Why the Hadas built a star on the ridge
Today the outer walls still run along the ridge for a long way, the great bastion still stands, and almost everything else is roofless stone, fig roots and sky.
Who took the valley: the Hadas, a branch of the Chauhan Rajputs, took Bundi from the Meena chiefs in the first half of the fourteenth century. Our Bundi guide tells that story in full.
Fortify first: a clan that has just won a valley by force knows it can lose it the same way, so the new rulers fortified the high ground.
- Built
- Traditionally 1354
- Built by
- Rao Bar Singh Hada
- Open
- Arrangements change; we check on the day
- Allow
- About two hours to explore unhurried
- Best time
- First light, October to March
- Photography
- Welcome
- Getting there
- Steep 20-30 minute path from the Garh Palace
- The date: tradition credits Rao Bar Singh with building Taragarh in 1354.
- The debate: some historians date the first walls a little earlier and the major works a little later, which is normal for a fort that grew over centuries.
- Last line of defence: this ridge held that role for the Hadas for about three hundred years.
- The name: star fort, from tara, a star, and garh, a fort.
- Two explanations: some say the fort looks like a star from the air. Others say the lamps on its walls looked like stars from the valley at night.
- Our favourite: the second, and you will understand why if you ever see the ridge from a haveli roof after dark.
- Seat and citadel: in its first centuries the Hadas lived up here behind the walls, while the town grew in the valley below.
- 1569: Rao Surjan Hada surrendered Ranthambore to Akbar and entered Mughal service. His successors became Mughal generals.
- Down the hill: with imperial protection came imperial money, and from the early 1600s the rulers built the Garh Palace on the slope beneath.
- Strongroom and watchtower: the court moved into painted rooms with balconies and fountains, and Taragarh became the arsenal and lookout on the hill.
- Guns, walls and water: below, every ruler added a room and a mural. Up here, they added defences. Nobody needed to live in the fort, and slowly the forest crept back.
The walk up, from the painted rooms to the gun bastion
- Starts from
- The Chitrashala's upper garden
- Climb
- Twenty to thirty minutes, no handrails
- Great bastion
- Bhim Burj
- Famous cannon
- Garbh Gunjan, now gone
- Water
- Reservoirs cut into the rock
Leaving the Chitrashala
The gate: most visitors reach the path from the upper garden of the Chitrashala, Rao Umed Singh's painted gallery, through a gate at the back of the courtyard.
- Stop here: drink some water and pick up a stick, because from here on the monkeys are in charge.
- Our guides' habit: they usually carry two sticks, one to lean on and one to wave.
The steep path and the first gate
Hard going: old paving stones polished smooth by centuries of feet, hooves and rain.
- Built for soldiers: for men and pack animals, not comfort, and with no handrails. Take it slowly and keep to the inside.
- The gateway: in twenty to thirty minutes you reach a massive gate in the outer wall, tall enough for an elephant and wide enough for a cart.
- Look inside it: the guardrooms where soldiers sat out the night are still there, filled with leaves.
Inside the walls, the forest takes over
The plateau: long and uneven, with thorn scrub, fallen walls and trees growing out of old rooms.
- No signboards: no tidy route, which is part of the pleasure. Paths fork towards bastions, tanks and broken pavilions.
- Where a guide earns his breakfast: he knows which tracks lead somewhere and which peter out in a thicket.
The queens' quarters
The Rani Mahal: local people's name for the remains of a small palace, from the centuries when the royal women lived up here.
- What survives: walls, a few arches and, in places, faded traces of painted plaster.
- Why see it: it tells you that before the palace below existed, the court lived on this windy ridge.
- Don't climb: the walls are much weaker than they look.
The reservoirs cut into the rock
Planned for sieges: a fort without water is a fort that will fall.
- How they work: large reservoirs cut into and built up from the rock caught the monsoon and held it through the dry months. Rocky beds and stone walls kept the water from soaking away.
- After a good monsoon: they still fill, and egrets and pond herons fish in them in the early morning.
- In April and May: often low or dry, so you can see how deep they go.
Bhim Burj, the great bastion
The name: Bhima, the strongest of the five Pandava brothers in the Mahabharata. A burj is a bastion or tower.
- The gun platform: the cannon called Garbh Gunjan, the thunder from the womb, once stood here.
- The town's story: its roar could be heard far across the valley and frightened the ladies of the court.
- The view: even without its gun the platform is imposing, and the view from its top is the widest in Bundi.
Along the ramparts
Kangura: the battlement merlons run along the ridge, with gaps for archers and later for matchlocks.
- Reading the land: cliffs on one side, steep slopes on the other, and the town tucked safely in the valley between.
- Stay back: some sections have collapsed and the drops are long.
The legend of the tunnels
The bazaar version: tunnels run from Taragarh to the palace, into the hills and, in bolder versions, to distant forts.
