Guide
The complex was built by İsmail Bey, the last ruler of the Candarid beylik, and it holds a mosque, a tomb, a medrese, a han, a bath and a library — a group of buildings that shows the art of the beylik period at its best. It stands on the Sahinsah rock in the İsmail Bey quarter of Kastamonu, and there are two rock tombs of the seventh century BC on the rock itself.
It was a centre of trade and of learning in its day, and part of it is in use again: the camel han and the medrese inside the complex have been laid out afresh by the provincial governorate and serve as a centre for regional cooking and handicrafts. It is opposite the police headquarters in the İsmail Bey quarter.
