The Manora Fort is situated away from

Pattukkottai Pattukkottai is a major town in Thanjavur district in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu and also important town in Delta districts and Commercial town of Thanjavur, Thiruvarur and Pudukkottai district Coastal areas. The town came to prominence th ...

Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is the southernmost States and union territories of India, state of India. The List of states and union territories of India by area, tenth largest Indian state by area and the List of states and union territories of Indi ...

, India and away from

Thanjavur Thanjavur (), also known as Thanjai, previously known as Tanjore, Pletcher 2010, p. 195 is a city in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is the 12th biggest city in Tamil Nadu. Thanjavur is an important center of southern Indian religion, art ...

. The fort was built by

Maratha The Marathi people (; Marathi: , ''Marāṭhī lōk'') or Marathis (Marathi: मराठी, ''Marāṭhī'') are an Indo-Aryan ethnolinguistic group who are native to Maharashtra in western India. They natively speak Marathi, an Indo-A ...

ruler

Serfoji II Serfoji II (, ) (24 September 1777 – 7 March 1832), also known as Sarabhoji II Bhonsle, was the last sovereign ruler of the Maratha principality of Thanjavur. He ruled from 1787 to 1793, and again from 1798 until his death in 1832. He was adop ...

in 1814–1815 to commemorate the successful advance of the British over

Napoléon Bonaparte Napoleon Bonaparte (born Napoleone di Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French general and statesman who rose to prominence during the French Revolution and led Military career ...

. It is an eight-storeyed,

hexagon In geometry, a hexagon (from Greek , , meaning "six", and , , meaning "corner, angle") is a six-sided polygon. The total of the internal angles of any simple (non-self-intersecting) hexagon is 720°. Regular hexagon A regular hexagon is de ...

al tower, which is 23 m high overlooking the

Bay of Bengal The Bay of Bengal is the northeastern part of the Indian Ocean. Geographically it is positioned between the Indian subcontinent and the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese peninsula, located below the Bengal region. Many South Asian and Southe ...

. The fort derives its name Manora, from the word ''

Minaret A minaret is a type of tower typically built into or adjacent to mosques. Minarets are generally used to project the Muslim call to prayer (''adhan'') from a muezzin, but they also served as landmarks and symbols of Islam's presence. They can h ...

''. In December 2004, five monuments including the fort were damaged in the

Indian Ocean tsunami On 26 December 2004, at 07:58:53 local time (UTC+7), a major earthquake with a magnitude of 9.2–9.3 struck with an epicentre off the west coast of Aceh in northern Sumatra, Indonesia. The undersea megathrust earthquake, known in the scient ...

. It was planned in 2007 by the State Tourism Department to renovate the structure and improve its infrastructure by building several additional facilities including upgrading the children's park and building a tourist's shed.

History

The fort was built by Tanjavur Maratha ruler

(1777-1832 CE) in 1814–1815 to commemorate the successful advance of the British over

(15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821) in the

Battle of Waterloo The Battle of Waterloo was fought on Sunday 18 June 1815, near Waterloo, Belgium, Waterloo (then in the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, now in Belgium), marking the end of the Napoleonic Wars. The French Imperial Army (1804–1815), Frenc ...

in 1815. The fort acted as a residence for the royal family and also as a light-house.

Architecture

The fort is located in away from

and away from

in a place called Sarabendrarajanpattinam in shores of

. The word ''Manora'' is believed to be derived from the word ''

minar Minar may refer to: *Minar (Firuzabad), a structure in Iran * Minar Rahman, Bangladeshi singer-songwriter * Ivo Minář, Czech tennis player * Thomas J. Minar, American academic administrator *Minar, an alternate spelling for minaret A minare ...

'' meaning tower. The fort is hexagonal structure and has eight storeys, raising to a height of tapering to its top. The tower is surrounded by a wall and a moat ant it resembles a fort. The monument looks like a

pagoda A pagoda is a tiered tower with multiple eaves common to Thailand, Cambodia, Nepal, India, China, Japan, Korea, Myanmar, Vietnam, and other parts of Asia. Most pagodas were built to have a religious function, most often Buddhist, but some ...

, with arched windows, circular staircase and eaves separating one storey from the other. Manora fort board

Renovation in modern times

The restoration and conservation of the monument was started in 2000 and completed in 2003. Tourists are allowed access up to the second level of the fort. A considerable part of the fort was damaged during the

in 2004. The Tamil Nadu state Tourism Development Corporation allocated for improving the infrastructure around the fort. The project was to develop children's park to have additional facilities, provide additional lighting, install display boards, plant saplings along the road, lay new road from Sethu Road to the fort and modify thatched umbrella roof structures on the beach. The fort is one of the most prominent tourist attractions in the district.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Manora (Fort) Forts in Tamil Nadu Thanjavur