MuhacirMuhacir or Muhajir (from مهاجر) are the estimated 10 million Ottoman Muslim citizens, and their descendants born after the onset of the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, mostly Turks but also Albanians, Bosniaks, Greek Muslims, Circassians, Crimean Tatars, Pomaks, Serb Muslims, and Muslim Roma who emigrated to East Thrace and Anatolia from the late 18th century until the end of the 20th century, mainly to escape ongoing persecution in their homelands. Today, between a quarter and a third of Turkey's population of 85 million have ancestry from these Muhacirs.
Blagoevgrad ProvinceBlagoevgrad Province (област Благоевград, oblast Blagoevgrad or Благоевградска област, Blagoevgradska oblast), also known as Pirin Macedonia or Bulgarian Macedonia (Пиринска Македония; Българска Македония), (Pirinska Makedoniya or Bulgarska Makedoniya) is a province (oblast) of southwestern Bulgaria. It borders four other Bulgarian provinces to the north and east, the Greek region of Macedonia to the south, and North Macedonia to the west. The province has 14 municipalities with 12 towns.
Millet (Ottoman Empire)In the Ottoman Empire, a millet (millet; مِلَّة) was an independent court of law pertaining to "personal law" under which a confessional community (a group abiding by the laws of Muslim Sharia, Christian Canon law, or Jewish Halakha) was allowed to rule itself under its own laws. Despite frequently being referred to as a "system", before the nineteenth century the organization of what are now retrospectively called millets in the Ottoman Empire was not at all systematic.
AlexandroupolisAlexandroupolis (Αλεξανδρούπολη, aleksanˈðrupoli), Alexandroupoli, or Alexandrople is a city in Greece and the capital of the Evros regional unit. It is the largest city in Greek Thrace and the region of Eastern Macedonia and Thrace, with a population of 71,601, and is an important port and commercial center for northeastern Greece. The city was first settled by the Ottoman Empire in the 19th century and grew into a fishing village, Dedeağaç. In 1873, it became a kaza and one year later was promoted to a sanjak.
KomotiniKomotini (Κομοτηνή, Gümülcine) is a city in the region of East Macedonia and Thrace, northeastern Greece. It is the capital of the Rhodope. It was the administrative centre of the Rhodope-Evros super-prefecture until its abolition in 2010, by the Kallikratis Plan. The city is home to the Democritus University of Thrace, founded in 1973. Komotini is home to a sizeable Turkish speaking Muslim minority. They were excluded from the 1923 population exchange. According to the 2021 census, Komotini has population of 65,107 citizens.
TorbešiThe Torbeši (Торбеши) are a Macedonian-speaking Muslim ethnoreligious group in North Macedonia and Albania. The Torbeši are also referred to as Macedonian Muslims (Makedonci-muslimani) or Muslim Macedonians. They have been culturally distinct from the Orthodox Christian Macedonian community for centuries, and are linguistically distinct from the larger Muslim ethnic groups in the greater region of Macedonia: the Albanians, Turks and Romanis. However, some Torbeši also still maintain a strong affiliation with Turkish identity and with Macedonian Turks.
Adrianople vilayetThe Vilayet of Adrianople or Vilayet of Edirne (ولايت ادرنه; Vilâyet-i Edirne) was a first-level administrative division (vilayet) of the Ottoman Empire. Prior to 1878, the vilayet had an area of and extended all the way to the Balkan Mountains. However, by virtue of the Treaty of Berlin (1878), the Sanjak of İslimye, most of the Sanjak of Filibe and a small part of the Sanjak of Edirne (the Kızılağaç kaza and Monastır nahiya) were carved out of it to create the autonomous province of Eastern Rumelia, with a total area of 32,978 km2.
XanthiXanthi (Ξάνθη, Xánthi, ˈksanθi, İskeçe) is a city in the region of Western Thrace, northeastern Greece. It is the capital of the Xanthi regional unit of the region of East Macedonia and Thrace. Amphitheatrically built on the foot of Rhodope mountain chain, the city is divided by the Kosynthos River, into the west part, where the old and the modern town are located, and the east part that boasts a rich natural environment.