List of lingua francas
Turkish is still in use and widely spoken in several areas formerly part of the Ottoman Empire and may be understood by older people in other parts of the Middle East.
Turkish vocabulary
When the Ottoman Empire arose out of the remains of the Selcuk Empire in Anatolia, its official language, "Osmanlıca" or Ottoman Turkish, became the only language to approach English in the size of its vocabulary (according to #Lewis). However, common people continued to use "kaba Türkçe" or "rough Turkish" which contained much fewer loanwords and which is the basis of the modern Turkish language.