Sultanhan caravanserai is one of the most significant tourist attractions in central Anatolia , also the largest and best preserved Seljuk caravanserai in Turkey. The site is located on the highway between Konya and Aksaray provinces; about kilometers 68 miles north-west of Konya and 45 kilometers 28 miles away from Aksaray. The Sultanhan caravanserai was built in by Seljuk sultan Alaeddin Keykubad I when Aksaray was an important stopover along the Silk Road that crossed through Anatolia.

Navigation menu
SULTAN HANI CARAVANSERAI
Gallipoli National Park. Sultanhani Caravanserai. Sultan Bayezid II Complex. Samsun Archaelogy Museum. Galata Bridge. Legends of Istanbul. John Sirince Village. HISTORY One of the largest caravanserais in the worldwide, Sultan Hani Caravanserai was made in Seljuk Time in order to be used as an accommodation for the people, especially merchants and as a defence for trade ways which was the first insurance system those times.
It is especially known to be linked with the trade routes along the former Silk Roads. But more than that, there was an extensive network of caravanserais built along the whole network of trade routes in the Middle East and Central Asia. This network of caravanserais supported the flow of commerce, information, pilgrimage and people across the trade routes throughout the history of the different and extended Muslim empires covering Asia, India, North Africa, and South-Eastern Europe from the 9th till the 19th century. It is also rendered as caravansarai and caravansary. Many different terms are being used in different languages and countries for the same or similar buildings: akhcanya Aa. Most typically it was a building with a square or rectangular walled exterior, with a single portal wide enough to permit large or heavily laden beasts such as camels to enter. The courtyard was almost always open to the sky, and the inside walls of the enclosure were outfitted with a number of identical stalls, bays, niches, or chambers to accommodate merchants and their servants, animals, and merchandise. The courtyard could contain herds of up to hundreds of camels, horses, and mules.
A merchant weighs the product he is about to sell to determine the price. Merchants often gathered in large areas such as markets to sell their products. The journeys of merchant s and their caravans along the Silk Road through the Middle East, Central Asia, and North Africa would have been much more difficult if not for the caravanserais also spelled caravansary that dotted those ancient routes. Merchants and their caravan s were the most frequent visitors. In furnishing, safe respite for guests from near and far, caravanserais also became centers for the exchange of goods and culture. As traffic along the Silk Road increased, so did the construction of caravanserais.