Evaluation on Khans of the Ottoman Period in Diyarbakir

Abstract

Our research is about Diyarbakir's architectural features and the city's busy trade potential between the period of the Ottoman rule of Diyarbakir and the Republican term. It was found that there were 25 caravansaries that were known their name in Diyarbakir until the period of Ottoman. Only four of these caravansaries reached completely or partially up to now; when it comes to the location, only nine of them could be identified by archival documents; there was no information about the other structures except their names. The planning, the external mass, the internal appearance and the material used in these architectures remain connected with the Ottoman tradition, but they mainly exhibit regional characteristics. According to our data, all the inns which we identified their planning styles, were built by doing some user spaces around a courtyard. The flat roofs with wooden girder, the crib with a dome, mirrored and cross vaults were applied variations. The dome transitions were provided by squinches. Diyarbakir trade buildings were mostly made of dark basalt stone in cutting method as well as white or yellowish lime that were ordered alternatively. It was concluded that the structures had decoration styles exhibiting characteristics of their period to a certain extent. The simple decoration style away from exaggeration was in floral, geometric, and partly written arrangements. It was found that in Diyarbakir which has a rich architecture with numerous and different types of structures, several buildings were built by state for the progress of trade in both regional and international trade network in reliable ways and stable conditions; however, some of these structures lost their essential features because of several damages, unconscious interventions and some additions while some others were neglected.