- The truth: hill forts across Rajasthan did have hidden passages and sally ports, and some openings are visible in the slopes around Bundi.
- Where they lead: nobody seems to know, and the forest department wisely keeps people out. Enjoy the story. Don't go looking for the entrance.
How a Rajput hill fort works, in plain words
Two families of forts: some, like Jaisalmer, stand alone on a hill in open country. Others, like Taragarh, Chittorgarh and Kumbhalgarh, follow the line of a ridge.
Giri durg: builders' term for a hill fort. Old Indian texts on statecraft ranked it among the strongest kinds of fortress.
The same tradition: Taragarh is not one of the six UNESCO hill forts, but seeing it after those famous sisters shows the same ideas in a smaller, poorer, wilder place. Our page on forts and palaces explains the family.
- Fort type
- Giri durg, a ridge-top hill fort
- UNESCO hill forts
- Six inscribed in 2013; Taragarh not among them
- Walls
- Rough-cut stone in lime mortar
- Local stone
- Greenish-grey, hard to carve
- Mass, not delicacy: walls are thick at the base and narrow as they rise.
- Why Bundi painted: the hard local stone is one reason the rulers below painted their palace walls rather than carving them into lace as Jaisalmer's builders did.
- Gates, the weak point: approaches turn sharp corners so an attacking elephant could not build up speed against the doors. Across Rajasthan, spikes were set into some gate leaves for the same reason.
- Overhead defence: guardrooms flank the passage, and slots and balconies above the arches let defenders drop stones or shoot down.
- Think like an attacker: look up as you walk through any gate at Taragarh, which is the point.
- Round bastions: like the Bhim Burj, they appeared as gunpowder changed warfare. A rounded tower deflects shot better than a square one and gives cannon a wide field of fire.
- The quiet genius: water harvesting. With almost all the year's rain falling in three months, a fort had to catch and keep every drop.
- The same instinct below: it built the stepwells in the town, including the great Raniji ki Baori.
A ruin that belongs to the monkeys and the birds
It is one of the few places in Rajasthan where you can feel what these hill forts were like in the long, quiet years between battles.
The macaques: a large troop of rhesus macaques, the most memorable residents of the fort.
Not dangerous if you are sensible: but bold, quick and very good at spotting a snack, a water bottle or sunglasses.
- Rhesus macaques
- Bold, brown, pink-faced
- Grey langurs
- Calmer, keep to the trees
- Birds
- Peafowl, parakeets, kites, vultures, egrets
- Forest
- Dry scrub, thorn woodland, figs
- Bring
- Binoculars
- The langurs: long-tailed, black-faced, calmer, and keep to the trees.
- Never feed either: feeding is what made the macaques bold in the first place.
- Roots and walls: fig trees have split walls apart over the centuries.
- Cool-month birds: peafowl strutting on the ramparts, parakeets in noisy flocks, bulbuls and robins in the bushes, kites and vultures on the air currents, egrets on the reservoirs.
- No fresh cement: nobody has rebuilt the walls or laid out lawns.
- Early morning sounds: mist in the valley, temple bells, a muezzin, a train somewhere far off, wind in the dry grass.
- Read more: add our page on wildlife around the temples to your reading.
The best hour and the best season for Taragarh
Dawn: in the cool season the valley often fills with mist, and as the sun rises the Garh Palace turns from grey to honey to gold beneath you.
Why early: the monkeys are sleepy, the air is fresh, and you will almost certainly have the fort to yourself.
The perfect order: come down at about nine, pass through the palace as it opens and reach your haveli for a late breakfast. That is the Bundi morning we plan for our own family.
- Best hour
- First light
- Second choice
- Late afternoon, down before dark
- Best season
- October to March
- Cold mornings
- December and January
- April to June
- Dawn only, down by eight
- Monsoon
- July to September, slippery
- Late afternoon: warm, long light and a lovely view west, but the stone has absorbed heat all day and the walk is hotter.
- Before dark: the path is unlit and the forest closes in quickly.
- Winter: bring a shawl or fleece for the ridge.
- Summer: very hot. We only take guests up at dawn.
- The monsoon: the hills turn green, the reservoirs fill and views are sharp after rain, but the old paving is slippery and vegetation grows thick over the paths.
- Rains rule: go only with a guide and only on a dry morning.
- Month by month: our guide to the best time to visit Bundi has more.
How to visit Taragarh well
Go with a guide: little signage, constantly forking paths. We arrange a guide who has walked Taragarh since childhood and knows the safe routes, the monkeys' habits and the stories.
Shoes: sandals and smooth soles are dangerous on the polished paving, especially on the way down.
Water out of sight: a visible bottle is an invitation to the macaques.
