The Taj Mahal (泰姬陵) is a love story, a sad and beautiful one. If it didn’t exist, we would easily imagine that the story of its construction was simply a fairy tale. Three hundred years ago, there lived an Indian emperor called Shah Jahan. His wife was a beautiful and bright woman whom he loved greatly. Her title was Mumtazl Mahal: its shortened form Taj Mahal, means “pride of the palace”. In the year 1630 this beloved wife of the emperor died. He was so brokenhearted that he thought of giving up his throne. He decided out of his love for his wife, to build her the most beautiful tomb that had ever been seen. He summoned the best artists and architects from India, Turkey, Persia and Arabia and finally, the design was complete. It took more than twenty thousand men working over a period of 18 years to build the Taj Mahal, one of the most beautiful buildings in the world. The building itself stands on a marble platform 29 meters square and 6-7 meters high. Towers rise from each of the four corners. The Mahal itself soars another 61 meters into the air. It is an eight-sided building made of white marble. The emperor planned to build an identical tomb of black marble for himself on the other side of the river connected by a silver bridge. However, his son put him into a prison in the palace before he could finish, and for the rest of his life, he could only gaze across the river at the tomb of his beloved wife. 小题1: The whole passage tells us about ______.
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