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50 Biggest Cities in the Ottoman Empire in 1900 with a Map

With the help of a map, can you name the most populous cities of the Sublime Ottoman State in 1900?
Click on the map to zoom in.
Includes vassal states that were nominally subject to the Sublime Porte (e.g. Bulgaria).
Excluding territories occupied by the U.K. and Austria-Hungary (e.g. Egypt, Cyprus, Bosnia and Novi Pazar)
Sources used for population estimates listed in this Pastebin.
Quiz by Dekkie
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Last updated: February 11, 2024
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First submittedFebruary 11, 2024
Times taken284
Average score56.0%
Rating4.86
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Population
Cities
900k
Constantinople
(Istanbul)
201k
Smyrna
(İzmir)
165k
Damascus
145k
Baghdad
130k
Aleppo
125k
Salonica
(Thessaloniki)
118k
Beirut
81k
Adrianople
(Edirne)
71k
Bursa
67k
Sofia
65k
Karbala
60k
Kayseri
60k
Mecca
60k
Mosul
58k
San'aa
56k
Jerusalem
55k
Urfa
Population
Cities
52k
Maraş
(Kahramanmaraş)
48k
Erzurum
45k
Hama
45k
Konya
43k
Aintab
(Gaziantep)
43k
Sivas
42k
Plovdiv
41k
Serez
(Serres)
40k
Gaza City
40k
Trabzon
38k
Bidlis
(Bitlis)
37k
Manastır
(Bitola)
35k
Aydın
35k
Homs
35k
Manisa
35k
Tekfurdağı
(Tekirdağ)
34k
Ruse
Population
Cities
33k
Al Hudaydah
33k
Janina
(Ioannina)
33k
Varna
32k
Ankara
32k
İskenderiye-i Arnavud
(Shkodër)
32k
Üsküb
(Skopje)
31k
Jaffa
(Tel Aviv-Yafo)
30k
Adana
30k
Basra
30k
Hillah
30k
Jeddah
30k
Kirkuk
30k
Malatya
30k
Medina
30k
Prizren
30k
Tripoli
+2
Level 55
Feb 11, 2024
The Ottoman Empire was very much on its last leg in the turn of the 20th century. Only about 22 years after this would the Sultanate fall and the modern-day Republic of Turkey would be proclaimed the following year under Atatürk.

As can be seen on the map, the Ottomans effectively lost control over the Vilayet of Bosnia and the Sanjak of Novi Pazar to Austria-Hungary, while the Sanjak of Cyprus and the autonomous regions of Kuwait and Egypt were lost to Britain.

These regions were occupied and only annexed later. Austria-Hungary would annex Bosnia in 1908 but withdraw from Novi Pazar. Cyprus and Egypt were annexed in 1914 while Kuwait effectively stopped being part of the empire shortly after World War I.

+2
Level 73
Feb 12, 2024
Nice quiz!

But a few things.

1. Could you be a bit more generous in type-ins for a few places like Skadar (Shkoder) please?

2. Just a personal opinion from a nobody, I think it would've been better to exclude Bulgaria (and Eastern Rumelia) too, for consistency's sake. I see that you've excluded de jure Ottoman lands under European occupation. Since you've decided to include cities under de facto Ottoman rule only on that front, wouldn't it have been better to do the same with Bulgaria?

+2
Level 55
Feb 12, 2024
Thanks!

1. This specific type-in will be added, but I tried to be pretty generous with the type-ins as there's just so much to add.

2. I knew opinions would differ on this and I've even thought of excluding Bulgaria, but it all really comes down to "it's complicated". Bulgaria's case was more of a situation of a legal fiction rather than a foreign power occupying land since late Ottoman control over vassal states was very weak, as could've been seen with Montenegro, Serbia and Romania before the Treaty of Berlin of 1878.

It could also be compared with Egypt a century earlier under Muhammad Ali, which would even go with war with Sultan multiple times despite being an autonomous part of the empire.