The first reports about presence of Jews in Sarajevo are dated to the middle of 16^th century since when they started gradually to integrate into economic and social streams in Sarajevo and Bosnia. It is very probable that they initially were settling on individual basis as merchants and just only from the beginning of 17th century they start to settle with families and organize as residential community. Choosing of Sarajevo was also a result of pressure that was imposed upon Jews in Dubrovnik, Venice and other merchant places of the West. Since then reports about Jews in Bosnia and their activities are more frequent, and in 17th century they constituted a distinguished economic community in Sarajevo with significant investment in business connection to Dubrovnik and Venice. Their primary occupation in relations with the West was trade followed by banking business. Research results show that at least 22% of Jews in Sarajevo performed some kind of trade, what is very high percentage if we take into account size of the community. This enabled Jews to position themselves in the most elite part of Sarajevo and they are the only social community that as a whole has lived in the most elite economic and professional area of the city. Towards the end of Ottoman rule, Jews of Sarajevo have been transformed into very respectable community that had 9% of share in the whole population of the city. Analysing some sources we see that they used 30% of storerooms and 16% of shops in the biggest trading buildings what additionally shows how important was their share in the economy of the city.

The trend of mass conversions to Islam took place in Bosnia and Herzegovina in the period between the 15th and 17th centuries, and has, thanks to the work of a couple of researchers of this period, been extensively studied and expounded on. On the other hand, the academic community has very little information on conversions to Islam in the period that followed. The goal of this study was to shed light on the conversions to Islam before the Sarajevo Sharia Court in the first half of the 19th century. In doing so, it devotes particular attention to the very act of conversion, its foundations in the Sharia law, the intensity of the conversions, and the identities of the converts themselves. Upon studying the Sarajevo court records, we see that the trend of the expansion of Islam did continue in the 19th century, albeit to a much more limited extent. Between 1800 and 1851, 123 people willingly converted to Islam before the Sharia Court in Sarajevo. In addition, there were also ten underage children (according to Sharia regulations), who were legally converted to Islam after one of their parents became a Muslim. There were conversions happening almost every year, with only five years in this period for which we have no registered conversions, while between one and seven people converted within one Gregorian calendar year. Previously, the new Muslims had been members of other monotheistic religions found in the region (Catholics, Orthodox Christians, Jews), and hailed from town and village surroundings.

Saraybosna şehrinin kuruluşu 15. yüzyılın ikinci yarısına denk düşer ve kuruluşu da gelişimi de vakıf eserleri vasıtası ile gerçekleştirilmiştir. Bosna sancağının ikinci sancak beyi olan İshak Bey'in oğlu İsa Bey, Saraybosna şehrinin kurulacağı yeri kendisi belirlemiş ve burada bina ettiği zaviye, köprü, han, hamam gibi vakıf eserlerle şehrin temellerini atmıştır(1). Kendisinden sonra gelen sancak beyleri aynı yolda devam etmişler, hem bizzat sancak beyleri hem yörenin zenginlerinin kurdukları yeni vakıflarla şehrin vakıflara dayalı iskeleti oluşmaya başlamıştır. Bu oluşum burada bizim de ele alacağımız Hüsrev Bey vakıfları ile tamamlanmıştır. Ya da Hamdija Kreševljaković, Ćiro Truhelka, Avdo Sućeska gibi Bosnalı tarihçilerin kabul ve tekrar ettikleri ifade ile Hüsrev Bey'in vakıf yoluyla gerçekleştirdiği imar faaliyetleri "sıradan bir kasabayı gerçek bir şehir haline getirmiştir"(2) ve Hüsrev Bey zamanı yine Bosnalı tarihçi Behija Zlatar'ın belirttiği gibi Saraybosna'nın "Altın Çağı"dır(3).