Speaking Archaeologically™

Speaking Archaeologically Scavenger Hunt 2019 What if, one Sunday, I ask you to visit your city's museum and look at every object housed there in the gallery? I know, you'd counter me with, “ Who goes to a Museum on a Sunday !” right? Rattan Kaur Rainu  Now what if I tell you, you'll be given a handout with out-of- focus pictures of the objects and you have to run up and down the different galleries of the museum, upload the pictures of the artefacts on Instagram with #SAHUNT2019 within a time limit and whoever finds the maximum number of objects wins the competition? Exciting, isn't it ? Now, won't you surely visit the Museum? To inculcate this habit of exploring the Archaeological jewels housed in the most significant museum of the country, I, with the help of Shriya, organised a Member-run-open-to-all Scavenger Hunt at the National Museum, Delhi. On January 6, 2019, I hosted the aforementioned event on behalf of Speaking  Archaeologically. A...

The words of a rather contemporary namesake poet Shayar Jamali, somehow perfectly describes the gloomy conditions of the 16 th century structure: Samiksha Purohit is a Citizen Archaeology Member at Speaking Archaeologically since May 2019. ‘’ Shayad ab kuch kam ho jae mere ghar ki virani,   Makdi jaale taan rahi hai ghar ke roshandaano mein’ ’ The Jamali Kamali mosque stands in the middle of the Mehrauli Archaeological Park, New Delhi. Once a monument with greater glory than its adjacent standing Qutub Minar, is now a supposed haunted place and a safe keeper of the ‘love story’ between its name givers- Jamali and Kamali. Sheikh Fazulla Jalali, or Jamali, a court poet during the reign of Babur, is said to have commissioned the mosque. While the identity of Jamali has a strong historicity attached to it, Kamali on the other hand remains a mystery. A contemporary poet, Jamali’s wife, his servant, his brother, a fictional name to rhyme with Jamali- the anecdotes ar...