The Network of Monasteries and Religious Patronage in the Ottoman district of Çernovi/ Rusçuk, 16th–17th Centuries: the Ottoman sources

Sacred geography is considered a symbolic identity marker of key importance for the cohesion of Christian communities during the period of Ottoman rule. This study aims to summarise the information on the monastery network in the district (kaza) of Çernovi (Cherven)/ Rusçuk (Ruse) on the Lower Danube, derived from the 16th-century Ottoman tax registers (tapu tahrir defters). I sought to contextualise the data within the Ottoman socio-economic and legal framework and to reassess the perception of the region as having an extremely poor or even abandoned Christian religious infrastructure after the conquest. Most likely, the nine monasteries registered in the tahrir defters were a legacy of the Second Bulgarian Kingdom, all located along the meandering riverbed of Lom River, between Rusçuk and Çernovi. Two monasteries were registered to Rusçuk, three to the village of Basarbe (Basarbovo), one to Koşov (Koshov), one to the village of Yovan (Ivanovo), and two to Çernovi