Trade · a Light

Anatolian road inns were spaced one day's walk apart

The Seljuks of Anatolia built stone inns along their trade roads at intervals of about thirty kilometres, a day with loaded animals. The largest, the Sultan Han near Aksaray, was built in 1229 for Kayqubad I and covers some four and a half thousand square metres: an open courtyard with arcades and stables, a vaulted hall for winter, and a small mosque raised on four piers in the middle of the yard so that the animals could be led underneath it. The endowment deeds that paid for these buildings provide for lodging without charge for a set period, commonly three days, with food, fodder, a bath, medicine for the sick and shoeing for horses.

Sultan Han, near Aksaray · 1229