"In some cities, Varanasi or Lucknow, for example, mosques dominate the landscape. In Varanasi, of course, deemed by many the Hindu city par excellence, small temples literally dot the ghats and city, although most of them date no earlier than the late eighteenth century It is particularly interesting that Rani Ahilya Bai Holkar’s newly constructed Vishvanath temple, the focal tirtha in all Varanasi, is notably smaller than the adjacent mosque constructed during Aurangzeb’s reign from the spoils of an earlier Vishvanath temple.” Yet the Rani was a woman of considerable resources, and the temple was built in 1777 when Hindu political power dominated in Varanasi.” Had she wished to build a larger temple, rather than one almost lost in the interior gullies of Dasashvamedh Ghat, she could have done so."