J is for Jaw-dropping... n... Journeys

 

Hello and welcome! to another A-Z series on M-i-V... 

All through April I'll be posting on the broad theme of Museums & Monuments Across the World - mostly those I've been to and a few on my bucket list that I haven't been able to visit yet. Museums are one of my favourite ways to get to know a culture, they sum up what those peoples want to preserve and pass onto their grandchildren, the facets they want to show their foreign visitors, how they perceive, present and preserve their own storyline and that of their interactions with the world. Come museum hopping with me!

J is for Jewel House

...which is the treasury in the Tower of London, where the Crown Jewels and royal regalia of the British monarchy are held and publicly displayed. The personal collections of the monarch is not housed here, so no Lovers Knot, Vladimir  tiaras etc, those are kept in an underground vault at Buck Palace. The ones at the Jewel House are essentially the pieces (including jewelled swords, sceptres and weapons) used for state ceremonial occasions. They include the State Imperial Crown and the Royal Sceptre set with the Cullinan diamonds I and II,  also the Queen Mother's Crown set with the Koh-i-Noor diamond. Each of the pieces have journeyed from different corners of the earth and represent the vanished length and breadth of the British Imperial power. 

Originally the medieval  Crown Jewels were held at Westminster Abbey, but in 1649 after the English Civil War, the  then monarch Charles I was beheaded and Parliament ordered the Crown Jewels to be moved to the Tower to be sold or destroyed. The monarchy was restored with the ascension of Charles II, son of Charles I, in 1661. Most of the Crown Jewels date from his coronation after the Restoration, only the coronation spoon dates from the 12th century and is the oldest piece.  The Crown Jewels have been available for some form of public viewing since 1665.

I have been to the Tower and the Jewel House on two of my visits to London - once in 1975 and again in 1999, the displays had changed substantially in the interim.  Better lighting, big screen displays, a travelator, better crowd management. Incidentally, today the Crown Jewels are viewed by an estimated 2.5 million visitors annually. 

Photography was not permitted obviously, so there are no personal photographs. Which would be somewhat superfluous anyways, considering these must be some of the most photographed items in the world. Read about the Jewel House here and here. You can view some of the Crown Jewels virtually by clicking on the link here. 

J is also for Jorasanko 

Jorasanko Thakur Bari (lit Jorasanko Tagore House) in Kolkata is the ancestral property of the Tagore family where Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore was born in May, 1861. The mansion was built in 1784 by the scions of the family who, for one reason or another, left their original family residence in a neighbourhood called Pathuriaghata deep in North Calcutta, the traditional abode of the Bengali rich and famous. 

The lane entrance to the Jorasanko Thakur Bari
is marked by this gate. Photography inside the
galleries is not permitted. Also not permitted in
the old aristocratic residences of Calcutta. Can't
for the life of me fathom why.

 

Rabindranath is the most famous Tagore globally  - he was the first Asian to be awarded the Nobel for literature, he renounced his knighthood to protest against the Jallianwala Bagh massacre, he wrote thousands of songs and poems, reams of short stories, plays, novels, letters, essays, he erased the lines  of diglossia between colloquial spoken Bengali and  formal written Bengali, he is to Bengali what Shakespeare is to English. Two of his songs went on to be adopted as national anthems of two countries - India and Bangladesh. When the British colonial government proposed to divide Bengal along religious lines, he countered that with a Hindu-Muslim Rakhi ceremony, where members of the two communities came together to tie a rakhi (a sacred thread of protection and friendship traditionally tied by sisters on their brothers' wrists to honour sibling bonds). You will find buildings and streets and cultural institutions and schools named after him all across the world, from Argentina and Chile to Vietnam and Japan, from Paris and Dublin to Madrid and Prague, from Bali and Australia to Mexico and Mauritius and Egypt. So it stands to reason that in his birthplace the Jorasanko family property is a museum dedicated to Rabindranath's life and times and houses a university named after him. 

In addition, however, the Tagore family itself had many luminaries at the forefront of the Bengal Renaissance and Bengali socio-cultural life. The Bengal School of Art pioneered by Abanindranath Tagore (Rabindranath's nephew) impacted the development of Indian modern art. Jnanadanandini Devi (sister-in-law) popularised the Nivi style saree, the most common saree style associated with Indian women today.  The Tagores were major social reformers and championed women's education, opposed inhuman  caste- and gender discriminatory practices such as sati and actively encouraged widow remarriage. In short, the Tagore family's contributions to the religious (the Brahmo Samaj, grandfather Dwarakanath was a founding member), social, cultural, industrial and political life of 19th-20th century Bengal and indeed, wider India, cannot be overstated. Naturally, the museum has galleries dedicated to these other aspects of Bengal's history as well.  Read more about the Jorasanko Thakur Bari Museum by clicking the link here. For some reason photography in the galleries isn't permitted, I cannot fathom why.

I must have visited this as a young child but don't have any memories at all. Need to create some pronto. On my immediate to-visit list. 

~~~

Did you know about the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre? It happened on 13th April, 1919 so this is the 107th anniversary. Around 20,000 non-violent protesters and general picnickers/public had gathered in the open grounds known as Jallianwala Bagh in Amritsar, Punjab. The British had prohibited gatherings of more than four in Amritsar due to political tensions, but the announcements were made at a busy, noisy time and many residents had missed them. And so they had gathered there for the Vaisakhi holiday.  They were mowed down by gunfire by British troops without any attempts to disperse the crowd. 

There is a site museum there now (also on my wish-list), a memorial to the unarmed protesters/public killed by a ruthless colonial military officer called Colonel Reginald Dyer, who wrote in his report that he had heard that 200-300 people were shot dead and British troops had fired 1650 rounds of ammunition, about a third of what they had brought to the grounds.  British authorities said 379 people were killed, the Indians estimates vary between 1500 and 2000. Dyer was widely condemned in Britain, reprimanded by the Army Council and made to retire from duty the following year. 

QE II visited the site several times during her reign, also the then Prince Charles, David Cameron too but there have been zilch official apologies for the killings. For Jallianwala Bagh and/or the millions killed due to other colonial atrocities. Don't quite understand why because I don't think anyone in India is asking for/expecting reparations. Personally I don't believe descendants should be made to pay for their foreparents' crimes. that's just an impractical idea. I'd be quite okay with a token one quid and one whole, sincere apology. But neither is forthcoming and I'm not holding my breath. 

Thank you for visiting and for your patience on this one! Have a wonderful A-Z if you are taking the Challenge and a wonderful April if you're not!

Posted for the A-Z Challenge 2026