During the age of the
Ottoman Empire most of Serbia and the Balkans were under Turkish control, and many Serbs moved to
Istanbul and
Anatolia for reasons ranging from economic to forceful relocation. On 28 August 1521, the
Belgrade Fortress was captured by
Suleiman the Magnificent, using 250,000 Turkish soldiers and over 100 ships. Subsequently, most of the city was razed to the ground and its entire Orthodox Christian population was deported to
Istanbul[2] to an area that has since become known as the
Belgrade forest.[3]
Many
Janissaries were of Serbian descent and were taken as children from their homes and educated in Turkey. Some Serbs achieved political prominence and several
Grand Viziers were born as Serbs.
^Heinz Kloss, Grant D. McConnell:[Kloss, Heinz; McConnell, Grant D. (октобар 1984). Linguistic Composition of the Nations of the World: Europe and the USSR. International center for research on bilinguism (на језику: енглески). 5. Quebec: Presses de l'Université Laval.
ISBN2-7637-7044-4
^Milenko M. Vukićević (1906).
Znameniti Srbi muslomani. Davidović. p. 104. Кућа Сијерчића води своје поријекло од старе српске властеоске куће Шијернића, како запнси тврде, или од Лучевпћа, како предање каже. Кад је сила османлијска навалила на Босну п Херцеговину, онда се кућа Шијернића храбро бо- рила протпв снле османлијске, борила се бранећи јуначкн своје огњиште и свој народ, свој језнк и своју слободу. Алп ко ће силн ...