OTTOMAN ARCHITECTURAL HERITAGE OUTSIDE THE TURKISH REPUBLIC
The examples of Turkish architecture can be found all across the vast Ottoman Empire covering the time span of over 600 years. The extent of this architectural heritage has been fully documented only in the European lands of the Empire in Balkans, thanks to the work of Ekrem Hakki Ayverdi. His work, published between 1980 and 1982, documented Turkish architectural examples of 235 in Romania, 725 in Hungary, 6941 in former Yugoslavia, 1015 in Albania, 3370 in Greece and 3340 in Bulgaria.
These, totaling about sixteen thousand, do not include the examples in Rodos, Istankoy, Sakiz, Limni and other islands in the Agean Sea as well as the island of Cyprus. If one looks at the breakdown of these at just two contries, Bulgaria and Greece, the following picture emerges: In Bulgaria, 2356 mosques, 420 schools, 42 buildings for charity (imaret), 174 religious meeting houses (tekke), 116 inns, 113 Turkish bath houses, 27 mausoleums, 24 bridges, 75 fountains, 26 kervansarays.
In addition, there are clock towers, bazaars, tombs, forts and castles and uncountable number of houses. If we look at Greece, a similar picture emerges with 2336 mosques, 504 various types of schools, 307 religious meeting houses, 207 various buildings for charity, 171 inns, 134 Turkish bath houses, 30 mousoleums, 25 bridges, 22 castles, 10 kervansarays, 10 fountains, 6 aqueducts, 5 watch towers. As in everywhere else, there are also uncountable number of markets or bazaars, tombs and houses.
Examples to some of these historical heritage can be found in the link below. Examples of Ottoman and Seljuk structures represent many centuries long Turkish heritage and culture over vast areas of these empires. Some still survive today despite mindless cultural barbarism exercised in many countries from former Yugoslavia, Macedonia, Greece to Arabic countries such as Saudi Arabia.
Source: http://www.turkishculture.org
