The Discovery Of India - pg. 173

Shah Jehan was a contemporary of Louis XIV of France, the grand monarch, and the Thirty Years' War was ravaging central Europe then. As Versailles took shape, the Taj Mahal and the Pearl Mosque grew up in Agra, and the Jame Masjid of Delhi and the Diwan-i-Aam and the Diwan-i-Khas in the imperial palace. These lovely buildings with a fairy-like beauty represent the height of Mughal splendor. The Delhi court, with its Peacock Throne, was more magnificent and luxurious than Versailles, but, like Versailles, it rested on a poverty-stricken and exploited people. There was a terrible famine in Gujrat and Deccan.