Bursa and Cumalıkızık: how the first Ottoman capital was built

The explanations distinguish finds, interpretations and open questions. Sources appear at the end of the page.

What the source says

The UNESCO page "Bursa and Cumalıkızık: the Birth of the Ottoman Empire" describes "a serial nomination of eight component sites in the City of Bursa and the nearby village of Cumalıkızık, in the southern Marmara region". According to the page, the property illustrates the creation of an urban and rural system establishing the Ottoman Empire "in the early 14th century", and Bursa is described as "the first capital of the Ottoman Empire". Source 1.

Five focal points

According to the page, the specific development of the city "emerged from five focal points, mostly on hills, where the five sultans (Orhan Ghazi, Murad I, Yıldırım Bayezid, Çelebi Mehmed, Murad II) established public kulliyes", which determined the boundaries of the city. Houses were constructed near the kulliyes, turning into neighbourhoods around them. The ensembles created by the components include khans, a bedesten, mosques, madrasahs, tombs, hamams and houses, among them the tomb of Orhan Ghazi, whom the page calls "founder of the Ottoman dynasty". Source 1.

The waqf village

Cumalıkızık is described as a waqf village, "meaning that it permanently belonged to an institution", as "the best preserved waqf village in Bursa" and as the only rural village of this system to show the provision of hinterland support for the capital. That is the page's answer to how the capital was built: not a single plan, but foci of public complexes around which neighbourhoods grew, with a village belonging to an institution that supported the city. Source 1.

Dating

The page dates in two wordings: the creation of the system and of the first capital "in the early 14th century", and "the birth of the Ottoman Empire in the 14th and early 15th centuries"; the method of building around kulliyes, the page says, developed during the foundation of the first capital and expanded "until the middle of the 15th century". All of this falls within the period of the beyliks and the early Ottomans on this site, approximately 1300-1453. The page gives no date for any of the five kulliyes, so it does not show in which order the focal points arose. The Met's timeline for 1400-1600 calls Bursa, in the entry for 1413-1421, "a cultural center attracting migrant artists". The kulliyes partially suffered destruction in the 1855 earthquake, and the page mentions 19th-century additions and partial reconstructions. Sources 1, 2.

Scope of reading: the UNESCO World Heritage Centre page on Bursa and Cumalıkızık and the Met timeline page for Anatolia and the Caucasus, 1400-1600 A.D., were read on 24 October 2026. The waqf documents, inscriptions and building surveys were not read.