The house of Kapurthala traces it's ancestory to the House of Jaisalmer in Rajasthan and before that, to the misl or tribe leader or soldier. Baba Jassa Singh who, between 1747 and his death in 1783 , gradually carved for himself, a kingdom in the Doab area - the land between two rivers. After the Second Sikh War and the 1857 Mutiny, the State was given zamindari lands in the United Province.

Maharaja Jagatjit Singh was a distinguished ruler who ascended the throne at the age of five in 1890. He hired Monsieur Marcel, of France, to design a chateau similar to the one at Versailles, it was named Jagatjit Palace after it's completion in 1906.