New findings through endowments concerning mosques and masjids of Istanbul

Abstract

It is known that the services, which are provided on socio-economic fields by foundations have diversified over years. Foundations constitute an indispensable part of Ottoman daily life. Details on the subject can be found in endowments, which represent the articles of association of such foundations. Whereas they concretized emotions and opinions thanks to benefactor endowments. They also conveyed information, which reflect their periods of activity, until today. In this scope, advancing Ottoman urban historiography through analyzing endowments can be considered as a source of knowledge to reach detailed and comprehensive results obtained from primary sources. While the studies on foundations have generally been illustrated through real estate foundations, moveable property foundations were not analyzed sufficiently. On the other hand, cash waqfs came to the forefront during researches on moveable property foundations that were conducted in limited numbers. As cash waqfs were handled as credit factors in such researches, only their numerical data was evaluated in the economic field. When endowments are examined as a whole, it seen that beyond what is known, cash waqfs include as much socio-cultural information as real estate foundations. The purpose of the study is to carry the cash waqfs away from the narrow frame they are trapped in and search into their contributions to the sustainability of charities. The selected examples allow tracking the changes that charities, which were contributed by several cash waqfs, underwent through years.