Ahmed Efendi, Osman Beyzade

In Modern English

He was the son of Osman Beyzade Mehmed Efendi, one of the notables of Mecidözü. It is related that he was of the Avkatlızades. He studied in Amasya and settled in the town of Mecidözü. There he taught for a time, then went to serve as naib in the sub-districts. Thanks to the wealth he had acquired he became a member of the administrative council and of the council of lawsuits; with the help of certain persons he became naib of the Mecidözü district in 1298 [1880-81] and died in 1301 [1883-84]. He was a scholar with influence.

Notes and Research

Old Words in the Text

• a'yân: notables
• mervîdir: it is related, it is told
• tahsîl-i ulûm: acquiring learning
• nevâhî niyâbetleri: naib posts in the sub-districts
• meclis-i idâre: administrative council
• de'âvâ meclisi: the council that heard lawsuits
• nâib: the qadi's deputy, the official in charge of the sharia court in a district
• zî-nüfûz: influential, one whose word carries weight

Mecidözü and the Avukatlızades

Mecitözü is today a district of Çorum. According to some accounts, the settlement grew around an estate belonging to Abdülmecid-i Herevi in 1136 and entered the records under the name "Mecitözü." Avukatlızade Hacı Ali Ağa, who came to the region in 1728, had a mosque, a bathhouse, a school and a large mansion built here, and these undertakings prepared the ground for the settlement's change from a village to a town. A madrasa was added under the leadership of his grandson. Hüsameddin's sentence "it is related that he was of the Avkatlızades" shows that this family was still known in the nineteenth century; that "Avkatlı" in the text and the spelling Avukatlı are the same family name is clear, but the real tie of the Osman Beyzade family to this lineage goes no further than a report and could not be verified.

Mecitözü was raised to kaza status in 1874 and its first kaymakam was appointed. The date Hüsameddin gives, 1298 [1880-81], falls six years after the founding of the district. For many years the area remained within the Amasya sanjak of the province of Sivas, and in 1916 it was transferred to the Çorum sanjak of the province of Ankara. The presence of Mecidözü scholars in Hüsameddin's book can therefore be explained by the region's attachment to Amasya at that time.

The Naib and Local Power

The naib is the sharia court official who stands in for the qadi in a district; at the kaza level, alongside the kaymakam, there worked the administrative council, the naib, the finance director, the correspondence clerk, the population official, the treasury steward and the telegraph official. The text says that Ahmed Efendi came to the naib's post thanks to "the wealth he acquired" and "the help of certain persons." This wording suggests that posts in the learned class were also tied to local influence and material means; but who gave the "help" is not written in the text.

The link between the scholarly circle of Amasya and Mecitözü is seen in other examples. The ancestors of Abdurrahman Kâmil Efendi, mufti of Amasya, came from Crimea and settled in the village of Doğla in Mecitözü, and his pen name "Mecidî" derives from Mecitözü. His father served as qadi. This shows that there were families of scholars in Mecitözü and that those raised there studied in the madrasas of Amasya.

School and Mansion in the Town

In the years after Ahmed Efendi's death new institutions were opened in Mecitözü: a primary school was founded in 1889, the school was raised to rüşdiye level in 1894, and in the same year the new government house and clock tower were completed through the efforts of the kaymakam of the time, İskilipli İsmail Kemal Bey. A battalion headquarters was also stationed in the area. Abdurrahman Kâmil Efendi's brother Sâdık Efendi and his sons Ahmed Emrî, Sabri and Mustafa Niyâzî also served as muftis and preachers; this family shows the continuation in Amasya of the circle of scholars of Mecitözü origin.

The Man in Other Sources

No information could be found in other sources about Osman Beyzade Ahmed Efendi or his father Mehmed Efendi. No separate study of the nineteenth-century naibs of Mecitözü was found either; the sources describing the administrative history of the district mention only the kaymakams.

Bibliography

Primary sources

• Abdîzâde Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar, Amasya Tarihi, Amasya Belediyesi Kültür Yayınları, 2022, vol. 6, p. 235–235. amasya.bel.tr

Academic studies

• Kamil Şahin, "Yetkin, Abdurrahman Kâmil", TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi. https://islamansiklopedisi.org.tr/yetkin-abdurrahman-kamil

Books

• Danyal Tekdal, Osmanlı Son Döneminde Kaza İdare Yapısı ve İdarecileri: Akçadağ Kazası Örneği (1870-1920), İnönü Üniversitesi, 2022. https://abakus.inonu.edu.tr/items/e889cb10-b146-440c-8482-2a04d5aecbc3/full