Travel - India

World's largest sundial

Near the City Palace is a collection of astronomical instruments built by Maharaja Sawai Jai Singh, the founder of Jaipur. This celestial observatory is called the Jantar Mantar, which means “calculating instrument”. It was in operation years earlier, but at least 23 astronomers were employed at the observatory in 1735.

One of the instruments, the Laghu Samrat Yantra, is a sundial that can measure time to an accuracy of 20 seconds. This was not good enough for the Maharaja, so he built a much larger sundial for more accuracy. The Vrihat Samrat Yantra is the world's largest, with an accuracy of 2 seconds.