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Beyşehir Encyclopedia / Article

Beyşehir under the Anatolian Seljuks

The Seljuk period brought a court landscape to the lake and laid foundations for the later medieval town.

Medieval BeyşehirHistory
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Lake and court

Sultan Alâeddin Keykubad I commissioned Kubadabad on the southwestern lake shore in the 1220s–1230s. Excavation reveals a complex of large and small palaces, service buildings and a boat house. The palace expresses a royal relationship to the lake distinct from the daily life of villages around it.[1]

The palace’s figured tiles and surviving foundations offer rare evidence for Seljuk courtly space. A historical chronicle attributed to Ibn Bîbî describes the sultan’s part in its design, while archaeological research establishes the layout and material record. The two kinds of evidence answer different questions.[1]

From frontier to town

The settlement that became Beyşehir was renewed during the Seljuk centuries. TDV’s Beyşehir article connects its development to Türkmen settlement and records Hacı Armağanşah’s role in the wider urban history. In the late thirteenth century the Eşrefoğulları transformed the town into their own political and architectural centre.[2]

This sequence should not collapse Kubadabad and Beyşehir into one capital: one was a lake-shore palace complex, the other a town that rose to prominence under a later dynasty. Their remains are linked by geography and political history, not by a single surviving city plan.[1][2]

Urban growth in the Seljuk centuries

M. Akif Erdoğru's TDV entry distinguishes the lake's older settlement history from the medieval re-establishment of the town. He writes that an earlier town existed by the mid twelfth century but had been ruined; Türkmen groups, largely Üçok according to his account, renewed it in the first half of the thirteenth century, probably before about 1240. This reconstruction is based partly on later place names and institutions, so it describes a documented historical interpretation rather than an excavated foundation date for every street.[3]

Erdoğru connects the Armağanşah quarter and mosque to Mübârizüddin Hacı Armağanşah, a court figure who endowed buildings in several Anatolian centres. This association shows that Beyşehir's early medieval town history involved more than the later Eşrefoğlu ruling family. Meanwhile the royal palace of Kubadabad lay on the opposite side of the lake. The court complex, the growing town and nearby villages shared a basin, but each had a different function and archaeological record.[4][5]

See also

Medieval BeyşehirKubadabad PalaceKubadabad is the excavated thirteenth-century Seljuk palace complex on the southwest shore of Lake Beyşehir.Medieval BeyşehirEşrefoğullarıThe Eşrefoğulları were a late thirteenth- and early fourteenth-century Anatolian beylik centred on Beyşehir.HistoryBeyşehirBeyşehir is a town and district in Konya province on the southeastern shore of Lake Beyşehir.Medieval BeyşehirAlâeddin Keykubad IAlâeddin Keykubad I was the Anatolian Seljuk sultan who commissioned the Kubadabad palace beside Lake Beyşehir.

References

  1. 1Kamil Uğurlu · Kubâdâbâd Sarayı · TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi · 2002
  2. 2M. Akif Erdoğru · Beyşehir - TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi · Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı İslâm Ansiklopedisi · 1992
  3. 3M. Akif Erdoğru · Beyşehir - TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi · Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı İslâm Ansiklopedisi · 1992 · medieval foundation and Türkmen settlement
  4. 4M. Akif Erdoğru · Beyşehir - TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi · Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı İslâm Ansiklopedisi · 1992 · Hacı Armağanşah and the town
  5. 5Kamil Uğurlu · Kubâdâbâd Sarayı · TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi · 2002 · location and construction

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