JAIPUR or Jeypore, the capital of a Rajput State of the same name. It is the most beautiful of the towns of India, situated in lat. 26° 55' N., and long. 75° 52' E., and the State lies between lat. 25° 41' and 28° 27' N., and between long. 74° 55' and 77° 15' E.; area, 14,465 square miles. The military consist of 452 artillery, 4600 infantry, 5142 cavalry, and 4096 Nagha. Its ruler is the chief of the Kachhwaha tribe of Rajputs, and claims descent from Rama, king of Ayodhya• in Oudh. Between Rama and Dhola Rao, who founded the Jaipur State in A.D. 967, thirty-four generations are said to have intervened. At the time of the foundation of Jaipur, Rajputana was under petty Rajput and Mina chiefs, owing allegi ance to the great Tuar dynasty of Rajputs, who then reigned at Dehli. Dhola Rao and his Kachh waha clan are said to have absorbed or driven out the petty chiefs, and to have founded a substan tial dominion, known as Dhundal. Half a century later, the Kachhwaha chief Hamaji wrested Amber from the Mina, and this place remained the capital until 1728, when Jai Singh D. aban doned it for Jaipur.
The emperor Akbar, in the sixth year of his reign, when on a pilgrimage to Ajmir, honourably received at Sanganir, Bihari Lal, then chief of Jaipur, and married his daughter. Bihari Lal, with three of his sons, entered the emperor's service. One of these sons, Bhagwan Das, attained distinction as a governor and commander; and his adopted son Man Singh was one of the most conspicuous of the imperial generals. He fought in Orissa, Bengal, and Assam ; and at a critical period, under great difficulties, he main tained his authority as governor of Kabul.
Jai Singh D., commonly known as Siwai Jai Singh, was remarkable for his scientific know ledge. He began to rule in A.D. 1699. He constructed observatories at Jaipur, Dehli, Benares, Muttra, and Ujjain, by which be was able to correct the astronomical tables of De La Hire, and to leave as a monument of his skill, lists of stars collected by himself, known as the ' Tij Muhammad Shahi,' or Tables of Muhammad Shah, the then emperor of Dehli, in whose favour Jai Singh stood high. Ile laid out and built the present Jaipur (Jeypore) in A.D. 1728. At a later period, the rajas of Jaipur united with Udaipur (Oodeypore) .and Jodhpur to resist the Muhammadan power. And, to regain the honour of intermarriage with the Udaipur family, which his family had lost by giving a princess to the Moghul emperor, the raja of Jaipur consented that the issue of a Udaipur princess should succeed in preference to an elder son by other wives. This attempt to set aside the right of primogeniture brought great disasters both on -Jaipur and Jodhpur. Subsequently, at the beginning of the 19th century (1809), the Jaipur ruler, was mixed up with a very horrible deed, to Krishna Kumari. The maharana of Udaipur had only ono
daughter, and the rajas of Jaipur and Jodhpur fought for her hand. The rana was, helpless to decide between the two candidates, and the whole country was convulsed by the struggle, for nearly all the chiefs of Rajputana took a part in the war. The Mahrattas and Afghans saw their opportunity, and the progress of their armies through Rajputana was to be,traced by blazing villages and ruined .harvests. The rana implored the British Government for protection. Even the rival princes of Jaipur and Jodhpur, joined in the solicitation. But public opinion in England was opposed to all such intervention. A word would have restored peace to Rajputana, but the British Government declined to interfere. Accordingly, the rana was obliged to purchase the protection of Amir Khan, the Afghan, by the cession of a large territory, and was then compelled by the Afghan to poison his own daughter to put an end to the war. The young Rajput princess accepted her doom, said, This is the marriage foredoomed for me,' and drank the opium ; but the tragedy filled Western India with shame and horror.
The political relations of the British Govern ment with Jaipur commenced in 1803, when Juggut Singh was then its maharaja ; in 1818 he ended a life which had been spent in the grossest debauchery, and regretted by no one. But on the 25th April 1819, a posthumous son was born by one of the ranis, and he was recognised as heir, both by the Jaipur nobles and the British Government. Till the ram's death in 1833, Jaipur was a scene of corruption and misgovernment. The young maharaja, Jai Singh, died in 1835, leaving a young son, Ram Singh, then under two years of age, and the agent to the Governor General then proceeded to Jaipur, reformed the administration, and assumed the guardianship of the infant heir. The agent's life was attempted, and his assistant was murdered. The larger portion of the Sambur lake belongs to Jaipur, and the salt manufactured from it yields 4 lakhs. Babra, three marches from Jaipur, on the road to Dehli, has one of the edicts of Asoka engraved on a block of stone or rock, on a hill, in old Pali, and of date P.c. 309. It is in the oldest Lat character. It differs somewhat in style and language from- the pillar and rock edicts. The subject is the Buddhist commandment forbidding the sacrifice of four-footed animals. The Vedas are alluded to, but not named, and are condemned as mean and false in their doctrine, and not to be obeyed. The Jaipur artisans produce trans lucent enamels, that is, enamel colours painted on gold, or gold-leaf, which gives light and splendour to the colours. — Treaties, Engagements, and Sunnuds, iv. p. 29 ; Beng. As. Soc. Jo. ix. p. 617 ; Malcolm's Tr.; R. As. Soc. i. p. 69. See Rajput.