Taj Mahal

While the heyday of Agra (ahg-rah) was as the capital of the Mughal Empire between 1526 and 1658, the city was founded much earlier. There has been much debate regarding the origin of the city's name. The most commonly-held theory is that it comes from the Hindi-Urdu word agar (अगर), meaning "salt pan", referring to the region's brackish soil; salt was once made in the area by evaporation. Others derive it from the ancient epic, the Mahabharata, claiming that the name comes from Sanskrit agravana (अग्रवन), meaning "grove forest", indicating the first of the many small forests where Krishna frolicked with the gopis of Vrindavan. In the Mughal era, Agra was also known as Akbarabad, which was given by emperor Shah Jahan to honour his grandfather Akbar. The recorded history of Agra begins around the 11th century, and over the next 500 years, the city changed hands between various kings, both Hindu and Muslim.