(Presenter Panel I, 13-15th c.) While it has become a well-accepted premise that medieval identity was a social construct determined in a large part by cultural distinctions, the question remains, given the sparse source base, how Muslims of medieval Anatolia constructed their political and cultural identities. This paper begins by addressing the question as to what can be culled from the existing source base in regard to self-identification and political and cultural allegiances. It will identify sources touching upon questions of identity generated by Turcophone Anatolian Muslim groups prior to the establishment of Ottoman domination, as well as sources for Turcophone Anatolian Muslims whose identities were shaped through interaction with Ottomans. Secondly this paper will discuss various aspects of identity formation of the so-called “beylik” period of Medieval Anatolia, ranging from the construction of Mongols as the infidel “other” to the use of the term “Ehl-i Rum,” a designation for scholars of Turcophone Anatolian origins educated in the Islamic heartland of Egypt and Syria. Ottoman attempts to appropriate renowned fourteenth-century Muslim Anatolians will be discussed, as well as the shaping of local Anatolian identities in resistance to Ottoman political and cultural hegemony. Particular focus will be made on the highly polemical and contested territory of Karamanid identity as reflected in ?ikari’s History of the Karamanids and the Ottoman historical writing tradition.