Adana’da Yapı Toplulukları ve Şehrin Gelişimi

Abstract

In this paper, the building communinities that were constructed during the period of the Otoman Empire and Ramazanoğlu Seigniory and their contribution of these structures to the development of the city have been discussed. The cultural and political interaction of the town with neighbouring societies besides the Eastern Mediterranean, Anatolian region and outer Anatolian regions have been revealed. Adana formerly named as “Adaniye” had appeared in the historical sources around 2000 B.C. and was the only town that was located on the west side of the Seyhan River. However, the city had been ravaged by disasters such as earthquakes and floods throughout the history. It also faced invasions and wars because of its fertile plains and its river, consequently it could not develop that much. Except Romans˗ Byzantines and Ramazanoğulları seigniory, the city that could not make its presence felt until the late 19th century has become one of the largest cities in Turkey although it looked more like a small town thanks to the barriers built on Seyhan River coasts, dried swamps, industrialization in agriculture and reclamation works. Having started in the Selcuks era, the times of Turks in Adana has become persistent in the times of Ramazanoğulları seigniory (1352/1353˗ 1608) that belongs to Memluk State . The structures/ the building communities that are built in the final times of the seigniory and that have reached today, belong to the times of Halil Bey (1485-1513) and his son Piri Paşa (1485-1513). Being involved into Ottomans nationality in the time of Yavuz Sultan Selim, Ramazanoğulları had managed to stand united in the by way of domain status. From that day forth, Adana was a sanjak in Halep state, which has become an independent province in 1867, it had been insatisfactory in terms of public works in Ottoman times.

Until the conquest by Ramazanoğulları, Adana had been a small habitat that consist of three districts, which then began to expand with now neighborhoods whose name generally comes from the mosgue that the neighborhood is located around. Although there used to be 17 neighborhoods in Adana in 1525, the number rises to 28 in 1572, and to 45 in 1753, the number of neighborhoods were 62 in the first half of the 19th century.

Two types of building community can be seen in Adana. The first one with large scale communities that create the central backbone of the city, and the second one is small scale kulliyas ( building complexes in Islam) that create the cultural and the physical texture of neighborhood, which are not more than a few structures generally scattered around neighborhood or courtyards. All the other examples except Adana Ulu Cami, belong to the second category.

Some of the building communities in central Adana could reach today, some partially could, and the rest could not or could reach but have lost their all unique characteristics completely. In our work, status and the contribution of these building communities which are constructed in Ramazanoğulları and Ottomans era to the development of the city have been discussed.