The Samadhi of Ranjit Singh is a 19th-century building in Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan, that houses the funerary urns of the former Sikh Maharaja Ranjit Singh. It is located within the Walled City, adjacent to the Lahore Fort, Badshahi Mosque, and the Gurdwara Dera Sahib. Its construction was started by his son and successor, Maharaja Kharak Singh, after the Maharaja's death in 1839, and completed nine years later. It overlooks the Hazuri Bagh, built by Ranjit Singh, to its south.
History
thumb|Photograph of the Samadhi of Maharaja Ranjit Singh in Lahore, Sikh Empire, by [[John McCosh, 1849]]
Maharaja Ranjit Singh died on Thursday, 27 June 1839, with there being a large funeral and cremation of his remains. The hair of the corpse was washed with Ganges water, the body was bathed and dressed in new clothes, being placed on a bier of sandalwood decorated with gold flowers. Four queens, most principally Rani Katochan, committed sati on his funeral pyre. Three days after the cremation, Kharak Singh retrieved his father's ashes. However, according to Khan, the construction of the monument was still not totally complete when the British annexed the territory in 1849. Portions of the building are believed to have been plundered from the adjacent Lahore Fort.
The building has gilded fluted domes and cupolas, and an ornate balustrade around the upper portion of the building. The front of the doorway has images of Ganesh, Devi and Brahma that are cut from red sandstone. The dome is decorated with Nāga (serpent) hood designs - the product of Hindu craftsmen that worked on the project. The wooden panels on the ceiling are decorated with stained glass work, while the walls are richly decorated with floral designs. The ceilings are decorated with glass mosaic work.
Funerary urns
Ranjit Singh's ashes are contained in a marble urn in the shape of a lotus, sheltered under a marble pavilion inlaid with pietra dura, in the centre of the tomb. Surrounding him, in smaller urns, are the ashes of four Hindu sati queens and seven concubines.
Scholarly assessments
right|thumb|The [[samadhi combines Hindu, Islamic, and Sikh motifs.]]Various authors in the 19th and 20th centuries, such as Thornton, Khan, Ihsan H. Nadiem, Nazir Ahmed Chaudhry, Kamil Khan Mumtaz, F. S. Aijazuddin, wrote assessments on the architecture of the samadhi, with most being negative due to being influenced by views first expressed by Thornton. Forty-eight individual fresco wall-paintings remain on the two-levels of the samadhi's interior. along with their wives.