Mesudiye Village biography
Founding Facilitator (~1907, Durayda)
A local figure remembered as the person who discovered the Durayda land and invited his community to settle there — the catalytic role in the 1907 founding of Mesudiye village.
In the early 1900s, scouting for suitable settlement land in the Karaman region for incoming Karabağlar muhajirs from Bulgaria, Çotuk Ahmet Efendi identified the Durayda — a tract that had been documented in Ottoman tahrir registers since 1500 but stood mostly empty by the late Ottoman period.
His invitation brought 94 households from the village of Çayır (Hacıoğlu-Pazarcık, Bulgaria) to the Durayda land. By autumn 1907, the settlement was complete and the new village named Mesudiye.
The Çotuk family — descendants of Ahmet Efendi — produced two later muhtars (Kadir Çotuk 1962-63, Abdurrahim Çotuk 1968) and remains one of the village's defining lineages.
Helper in the Founding of the Village
The Karabağlar Oymağı (tribal branch)
Durayda, ~1907
A member of the Karabağlar oymağı, which originally came from Bulgaria. While his fellow townsmen were waiting at a han (inn) in Konya, he went independently to the Durayda region and discovered it.
Çotuk Ahmet Efendi is one of the members of the Karabağlar oymağı (tribal branch) who came to Anatolia in the 1906–1907 wave of migration from Bulgaria. While the migrant caravan was lodging at a han (inn) in Konya, Ahmet Efendi went to the Durayda region independently of the others and looked it over.
Having established that the area was suitable for settlement, Ahmet Efendi found his fellow townsmen waiting at the han and made them an offer: “Gelin buraya, Durayda'da boş arazi çok.” (“Come here, there is plenty of empty land in Durayda.”) As a result of this call, 94 households decided to settle in Durayda, and the foundation of today's village of Mesudiye was laid.
He is not the one who actually founded the village, but the decisive figure who helped it to be founded. By discovering Durayda and directing his fellow townsmen there, he made the settlement of 94 households possible. His lineage has taken part in the village administration without interruption ever since the founding.
Origin: The Karabağlar oymağı, Bulgaria
Region settled: Durayda (today's Mesudiye)
Number of households he directed there: 94 households
Muhtars from his lineage: Kadir Çotuk (1962–63), Abdurrahim Çotuk (1968)
Member of the ihtiyar heyeti (council of elders) from his lineage: Cüneyt Çotuk (present day)