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Karacaahmet Cemetery
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Karacaahmet Cemetery
The Karacaahmet Cemetery (Turkish: Karacaahmet Mezarlığı) is a 700-year-old historic cemetery located in Üsküdar, on the Asian side of Istanbul. Karacaahmet cemetery is the largest and second oldest in Istanbul at 750 acres (3.0 km2), and the largest burial ground in Turkey by number of interred.
The cemetery was named after a warrior companion of Orhan, the second Ottoman sultan and is believed to have been founded in the mid-14th century. Karacaahmet Cemetery, which hosts many bird species, looks like a forest with trees such as cypress, plane tree, oak, laurel, hackberry, and various other plants. The burial ground is covered by high cypress trees.
As a 700-year-old burial ground of historical importance, Karacaahmet Cemetery was declared a natural protected area and national historical landmark site in 1991, in accordance with the decision of the Istanbul Cultural and Natural Heritage Preservation Board. According to this decision, the cemetery area can only be used for burial of the dead, the cemetery cannot be removed or used as a park area in any way.
Karacaahmet Cemetery comprises 12 parcels, each dedicated to different religious groups. Many historical headstones can still be seen with inscriptions written in the Ottoman Turkish alphabet, a version of the Arabic alphabet. The total number of burials is not known precisely, because no records were kept in the past, but it is estimated in millions. Because the burial registers of the Istanbul Cemeteries Directorate started to be kept only after 1937.
The shrine of Karaca Ahmet Sultan, a 13th-century physician and saint of Bektashis, a tariqah of Islam, is situated within the cemetery. There are also many other historical tombs and masjids, which is the Arabic word for mosques, built during the Ottoman period.
The cemetery, which began to expand in parallel with the increase in the Turkish population during the reign of Sultan Murad I, expanded further after the conquest of Istanbul in 1453. Karacaahmet was officially turned into a cemetery in 1582 by the mother of Murad III and Selim II's wife, Nurbanu Sultan, who donated 124 hectares of land from her own property for a city cemetery and ordered the cypress trees to be planted there. In addition, she appointed 13 guards for the preservation of these cypress trees and 24 people as gravediggers for the burial of dead.
The name of the cemetery, which was first mentioned in official sources as the cemetery of Karacaahmet Sultan in 1698, is also "Usküdar Mekabir-i Muslimini".
This cemetery, which was originally an empty, vast and clean ground, has always been a favorite place for the people of Istanbul for centuries and has served as a burial ground without interruption since its foundation.
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Karacaahmet Cemetery
The Karacaahmet Cemetery (Turkish: Karacaahmet Mezarlığı) is a 700-year-old historic cemetery located in Üsküdar, on the Asian side of Istanbul. Karacaahmet cemetery is the largest and second oldest in Istanbul at 750 acres (3.0 km2), and the largest burial ground in Turkey by number of interred.
The cemetery was named after a warrior companion of Orhan, the second Ottoman sultan and is believed to have been founded in the mid-14th century. Karacaahmet Cemetery, which hosts many bird species, looks like a forest with trees such as cypress, plane tree, oak, laurel, hackberry, and various other plants. The burial ground is covered by high cypress trees.
As a 700-year-old burial ground of historical importance, Karacaahmet Cemetery was declared a natural protected area and national historical landmark site in 1991, in accordance with the decision of the Istanbul Cultural and Natural Heritage Preservation Board. According to this decision, the cemetery area can only be used for burial of the dead, the cemetery cannot be removed or used as a park area in any way.
Karacaahmet Cemetery comprises 12 parcels, each dedicated to different religious groups. Many historical headstones can still be seen with inscriptions written in the Ottoman Turkish alphabet, a version of the Arabic alphabet. The total number of burials is not known precisely, because no records were kept in the past, but it is estimated in millions. Because the burial registers of the Istanbul Cemeteries Directorate started to be kept only after 1937.
The shrine of Karaca Ahmet Sultan, a 13th-century physician and saint of Bektashis, a tariqah of Islam, is situated within the cemetery. There are also many other historical tombs and masjids, which is the Arabic word for mosques, built during the Ottoman period.
The cemetery, which began to expand in parallel with the increase in the Turkish population during the reign of Sultan Murad I, expanded further after the conquest of Istanbul in 1453. Karacaahmet was officially turned into a cemetery in 1582 by the mother of Murad III and Selim II's wife, Nurbanu Sultan, who donated 124 hectares of land from her own property for a city cemetery and ordered the cypress trees to be planted there. In addition, she appointed 13 guards for the preservation of these cypress trees and 24 people as gravediggers for the burial of dead.
The name of the cemetery, which was first mentioned in official sources as the cemetery of Karacaahmet Sultan in 1698, is also "Usküdar Mekabir-i Muslimini".
This cemetery, which was originally an empty, vast and clean ground, has always been a favorite place for the people of Istanbul for centuries and has served as a burial ground without interruption since its foundation.
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