Amasyalıdır. Züamâdan Bektemur oğlu Şeyhî Beyzâde İskender Bey’in mahdûmudur. Pederi Kazasker Amasyalı Seydî Alizâde Abdurrahman Efendi’nin sadâretinde kethüdâsı olmuşdu. [464] Biraderi mevâlîden Abdurrahim Efendi ve amcası da el-Hâc Abdurrahman Bey’dir.
Amasya’da “Hamdullah-i sânî” demekle meşhûr olan Şehyzâde Hamdullah Efendi bin Mahmûd Çelebi’den ve İstanbul’da Amasyalı Hamdullah-ı evvel zâde Pir Mehmed Dede bin Mustafa Dede’den temeşşuk ve hutût-ı mütenevvia’yı ahzederek Bostanzâde Mehmed Efendi ile Hicâz’a gitdi.
Hicâz’dan avdetinde Şam’da ikâmet edib füdalâ-yı Şâmiyyeden eş-Şeyh Hasan el-Bûrînî’den ulûm-ı şer’iyye ve edebiyyeyi ahz u ikmâl edib tedrîse mücâz ve ders-i âm oldu. Câmi-i Benî Ümeyye’de yıllarca tedrîs-i ulûm edib ba’zı medârise müderris oldu. Bin senesi zilhiccesinde meflûcen vefât etdi.
Fâzıl, müteşerri’, hattât-ı meşhûr idi. Müstakîmzâde Süleyman Sadeddîn Efendi “Tuhfetü’l-hattâtîn” adlı eser-i matbû’ında diyor ki: “Lütfu’s-semer ve hülâsatü’l-eserde mukarrer olduğu üzere ahvâl-i sûfiyye-i kirâma gücenik olması sebebiyle⁵¹ mübtelâ-yı nâzile-i felc olup (tekmîl-i sohbet-i 1000) târihinden sonra belde-i mezbûrede rihlet etdi. [465]
In Modern English
He was a native of Amasya, the son of İskender Bey, known as Şeyhî Beyzâde, son of Bektemür and one of the zeamet holders. His father had served as steward (kethüda) to Seydî Alizâde Abdurrahman Efendi of Amasya while the latter was chief military judge (kazasker). His brother was Abdurrahim Efendi, one of the senior judges, and his paternal uncle was el-Hac Abdurrahman Bey.
He practised writing (meşk) and learned the various scripts from Şeyhzâde Hamdullah Efendi, son of Mahmud Çelebi, known in Amasya as "the Second Hamdullah," and, in Istanbul, from Pîr Mehmed Dede, son of Mustafa Dede, a descendant of the first Hamdullah of Amasya; he then went to the Hejaz together with Bostanzâde Mehmed Efendi.
On his return from the Hejaz he settled in Damascus; there he learned and completed the religious sciences and the sciences of language and literature under Şeyh Hasan el-Bûrînî, one of the scholars of Damascus, received permission to teach, and rose to the rank of müderris. For years he taught at the Umayyad Mosque and became müderris at several madrasas. He died of paralysis in Dhu al-Hijjah of the year 1000 [September 1592].
He was a virtuous man, strictly bound to the rulings of religion, and a well-known calligrapher. Müstakimzâde Süleyman Sadeddin Efendi says in his printed work Tuhfetü'l-hattâtîn: "As recorded in Lutfü's-semer and Hulâsatü'l-eser, because he was resentful of and denied the states of the Sufis, he was struck by the affliction of paralysis and died in that city after the year 1000, which the phrase 'tekmîl-i sohbet' gives by the abjad reckoning."
Notes and Research
Old Words in the Text
- sadâret: here, the office of chief military judge (kazasker)
- kethüdâ: steward, a deputy who runs the affairs of a high official
- mevâlî: scholars at the rank of senior judge and müderris
- temeşşuk: practising writing by following the model set by the teacher
- hutût-ı mütenevvia: various kinds of script
- füdalâ: virtuous scholars
- ulûm-ı şer'iyye ve edebiyye: the religious sciences and the sciences of language and literature
- ahz u ikmâl: learning and completing
- tedrîse mücâz: permitted to teach, holding a licence (icazet)
- ders-i âm: a scholar who has reached the authority to teach in a madrasa
- Câmi-i Benî Ümeyye: the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus
- meflûcen: paralysed
- müteşerri': strictly bound to the rulings of the sharia
- mukarrer: recorded, stated
- nâzile-i felc: the affliction of paralysis
- rihlet etmek: to depart, to die
His Teachers: The Family of Şeyh Hamdullah
Ahmed Efendi's teachers of writing came from the family of Şeyh Hamdullah of Amasya (d. 926/1520), regarded as the founder of Ottoman calligraphy. Şeyh Hamdullah was born in the Eslem Hatun quarter of Amasya and was the son of the Suhrawardi sheikh Mustafa Dede; he was calligraphy teacher to Bayezid II when the latter was a prince, and later went to Istanbul. Among the pupils he trained, the sources name his son Mustafa Dede and his son-in-law Şükrullah Halife as the most important representatives of the school of Şeyh Hamdullah. Şeyhzâde Hamdullah Efendi, whom Hüsameddin calls "the Second Hamdullah," is, according to another entry of the book, the son of Mahmud Çelebi, the brother of Şeyh Hamdullah, and learned calligraphy from his uncle. In the same entry Hüsameddin writes that he stayed in Amasya in 896 when his uncle went to Istanbul, that in 912 he became calligraphy teacher to Prince Ahmed, and that he died around 931 [1524-25]. Thus Ahmed Efendi's teacher in Amasya represents the branch of the family that remained in the hometown.
