Zenana

Rather than being the prison-like space of licentious activity popularized by European imagination (see Orientalism), the zenana functioned as the domain of female members of the household, ranging from wives to concubines to widows, unmarried sisters and cousins, and even further distant relations who were considered dependent kin. In addition to the women of rank, the zenana was populated by attendants of various skills and purposes to provide for the needs of the ladies residing within. All visiting friends, servants, and entertainers were invariably female, down to the highly trained corps of armed women – guards known as urdubegis – assigned to escort and protect the women in the zenana.[6]

Entrance to the Jodha Bai Mahal in the harem at the Mughal city of Fatehpur Sikri.

According to Abu'l-Fazl ibn Mubarak, author of the Akbarnama, the zenana of Akbar the Great at Fatehpur Sikri was home to more than five thousand women, who had each been given her own suite of rooms. The size of the zenana meant that it was a community unto itself, and it thus required systematic administration to maintain; all of these administrators were female. Abu'l Fazl describes the zenana as being divided into sections, with daroghas appointed to tend to the financial and organizational needs of the residents.[7] Other administrative positions included the tehwildar, or accounts officer, responsible for the salaries and financial requests of the inhabitants. Then there were the mahaldars, the female servant of the highest authority chosen from within the ranks of the daroghas, who often acted as an intelligence source from the zenana directly to the emperor. The royal anagas (the Turki language word used at the Mughal court for wetnurses),[8] were elevated to positions of rank, though their purpose was not strictly administrative.[9]

It was because male members of Mughal society did not closely define the concept of purdah as a reflection of their own honor that wives, daughters, and particularly unmarried women in the upper-echelons of the empire were able to extend their influence beyond the physical structures of the zenana. That less-constrictive interpretation of purdah allowed the ladies of the Mughal court to indirectly participate in public life, most notably in civic building projects. Jahanara herself was responsible for the major alteration of Shahjahanabad, by constructing the now famous Chandni Chowk market in Old Delhi. Altogether, wives, daughters, and even a courtesan were the primary patrons of 19 major structures in the city.[10] Owing to the cultural precedent set by their Timurid ancestors, it was comparatively more acceptable for Mughal women to perform civic charity in the form of building projects and even engage in leisure activities outside the zenana like hunting, polo and pilgrimage, than it would have been for their Safavid contemporaries.[11] Nur Jahan seems to be unique in that she had a particular affinity for hunting, and was able to gain permission to accompany her husband Jahangir on several outings, even once killing four tigers easily with her excellent marksmanship.[12]

Despite the social freedom that came with being a member of the royal household, Mughal women did not go about unveiled and were not seen by outsiders or men other than their families. Instead, when they traveled they covered their heads and faces in white veils, and they were transported in howdahs, chaudoles, carriages and palanquins while covering on all sides, to maintain the modesty and seclusion required of purdah. When entering or exiting the zenana itself, female pallbearers carried their palanquins, and they were only transferred to male servants and eunuchs outside the walls of the zenana. Should outsiders be required to enter the zenana, as in the case of an illness where the lady could not be moved for her health, the visitor was covered from head to foot in a shroud and led blindly to the lady by a eunuch escort.[13]