Kızılhan Restoration in Beçin Will Create an Academic Hub
A Menteşe-era building in Beçin is due to reopen in 2027 for summer schools and symposiums.
Restoration of Kızılhan, a Menteşe-era building in the ancient city of Beçin in Milas, Muğla, is moving toward its final stage. According to the head of excavations, Professor Kadir Pektaş, the Kızılhan restoration should finish in early 2027. The building is then due to serve as a venue for social science summer schools, conferences and symposiums.
Pektaş spoke to the state-run Anadolu Agency. He said conservation and restoration were the main focus at the Beçin archaeological site this year.
What the Kızılhan restoration involves
Kızılhan stands opposite the madrasa (a historic religious school) and the mosque in Beçin. Pektaş dates it to the 14th or 15th century, during the Menteşe Beylik. A beylik was a small Anatolian principality ruled by a bey.
He described Kızılhan as the only known example in Anatolia that combines a single courtyard with a two-story layout. The domes on the upper floor and the vault on the lower floor had collapsed.
The project repairs the domes, the vault and the walls. Pektaş stressed that this is not a large-scale rebuild. The team reinforced the surviving walls and used original stones and bricks found scattered around the site.
Work on Anonymous Tomb No. 1 is already complete. It lies in the cemetery opposite the entrance to the inner castle.
A historic building with a new daily use
The project has backing from the General Directorate of Cultural Heritage and Museums and from the Muğla Governorship’s Investment Monitoring and Coordination Directorate. Pektaş said the aim is regular use once the work ends, not a closed monument. In his words, the team plans to use Kızılhan as a venue for social science summer school activities.
Reusing a restored building in this way is a common conservation approach. It gives the structure a purpose and a reason to be maintained. Pektaş presented it as a way to preserve the building and keep it in use.
Why Beçin matters to history readers
The Menteşe were one of the Anatolian beyliks that shaped the region in the late medieval period. Viewers of Kuruluş Osman will know that this was an era of competing principalities. The series is a drama, though, and it is not a record of what stood in Beçin.
Beçin has other restoration work in progress. Earlier reports from Daily Sabah and Hürriyet Daily News describe work on its castle walls, the Yelli Mosque and the Bey Bath. Those reports are from earlier dates, so their progress figures may have changed.
For now, the confirmed timeline is early 2027. The final use of the building will depend on the plans Pektaş outlined.
Source: Hürriyet Daily News
Featured image: Gargarapalvin / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0
