Behind the Military Frontier this Ottoman world had settled down by the later sixteenth century into an effective, well-run and civilized sphere. The distinctive landscape of mosque, madrasa, caravanserai, coffee-house, public bath, hospital, fountain and market dotted innumerable small towns, maintained in many cases by the vakifs, the charitable Islamic foundations run by important citizens. Small elements from these can still be seen in scattered, dusty and battered buildings or in mosques converted to use as churches.
