke, and serve it with bajra roti and white butter.
- A special night: a table on the terrace at Umaid Bhawan, or under the floodlit walls at RAAS.
- More than restaurants: we arrange haveli courtyard dinners and private lessons with Marwari home cooks. The full list is in our food of Jodhpur guide.
Tie-dye, breeches and durries
A home of tie-dye: Marwar is one of the homes of bandhani, with thousands of tiny knots pinched into the cloth before dyeing, and of leheriya.
Watch it made: around the clock tower, women still pinch cloth into dots with a fingernail grown long for the purpose.
Real or printed: our guide to leheriya and bandhani explains how to tell them apart.
- Bandhani
- Thousands of tiny tied knots
- Leheriya
- The monsoon wave pattern
- Bandhgala
- Made to measure in a few days
- Durries
- Salawas, half an hour south
- The Jodhpuri bandhgala: the high-collared jacket of every Rajput wedding. Good tailors here make one in a few days.
- Riding breeches: the ones Sir Pratap Singh took to the polo grounds of England are a city speciality too.
- In the old city's shops: embroidered mojari slippers, silver jewellery and tied-and-dyed safas.
- Wind a safa: our turban-tying session shows you how a Marwari safa is wound.
- Furniture: Jodhpur is India's great workshop for reproduction and antique-style furniture, with warehouses on the city's edge shipping worldwide.
- Salawas durries: flat cotton and wool rugs woven on pit looms in family courtyards. Easy to combine with the Bishnoi villages.
- Buy from makers: we never take you to the commission emporiums some drivers favour. Our shopping guide has the details.
Seasons and festivals in Jodhpur
October to March: warm, bright days and cool nights.
December and January: early mornings are cold enough for a jacket on the ramparts.
- Season
- October to March
- Coldest
- December and January mornings
- Hot season
- April to June, often well above 40°C
- Monsoon
- July to September, short storms
- April to June: the heat is serious, often well above 40°C. We plan days around early starts, long lunches and a pool.
- July to September: short storms and a rare green tinge to the hills around Kaylana.
- Month by month: our best time to visit Jodhpur guide.
Rajasthan International Folk Festival, October
When: every October, close to the full moon.
- Where: Mehrangarh becomes a stage for folk musicians from Rajasthan and around the world.
- The moment: Manganiyar singers at dawn on the ramparts, and courtyards full of music late into the night.
- Our view: one of our favourite events in India.
Marwar Festival, the autumn full moon
- When: over the full moon of Sharad Purnima in October.
- What: the folk heroes of Marwar celebrated with music, dance and processions around the city and at Mandore.
World Sacred Spirit Festival, February
Who performs: Sufi singers, qawwals and spiritual musicians from many traditions.
- Where: Mehrangarh and Ahhichatragarh in Nagaur.
- Plan ahead: seats are limited, and we plan these trips well ahead.
Gangaur and Dhinga Gavar, spring
Gangaur: after Holi, the women of Jodhpur worship Gauri for sixteen days.
- Dhinga Gavar: the city's own wild night, when women walk the old lanes in costume carrying sticks, and any unmarried man who crosses their path risks a tap.
- The mood: joyful, loud and very local.
Out into Marwar
- Bishnoi rules
- 29, set out in 1485
- Khejarli
- 1730, up to 363 killed saving trees
- Rohet
- About 40 minutes south
- Osian
- About 90 minutes north
The Bishnoi villages
Who they are: a community south of the city who have protected trees and wild animals since their guru Jambheshwar set out twenty-nine rules in 1485.
- Khejarli, 1730: Amrita Devi and as many as 363 others were killed hugging khejri trees to stop them being cut for the maharaja.
- Why go: a morning in their villages, with blackbuck grazing near the houses, is one of the most moving things you can do in Rajasthan.
Rohet and the horse country
Marwari horses: the family fort at Rohet, about forty minutes south, breeds the breed with the inward-curving ears.
- Ride out: across the farmland at dawn.
- Or a week: on a Marwari horse safari.
Osian, Khimsar and Nagaur
Osian: north of the city, its temples are among the oldest in Rajasthan, and Osian has its own dunes.
- Khimsar: a sixteenth-century fort with a dune village nearby.
- Nagaur: a superbly restored fort and the great cattle fair of winter.
West towards Jaisalmer
- The overnight break: on the long road to Jaisalmer, the camps at Manvar are perfect among the dunes.
- The stops: in our route guide, Jodhpur to Jaisalmer.
Getting to Jodhpur and getting around
By air: Jodhpur Airport (JDH) is only a few kilometres from the centre, with direct flights to Delhi, Mumbai and other Indian cities.
From Jaipur: about five to six hours. Our Jaipur to Jodhpur route guide suggests stops, including Ajmer and Pushkar.
- Airport
- JDH, a few km from the centre
- From Jaipur
- About 5-6 hours by road
- From Udaipur
- About 5-6 hours, via Ranakpur
- To Jaisalmer
- About 5 hours west
- To Bikaner
- 4-5 hours north
- From Udaipur: about five to six hours, best broken at the Jain temple of Ranakpur.
- Onward: Jaisalmer is about five hours west, and Bikaner four to five hours north.
- By luxury train: both the Palace on Wheels and the Maharajas' Express stop here. Our luxury trains guide compares them.
- In the old city: we walk or take an auto-rickshaw, because the lanes are too narrow for a car. Your chauffeur waits at the nearest gate.
- Every leg: our guide to road distances and drive times covers them.
- The desert loop: Jodhpur is the centre of our desert triangle journey with Jaisalmer and Bikaner.
Three days in Jodhpur, the way we'd spend them
- Nights
- Three
- Day one
- The fort and the old city
- Day two
- Bishnoi country and Mandore
- Day three
- Stepwell and dunes
- Other lengths: our Jodhpur itinerary guide has versions for two and four days.
- Longer journeys: Jodhpur anchors our Jaipur, Jodhpur and Udaipur journey and the longer Royal Rajputana.
Day one, the fort and the old city
Opening time: Mehrangarh, with a full morning for the museum.
- Late morning: walk down through the Rao Jodha Desert Rock Park to Jaswant Thada.
- Late afternoon: after lunch and a rest, Brahmpuri with a local guide.
- Dusk: the clock tower, for mirchi bada and lassi as the lights come on.
Day two, the Bishnoi country and Mandore
Early: the Bishnoi villages, with breakfast in a farmer's courtyard and time with the potters and durrie weavers.
- Before lunch: the Umaid Bhawan museum, then a long lunch.
- Late afternoon: among the cenotaphs at Mandore.
- Dinner: on the palace terrace.
Day three, stepwell and dunes
Morning: Toorji ka Jhalra while it is quiet, and the lanes around it.
- Afternoon: after an early lunch, about ninety minutes to Osian for the temples in the afternoon light.
- Sunset: a camel ride over the dunes, or continue to a night in a village fort.
What our Jodhpur friends tell us
Mehrangarh at opening time: not at eleven. By late morning the coach groups arrive and the courtyards fill.
See the blue from above: from the fort ramparts or a rooftop in Brahmpuri, best of all in the soft light after sunrise.
- Wear shoes with grip: for the fort ramp and the stepwell. The old sandstone is polished smooth by centuries of feet.
- Cover up: shoulders and knees at the Chamunda temple, Jaswant Thada and in the old lanes. Shoes come off at every shrine.
- Ask before photographing people: especially women. Most say yes, and a few words of greeting go a long way.
- Street food rules: eat where the queue is longest and the oil hottest, in the morning. Skip anything that has been sitting.
- Carry small notes: for chai, tips and temple offerings, though most shops now take UPI phone payments.
