City Museum Udaipur

The City Palace museum is housed in the City Palace at Udaipur and is its main attraction. It is reached through the Ganesh Deori or the Door of Lord Ganesh. Made in 1890, it is among the earliest museums of Rajasthan. This museum is also called Pratap Museum.

The exhibits here include the famous Mor Chowk, with its extraordinary peacock mosaics made in late the 19th century. The enamelled peacock is made in the inlay work that is an art form of Rajasthan. It is encrusted with lapis lazuli and other stones, is 2^½ ft high and is set in a panel of ornamental leaf patterns. The chowk was built by Maharana Karan Singh to use as his new Durbar. The peacocks were added two hundred years later in the 19th century by Maharana Sajjan Singh. Above the mosaics, there is a series of figures from the mid-19th century, inlaid in glasswork on the outer walls of the Surya Prakash.

The other museum artefacts include antique paintings of Mewar, Rajasthani art, coins, sculptures, inscriptions, portraits and wall-paintings. The turban of Prince Khurram, later Emperor ShahJahan is also on display here. The armour worn by Maharana Pratap in his battle against Emperor Akbar and the war bugle and drums of Rana Sanga as well as the fake trunk used as the armour of Maharana Pratap's horse Chetak, are all the pride of City Museum at Udaipur. Chetak's armour was so designed that enemy horses would take it to be an elephant and think twice about attacking its rider, while enemy elephants would mistake it to be a baby elephant and thus hesitate to attack it.

Not only these, the museum also has finest cotton, silken brocade and muslin and necklaces, belts, rings, bracelets and anklets worn by royalty on display.

This fabulous museum is open from 0930hrs to 1630 Hrs everyday and is closed on Sundays.