English

The interior of the Caravanserai of Saʿd al-Saltaneh in Qazvin, Iran.

The view from the courtyard of the Shah Abbas Caravanserai, now a hotel, in Isfahan, Iran.

Plan of a Safavid caravanserai

Alternative forms

• caravansarai, caravansary

Noun

caravanserai ‎(plural caravanserais)

1. A roadside inn having a central courtyard where caravans can rest.
   • 1859, Omar Khayyám, The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám translated by Edward FitzGerald, XVI,

     Think, in this batter'd Caravanserai / Whose Doorways are alternate Night and Day, / How Sultán after Sultán with his Pomp / Abode his Hour or two, and went his way.

   • 1938, George Orwell, Down and Out in Paris and London, Chapter XXXIV,

     When we got to Cromley, it was too early to go to the spike, and we walked several miles farther, to a plantation beside a meadow, where one could sit down. It was a regular caravanserai of tramps—one could tell it by the worn grass and the sodden newspaper and rusty cans that they had left behind.

   • 1990, Peter Hopkirk, The Great Game, Folio Society 2010, p. 48:

     Eight days later, after leaving the desert and riding through neatly tended villages and snow-capped mountain scenery, he arrived there, hiring himself a room in a caravanserai near the bazaar.

2. (humorous) An upscale hotel.
   • 1838, Anonymous, A Guide to the Lakes of Killarney and the South of Ireland, London: J. Onwhyn, p. 56,

     By the bye it is as well to mention, for the benefit of the inexperienced, that there are no Inns in Ireland; all are hotels, from the lowest road cabin to the splendid caravanserai, with all its appurtenances of luxury and ease.

   • 1940, Sinclair Lewis, Bethel Merriday, London: Jonathan Cape, Chapter XXVII, p. 281,

     Six anxious inquiries of marble-fronted-hotel clerks about rates; and twice when she angrily made it plain she couldn't afford it, and quit the caravanserai where Andy and Mahala and Mrs. Boyle were to loll in kitchenette-bedizened splendour and hunted up a smaller hotel that looked like a private house with obesity.

3. A home or shelter for caravans.

Synonyms

• khan
• sarai, serai

Translations

References

• Hillenbrand, Robert. 1994. Islamic Architecture: Form, function and meaning. NY: Columbia University Press. (see Chapter VI for an in depth overview of the caravanserai).
• Sims, Eleanor. 1978. Trade and Travel: Markets and Caravanserais.' In: Michell, George. (ed.). 1978. Architecture of the Islamic World - Its History and Social Meaning. London: Thames and Hudson Ltd, 80-111.
• Yavuz, Aysil Tükel. 1997. The Concepts that Shape Anatolian Seljuq Caravanserais. In: Gülru Necipoglu (ed). 1997. Muqarnas XIV: An Annual on the Visual Culture of the Islamic World. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 80-95. Available online as a PDF document, 1.98 MB archnet.org/library/pubdownloader/pdf/8967/doc/DPC1304.pdf.