The last heir to the former Ottoman Empire, Prince Bayezid Osman, has died at the age of 92. Osman Bayezid Osmanoğlu was the 44th head of the Ottoman family.

On Friday he died at his home in New York, USA. If the Ottoman monarchy were restored, he would be Grand Sultan Bayezid III.

He was the first member of the House of Osman to be born in exile, and the first head to have been born after the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, which was dissolved in 1922. Prince Bayezid moved to the United States with his mother, older brother and two stepbrothers after the divorce of his parents. His father, Şehzade Ibrahim Tevfik, died in 1931.

The entire Osman family was deposed and expelled on March 3rd, 1924. A prohibition was also introduced that no members of the family could get into the modern Turkey before 50 years passed. The Osman-family could therefore not return to Turkey until 1974. Many members of the family got exiled into Europe and some went to the United States. After the ban had been listed, several members of the family went back to Turkey; while most of the family remained in the country that had given them exile.

Osman never married and has no children. On 23 September 2009 following the death of Ertuğrul Osman, he succeeded as the head of the House of Osman. The next leader of the House of Osman is 86-year-old Syrian-born Prince Şehzade Dündar Aliosman Efendi. August 12 this year the Ottoman dynasty welcomed their newest prince and 5th generation grandson of Sultan Abdülhamid II. The little prince’s father Abdülhamid Kayıhan Osmanoğlu is the first sultan who was born in Istanbul after the exile that lasted 50 years for the men of the Ottoman dynasty.