CONTRIBUTIONS OF BALKAN COUNTRIES TO CLASSICAL TURKISH LITERATURE

Abstract

If one of the signs of the level of development of countries is cities, the other is thelevel of the life of science, art and culture performed in these cities.Viewing thesituation of Balkan geography under the domination of Ottomans since 15thcentury, it is seen that there was a very lively literary and cultural life especially insome city centres.These centres were not only creating a convenient environmentbut were also raising poets and writers for many large centres, initially to Istanbul.Places like Skopje, Pristina, Prizren, Yenice Vardar, Shkodra, Silk, Plovdiv,Kyustendil, Bitola, Smederevo, Sarajevo, Tetovo, İştib, Serres were the centres weknow the life of literature was lively and where a good number of poets werebrought up. Among these, it is known that especially in 16. Century, numerous poetsgrew in Pristina, Prizren, Skopje and Vardar Yenice. In this paper, thecontributions these four Balkan cities made to classical Turkish literature arediscussed in sum.