Leon de Laborde's visit to Alahan in 1826 provided the earliest western account of the monastery complex that is now so closely associated with the work of the British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara through the excavations conducted by Michael Gough. Laborde was not, however, the first of the modern visitors. He was preceded by the indefatigable Evliya Çelebi, who visited the site in 1671–1672, while on his way to Mecca for the pilgrimage. Evliya followed more or less the course of the modern highway from Karaman to Mut, and I give below the full account of his journey between these two stations. Of the two primary authorities for the text, I have used MS. Pertev Pş 462, f. 68a as my chief source, with supplements from MS. Beşir Aǧa 452, f. 68a (a fuller, but less scrupulous, and on the whole less intelligent copy). The two copies vary more than is normally to be expected. The lost exemplar may have become increasingly unclear in the final two volumes, and the copyists were probably tiring of their monumental task. In the 1935 modernization of Seyahatname, Vol. IX, the passage occurs on pages 315–316.
