Bangalore is older than its glass towers: a 1537 mud fort, a Chola-era temple, Tipu Sultan's teakwood palace and a British Cantonment built after 1809. Three days through forts, tombs, museums and the pete's trading streets.
All that survives of Kempegowda's 1537 mud fort, rebuilt in stone by Hyder Ali in 1761 and stormed by Cornwallis in March 1791. The Delhi Gate, two bastions and a small Ganapathi temple remain. Open 08:30–17:30, closed Mondays.
Two-storey teakwood palace begun by Hyder Ali and finished by Tipu in 1791, its pillars and arches painted in floral fresco. Tipu called it Rash-e-Jannat, 'the envy of heaven'. A ground-floor museum shows Srirangapatna-era prints and Tipu's garments.
Built about 1689 in Vijayanagara-Dravidian style by the Wodeyars of Mysore, this granite temple sits beside the fort and predates the palace. Hyder Ali and Tipu both preserved it. Note the pillared mandapa and the black stone Venkataramana idol.
The oldest temple in the city, Chola-founded around the 12th century and expanded under Hiriya Kempegowda in the 16th. Its towering gopuram, 48 carved pillars and Nataraja reliefs sit in a working neighbourhood shrine. Evening aarti draws locals.
India's second-oldest museum, opened 1865 by Surgeon-Major Edward Balfour. Eighteen galleries hold Mohenjo-daro relics, Halebidu Hoysala sculpture, Vijayanagara coins and neolithic tools from Karnataka. Open 10:00–17:00, closed Mondays.
Consecrated 1816 for the British garrison, modelled on St Paul's in London with a shallow dome and Tuscan columns. It burned in 1923 and was rebuilt by 1927. The Anglican graveyard plaques record officers who died in the Mysore and Burma campaigns.
A 1930s mansion on Palace Road, once home to the Manikyavelu family, now holding 500 works tracing Indian art from the Company School and Raja Ravi Varma to Amrita Sher-Gil. Open 10:00–17:00, closed Mondays and public holidays.
Built 1878 for Rev. J. Garrett and bought by the Wodeyars in 1884, a Tudor-Revival pile of turrets, fluted columns and Gothic windows modelled on Windsor Castle. The audio guide covers the Mysore royal family's hunting trophies and Raja Ravi Varma canvases.
Kempegowda's original 1537 trading town, still laid out by trade: Chickpet for silk, Balepet for bangles, Tharagupete for grain. Narrow lanes, 19th-century timber-fronted shops and the Dharmaraya Swamy Temple, home of the Karaga festival.
One of four watchtowers Kempegowda II built around 1597 to mark the city's intended limits — the others stand at Ulsoor, Mekhri Circle and Ramana Maharshi Ashram. This one caps the Peninsular Gneiss outcrop, dated to roughly 3,000 million years.
The 1809 British Cantonment quarter: Hutchins Road bungalows with monkey-top gables, the Anglo-Indian enclave of Cox Town and the old Bowring Institute of 1868. Street names — Wellington, Cavalry, Brigade — still map the garrison's plan.
The 1868 Attara Kacheri ('eighteen offices'), a red Gothic building that housed Bangalore's colonial secretariat and now the Karnataka High Court, faces Vidhana Soudha. Its façade and the statue of Sir Mark Cubbon on horseback close a Cantonment day.