Destiny of the Prisoners of War in Sarajevo in the 16th Century

Abstract

Ottoman arrival in the Balkan brought considerable changes to the cities of that region. Their characteristics were: numerous, mostly Moslem population, monumental islamic buildings and bazaar streets with various crafts. The number of city population was constantly growing during the 16th century, while its religious structure was changing in favour of the Moslems. lt was caused by the mass islamization of the native population, as well as by the method of moving and colonization. In Sarajevo, for example, from the middle of the l51h century, when Isa-bey lshaković started the urbanization of this city by bulding his endowments, the majority of the population were the Christians, while near the end of the 16th century the Moslems were in the majority. Sarajevo at that time had 5.535 houses. 4.382 houses were Moslem, 140 were Christian and 3 houses were Jewish. The population of Sarajevo was mainly native, autochtonous population that immigrated there from the city surrounding and the neighboring sanjaks, as well as from the Eastern provinces of the Ottoman Empire. The censuses of Sarajevo from the 16th century show that among the population was also the considerable number of staves, mostly free staves of Croatian, Hungarian and Slovenian descent.

The present paper speaks about the destiny of the prisoners who found themselves in Sarajevo. Some of them were sold in the slave markets, the others returned to their homes by way of the exchange of prisoners or simply by way of escape, while the majority of them remained in Sarajevo, where after they had accepted Islam they were set free and became equal with other citizens trying to adapt themselves to the circumstances in Bosnia.