On Pîr Mehmed Dede, his teacher in Istanbul, present-day sources give a somewhat different lineage. According to the calligrapher biographies based on Müstakimzâde, Pîr Mehmed Dede was the son of Şükrullah Çelebi, son-in-law of Şeyh Hamdullah, that is, a grandson of Şeyh Hamdullah through his daughter; Mustafa Dede is not his father but his maternal uncle. He first practised the script under his father and received his licence, and then benefited from his maternal uncle Mustafa Dede as well. It is noted that he had a style of his own that united the two branches represented by his father and his uncle, and that a Qur'an manuscript dated 964 (1556), presented to Suleiman the Magnificent, was endowed to the Süleymaniye Mosque. His death is placed at about 988 (1580). Hüsameddin's note "son of Mustafa Dede" therefore needs correcting. Ahmed Efendi's study with him must also fall before 1580, hence before his Damascus years.
These dates create a chronological difficulty in the entry. Since his teacher in Amasya died around 931, Ahmed Efendi must have begun practising writing before the 1520s; his teacher in Damascus, Bûrînî, as will be seen below, began teaching in that city only in 1580. Considering that Ahmed Efendi died in 1592, he would have been of a very advanced age when he studied with Bûrînî. This is not impossible, but it is also possible that Hüsameddin confused the name or identity of one of the teachers.
His Teacher in Damascus, Hasan el-Bûrînî
Hasan el-Bûrînî, with whom Ahmed Efendi studied in Damascus, was a well-known historian, jurist, and poet of Damascus in his time. Born in 963 (1556) in Saffûriya in Palestine, he studied in Damascus, returned to that city in 1580, and began teaching Shafi'i jurisprudence at the Umayyad Mosque and giving lessons at many madrasas. He became greatly famous for his method in teaching and his fine speech, and knew Persian and Turkish as well; he died in Damascus in 1024 (1615). His best-known work is Terâcimü'l-a'yân min ebnâi'z-zamân, which contains the biographies of 205 people who lived in his own age. These dates show that Ahmed Efendi may have studied with Bûrînî between 1580 and 1592; his teacher must have been younger than himself. That a calligrapher from Amasya settled in Damascus and entered the scholarly circles there to the point of teaching at the Umayyad Mosque is remarkable.
The Account Related by Müstakimzâde
Müstakimzâde Süleyman Sadeddin Efendi's Tuhfe-i Hattâtîn, begun in 1173 (1759-60), gives the lives of thousands of calligraphers and is regarded as the first reference in the history of calligraphy. The author often gives dates by abjad; the phrase "tekmîl-i sohbet" (the completion of the conversation) that he uses for Ahmed Efendi also yields the number 1000 and describes the end of a life in an elegant way. Of the two works on which Müstakimzâde relies, Lutfü's-semer is the biographical book written by Najm al-Din al-Ghazzi of Damascus (d. 1061/1651) on the leading figures of the eleventh (seventeenth) century and the famous personalities of Syria; Hulâsatü'l-eser is the biographical work of al-Muhibbi, and is also among the sources consulted for the life of al-Ghazzi. That Ahmed Efendi appears in these Arabic sources shows that he was a scholar known in Damascus.
Hüsameddin objects in a footnote to the account that the paralysis was a punishment for his attitude towards the Sufis. In his view this reason is weak: many a denier and apostate dies perfectly healthy, and many a sheikh and friend of the Sufis departs for the hereafter paralysed; paralysis is an ailment of the body, and tying it to denial or submission is merely a nominal interpretation. This objection shows that Hüsameddin read his sources with a critical eye. No information was found on any work of calligraphy by Ahmed Efendi that has survived to the present.
Bibliography
Primary sources
- Abdîzâde Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar, Amasya Tarihi, Amasya Belediyesi Kültür Yayınları, 2022, vol. 6, p. 148–148. amasya.bel.tr
- Abdîzâde Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar, Amasya Tarihi, entry "Hamdullah Çelebi-Şeyhzâde, Sânî", vols. 9–12.
Academic studies
Books