2025/02/04 by Özkan Akpınar · 1 voice
Social Sciences · Arts and Humanities · #Islamic Studies and History #Eurasian Exchange Networks #Ottoman and Turkish Studies
paper · doi:10.1080/19448953.2025.2461968
openalex publication_date 2025/02/04 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/06/15
The rise of the Eastern Mediterranean ports for international trade and the commercialization of agricultural production in the late Ottoman Empire made the land around the ports a profitable resource, prompting efforts to turn wetland regions into arable land. This article focuses on one such reclamation project in the empire’s Balkan territory of Serres, Thessalonica, along the River Karasu and Lake Tahyanos at the end of the nineteenth century. It narrates the development of the project from the initial efforts of the local administration into a full-fledged commercial enterprise. The reclamation process is shown to be highly contested as various actors and stakeholders, including the Public Debt Administration (PDA), international and domestic entrepreneurs, and peasants, struggled over the wetland region, and the central and local governments endeavoured to cope with the resulting difficulties.