Pomaks in Turkey Pomaks in Turkey The Pomaks in Turkey refers to an ethnic group, who are predominantly Muslim and speak their own dialect of Bulgarian. They mostly live in Eastern Thrace, though some are also present in Anatolia. In the census of 1965, 23,138 Turkish citizens spoke Pomak as mother language. Proportionally, they were most numerous in Edirne (3.4%), Kırklareli (1.3%) and Çanakkale (1.0%). 2,776 of these could only speak Pomak . Another 34,234 spoke Pomak as second best language. The Pomaks of Turkey speak a Bulgarian dialect. According to Ethnologue at present 300,000 Pomaks in European Turkey speak Bulgarian as mother
Bulgarians in Turkey Orthodox Bulgarians who settled in Ottoman-ruled northwestern Anatolia, possibly in the 18th century, and remained there until 1914. Much more intense was the fate of the Bulgarian population of Eastern Thrace in the Ottoman Province ("vilâyet") of Edirne. According to Lyubomir Miletich's detailed study of the province published in 1918, the Bulgarian population of the province (today mostly in Turkey, with smaller parts in Greece and Bulgaria) in 1912 numbered 298,726, of whom 176,554 Exarchists, 24,970 Patriarchists, 1,700 Eastern Catholics and 95,502 Muslims (Pomaks). In the Çorlu and Constantinople regions, Miletich estimates the Bulgarian population at a further 10,000. After