The Construction Process of a School: The Antalya Kaleiçi Orthodox Christian Girls’ School (Dumlupınar Secondary School) in Ottoman Archival Documents

Abstract

Occupied by the Ottomans since the last quarter of the 14th century, Antalya had a demographic structure by which Muslims obtained a quantitative superiority in the period that followed. However, non-Muslim communities contained to maintain a demographic and social presence. These communities, especially the Rums (Greeks), were a significant element of urban society with their living spaces intramuros and in the adjacent hinterland of Antalya. Their social conditions were redefined by the Edict of Gülhane and the Reform Edict. These edicts gave them the right to construct their own public spaces along with other social rights. Accordingly, from the 19th century on, there is a significant rise in the number of public buildings constructed by these communities, especially in the vilayets. The situation is similarly characteristic of Ottoman Antalya. Throughout this study, the construction process of the modern Dumlupınar Secondary School, originally built in the late 19th-early 20th century for female children of Antalya’s Rum community, will be discussed in correlation with Ottoman archival documents. This study contributes to the literature on the Ottoman past of Antalya with its review of the original drawings of its plan and façade, which will be published for the first time.