Sultanhanı Kervansarayı

Sultanhanı Caravanserai is on the Kayseri-Sivas highway and is 47 km from Kayseri. It is inside the village bearing the same name. It was commissioned during the reign of the Seljuk Sultan Alaeddin Keykubat I between 1232-1236. In some publications, it is also referred to as Tuzhisarı Sultan Han.

Photo: General Directorate of Promotion

Sultanhanı Caravanserai is one of the typical Seljuk caravanserais. Although Seljuk caravanserais were designed according to the same plan, they also have different appearances from one another. This difference becomes evident through additional structures or elements. Sultanhanı, in particular, differs in appearance from other caravanserais with the pavilion mosque in its center.

Photo: General Directorate of Promotion

The caravanserai, oriented south-north, consists in its plan scheme of a rectangular covered section measuring 32 × 45 m. and rectangular open courtyard sections measuring 46 × 53 m.

Photo: General Directorate of Promotion

Almost the entire portal on the north façade has been restored. The door, set between two fluted piers, is surrounded by geometric and vegetal ornamental borders. As far as can be understood from the small amount of decoration that remains, after an interlaced sequence with meanders there is a wide geometric border consisting of a twelve- and eight-pointed star system.

Photo: General Directorate of Promotion

In the open courtyard of the caravanserai, on the front façade, there are two rectangular rooms with doors opening to the courtyard and the furnace section of the bath. The spaces are covered with pointed barrel vaults. On the west façade of the courtyard there is a bath consisting of four units, square in plan, three of them domed and one covered with a pointed barrel vault.

Photo: General Directorate of Promotion

To the south of the bath there are rectangular rooms covered with pointed barrel vaults, each consisting of three units. On the east façade of the courtyard there is the camel shelter section, consisting of two naves with seven pointed-arched openings resting on twelve supports. This section is covered with a pointed barrel vault in the east-west direction. On the front façade of the courtyard, on both sides of the gate, there are fluted piers; at the front corners, star-shaped piers; and on the side façades and the rear corners of the courtyard, polygonal buttresses provide support. On the inner and outer façades of the caravanserai courtyard, lion-headed spouts near roof level are noteworthy.

Photo: General Directorate of Promotion

In the middle of the courtyard is the pavilion mosque with its substructure of four arches. The mosque space, square in plan, measuring 8 × 8 m. externally and approximately 5,30 × 5,30 m. internally, was placed on a substructure consisting of four arched openings on four supports. At the corners of the mosque there are colonnettes, each decorated with different geometric patterns. On the east and south arches forming the substructure, there are opposing dragons depicted with scale-patterned curved bodies, slanted eyes, and pointed teeth.

Source:

1. Kayseri Governorship

2. TDV Encyclopedia of Islam

Places to Visit in Kayseri Address: On Sivas Road, Bünyan