Religious buildings are very important urban images. They form the identities of the societies living in the city and express their existence. Especially for the societies living in the Ottoman cities, they are gathering places with a very high sense of belonging and they are symbolic structures where differences between beliefs, traditions and customs are expressed. It is the representation of populations belonging to different ethnic groups living in Ottoman cities. It is known that many Ottoman cities lost this diversity after the War of Independence. The population of non-Muslim communities or populations exchanged and their religious buildings are abandoned. Religious buildings form a very important part of social life with their unifying and gathering aspects they serve as society’s meeting places. Religious buildings, which differ from other structures in the region with their physical features, are also very effective in the perception of the people living in the city and the urban memory. It is possible to say those religious buildings which can be described as a reflection of the feeling of “belief”, which is one of the spiritual values that make up the identity of a city on the urban fabric, preserved their primary place in every period of history.

In the Ottoman period as it is stated before the cities hosted so many communities such as Muslims, Greeks, Armenians, Jews, and Levantines. Due to this, the cities hosted many different types of religious buildings such as mosques, churches, and synagogues. After the establishment of the Republic of Turkey, when the populations were exchanged, the religious buildings belonging to non-Muslim communities were abandoned. Some were converted into mosques, and some were lost in the pages of history. At any rate, all of them are cultural heritage values and urban memory items of the historical urban space. All these lost cultural heritage values are hidden in the pages of history books or the minds of elderly people belonging to these societies. It is a very hard duty to take the knowledge from the pages of history. In this study, the religious buildings that are lost during the historical process are tried to be redefined by literature studies, fieldwork, and oral history work. 

The context of this work is to define the religious buildings which are not surviving today and were built during the historical process in the city of Uşak. The lost cultural values of the city of Uşak have various reasons for extinction. The most important of these reasons that shape the physical structure of the city is the natural disasters. Especially in the great Uşak fire of 1894, all neighborhoods except the Aybey District were burned and most of the buildings were destroyed. In addition, the fire which was started by the Greeks after the National Struggle is the most important disaster that destroyed many buildings in the city. Some of the buildings in the city have been transformed and included with different functions. In this context in addition to Tuz Pazarı Mosque, Buğdaylı Mosque, Çallı Ömer Efendi Mosque and Nebi Mosque, St. Konstantinos-Eleni Church, Panayia Church, St. Marie De Dieu Church are taken into consideration in the manuscript as the religious buildings which do not exist due to various reasons. Kırık Minare Mosque is taken into consideration as an example of usage with different functions. In the research carried out in the city of Uşak, where the Muslim, Greek and Armenian population lived together for a while in the historical process; It is seen that there are many mosque structures and some churches that determine the development axis of the city and date to Beylikler Period. Regarding the religious structures examined within the scope of the study; In addition to the data about the dates of construction, their location in the city and their extinction process, many old photos were also found. All this historical data was analyzed and the architectural features of the unearthed structures were tried to be read. The places where religious buildings were located during the historical process overlapped with today’s maps. The surviving religious heritage was systematically classified. To carry the knowledge and story of the lost urban features of the historical cities to the future is very important and equally important as to transfer the cultural assets that exist today to the future. All these cultural layers together form the subjectivity, authenticity, and preservation values of a historical city. The redefining of the lost religious values of the cities and making them visible and adding these values to the urban space again is important because it protects the historical city with all its layers. Because all these unearthed values give a sense of belonging to historical cities.