- Footwear
- Proper shoes with grip
- Carry
- Water in a closed bag, a stick
- Access
- Not for wheelchairs or pushchairs
- Facilities
- No café, no bins
- A stick: you will rarely need to use it. Simply carrying one keeps most monkeys at a respectful distance.
- Secure everything: monkeys grab sunglasses, phones and hats, then sit on a wall just out of reach, looking pleased with themselves.
- Things that change: fees and opening arrangements, and parts of the fort sometimes close for safety. We check on the day.
- Limited mobility: not suitable for wheelchairs, anyone unsteady on their feet or heavy pushchairs.
- By vehicle: some guests go round to an upper gate when the road is open, cutting out most of the climb but leaving rough ground at the top. See our guide to accessible travel in Rajasthan.
- Photography: a wide lens for the panorama and a short telephoto for the palace below. Our photography tips for Rajasthan cover light and etiquette.
- Children: keep them close and never let them run ahead. Walls are crumbling, and some drops are sheer.
- Rubbish: take it down with you. The monkeys will scatter anything you leave.
What most visitors miss at Taragarh
The palace seen from above
The plan revealed: from the upper fort you look down on the roofs and terraces of the Garh Palace.
- What you see: each ruler's wing stepping down the hill, the courtyards, and the Chitrashala garden like a green pocket between them.
- Trace your route: take five minutes to find the way you walked that morning. It changes how you remember the palace.
The lakes and the cenotaphs
Nawal Sagar: in the town, with its half-submerged temple.
- Jait Sagar: the long sheet of water to the north, where Kipling stayed at the Sukh Mahal in 1887.
- The old walls: ask your guide to point out the line of the town walls.
- Read more: our journal piece on Kipling in Bundi tells you what he made of it all.
The sound of the town
- Sit for ten minutes: on a bastion at sunrise, and listen.
- Bundi wakes in layers: first the birds, then the temple bells, then pressure cookers, scooters and children going to school.
The small shrines
Still tended: small shrines, some Hindu and some Muslim, looked after by local people.
- The dargah: a Sufi tomb shrine that people in Bundi associate with a saint or warrior of the fort's early centuries.
- Signs of worship: fresh marigolds, a lamp, a thread tied to a tree. Leave them as they are.
- Manners: take your shoes off on a shrine platform, and don't photograph anyone praying without asking.
What to see before and after the climb
The Garh Palace and the Chitrashala
- The natural pairing: climb at dawn, come down through the palace as it opens, and spend unhurried time in the painted rooms.
- The Chitrashala: the finest gallery of Bundi murals, worth at least an hour with a guide who can read the walls.
Raniji ki Baori
- The queen's stepwell: built in 1699, about fifteen minutes' walk from the palace gate through the blue lanes.
- The counterpoint: one built for war, the other built for water and for the town.
Nawal Sagar at dusk
- End by the water: when full, the lake reflects the palace and fort walls, and the town gathers along its edge in the evening.
- Look back up: at the ridge where you stood that morning.
Sukh Mahal and Kshar Bagh
- A short drive north: the summer pavilion on Jait Sagar and the royal cenotaphs of Kshar Bagh make a quiet afternoon.
- More ideas: see our full list of things to do in Bundi.
Where to stay close to Taragarh
Small heritage havelis: Bundi's finest rooms are in the lanes beneath the Garh Palace, run by the families who own them.
Haveli Braj Bhushanjee: a painted family haveli just below the palace.
- Palace hotel
- None in Bundi
- Most established
- Haveli Braj Bhushanjee
- Most stylish
- Bundi Vilas
- Pool and space
- Kota, about forty minutes away
- Nights
- Two in Bundi itself
- Bundi Vilas: a restored haveli set against the palace walls.
- Both: a short walk from the Taragarh path, with roof terraces where you can watch the ridge catch the first light before you set out.
- Honest comparisons: our guides to Bundi's heritage havelis and luxury hotels in Bundi.
- The Kota option: we can base you in Kota for a pool and more space, but you lose walking from your door into the fort at dawn.
- Our advice: for most guests, two nights in Bundi itself. Our Bundi itinerary shows how we fit Taragarh in.
What our guides tell friends before they climb
Start before sunrise: plan to be down by nine, ahead of the heat and the few other visitors.
Breakfast after: but take a banana or a biscuit in a zipped pocket, and eat it only once you are back in the palace.
- No eye contact: don't stare at a big male macaque or bare your teeth at him in a smile. Monkeys read that as a challenge. Look away and walk on calmly.
- If a monkey grabs something: let it go. Your guide may be able to trade it back. Never pull against an animal.
- Stay on the paths: thorn scrub hides holes, loose stones and old wells.
- Dress: muted, comfortable clothes that cover shoulders and knees. You'll pass shrines and local people.
- More forts like this: combine Taragarh with Chittorgarh and other great hill forts on our offbeat Rajasthan journey, or read our piece on offbeat forts.
