Original Ottoman Turkish Text
Title: Müseddes-i Ünsiyye Der-Vasf-ı Şehr-i Amâsiyye
Metre: Fe‘ilâtün Fe‘ilâtün Fe‘ilâtün Fe‘ilün
Ey göñül himmet-i ‘ulyâ ile ben mümtâzam
Taşlu yerlerde karâr eyleyici şâh-bâzam
Kalmazın ‘âlem-i süflîde hümâ-pervâzam
Rûh-ı kudsî baña hem-dem ben aña hem-râzam
Cây-gâh olmagıla şehr-i Amâsiyye baña
Muttasıl feyz olınur kuvvet-i kudsiyye baña
Virmezin devlet-i dünyâya ma‘ârif güherin
Sen beni dûn u denî añlama ‘âlî-nazarın
Kadrüm iz‘ân idenüñ hıdmetine hâk-i derin
Sırr-ı mahfî ise de n'olsa kimüñ anı dirin
Cây-gâh olmagıla şehr-i Amâsiyye baña
Muttasıl feyz olınur kuvvet-i kudsiyye baña
Sûretâ câh u celâl ehli gibi muhteşemem
Mâlik-i tabl u ‘alem sâhib-i hayl ü haşemem
Ma‘nide sâlik-i peşmîne-keş-i mugtenemem
Köhne ihrâm ile çün şeyh-i harem-i muhteremem
Cây-gâh olmagıla şehr-i Amâsiyye baña
Muttasıl feyz olınur kuvvet-i kudsiyye baña
Ne bilür ehl-i riyâ ben niçe hikmet-dânam
Fahr-ı erbâb-ı hüner merd-i kavî-iz‘ânam
Nakd-i ‘irfân ile mahsûd-ı ribâ-hârânam
Sadr-ı vîrânede dervîş-i tehî-hemyânam
Cây-gâh olmagıla şehr-i Amâsiyye baña
Muttasıl feyz olınur kuvvet-i kudsiyye baña
Niçe şeh-zâdelerüñ mesken ü me’vâsıdur ol
Ehl-i hâcât olanuñ Ka‘be-i ‘ulyâsıdur ol
Sâhil-i bahr-ı gınâ meşgale deryâsıdur ol
Evliyâ mecma‘ı aktâb musallâsıdur ol
Cây-gâh olmagıla şehr-i Amâsiyye baña
Muttasıl feyz olınur kuvvet-i kudsiyye baña
Merkad-i pâkine var Hazret-i Pîr İlyâs'uñ
Pür-safâ eylesün âyîneñi silsün pâsuñ
Gümüşî-zâde'ye dil nakdi gerek ihsâsuñ
Zerk ile bencileyin kalbini tâ nahhâsuñ
Cây-gâh olmagıla şehr-i Amâsiyye baña
Muttasıl feyz olınur kuvvet-i kudsiyye baña
Hamdü-lillâh ki hüner mülkine oldum vâlî
Oldı şânum gibi ‘irfân ile kadrüm ‘âlî
Kevkebümden yañadur kevkebenüñ ikbâli
Hasb-i hâl oldı bu güftâr baña ey Âlî
Cây-gâh olmagıla şehr-i Amâsiyye baña
Muttasıl feyz olınur kuvvet-i kudsiyye baña
In English
1. O heart, I have been made eminent by a lofty aspiration; I am a falcon, a king among birds of prey, that settles on stony, rocky places. I fly high like the hümâ and do not linger in this lowly world. The Holy Spirit is my companion and I am its confidant. Since the city of Amasya became my dwelling place, grace (feyz, spiritual abundance) flows to me unceasingly from a sacred power.
2. I do not give the jewel of my learning and gnosis in exchange for worldly fortune, office and wealth. O you of lofty sight, do not take me for base and worthless. For whoever recognises my worth, I am the dust of his door in his service. Though it be a hidden secret, whosever it may be, I tell it. (The fourth line can be read in two ways: "even if it is a hidden secret, I say whose it is" or "hidden though it is, what does it matter, I tell it to anyone".) Since the city of Amasya became my dwelling place, grace flows to me unceasingly from a sacred power.
3. Outwardly I am as imposing as the men of rank and splendour; I possess drum and banner, I am master of horses and retinue. Yet inwardly I am a wayfarer on God's path, a dervish who counts the wearing of a woollen cloak as gain; wrapped in an old pilgrim's garment (ihram), I am like an honoured sheikh of the Kaaba. Since the city of Amasya became my dwelling place, grace flows to me unceasingly from a sacred power.
4. How should the hypocrites know how much wisdom I possess. I am the pride of the men of talent, a man of strong understanding. For my capital of gnosis I am envied by the usurers; in the seat of honour of a ruined corner, I am a dervish with an empty purse. Since the city of Amasya became my dwelling place, grace flows to me unceasingly from a sacred power.
5. Amasya is the home and refuge of many princes; it is the lofty Kaaba of those in need, the place to which wishes turn. It is a sea of occupation and gain on the shore of the sea of wealth. It is the gathering place of saints, the prayer ground of the poles (aktâb), the greatest saints of their age. Since the city of Amasya became my dwelling place, grace flows to me unceasingly from a sacred power.
6. Go to the pure tomb of Hazret-i Pîr İlyâs; may he fill the mirror of your heart with purity and wipe away its rust. You must show the closeness you feel for Gümüşîzâde (a member of the Gümüşlüzâde family) with the coin of the heart. (The last line is obscure and its exact meaning is uncertain. Because the word "kalb" means both "heart" and "debased, counterfeit coin", the line can be read as a warning addressed to one who, like me, turns his heart by deceit into the coppersmith's ware, that is, into worthless metal.) Since the city of Amasya became my dwelling place, grace flows to me unceasingly from a sacred power.
7. Praise be to God that I have become governor of the realm of talent; like my name, my worth too has become lofty (âlî) through gnosis. The fortune of my pomp and retinue comes from my star. O Âlî, these words have become the account of my own state. Since the city of Amasya became my dwelling place, grace flows to me unceasingly from a sacred power.
Literary and Historical Commentary
The Poet
Gelibolulu Mustafa Âlî was born in Gelibolu (Gallipoli) on the night of 2 Muharrem 948 (24/25 April 1541). After a madrasa education he attracted notice with his poems and became divan secretary to Şehzade Selim (Prince Selim, later Selim II), to whom he presented his first work, Mihr ü Mâh. His life was spent in the frustration of never quite reaching the offices he thought he deserved: he served as a secretary in Aleppo and Damascus, in Bosnia, and on the Georgian and Shirvan campaign; he held treasury posts in Erzurum, Baghdad and Sivas, and was repeatedly dismissed and left without office. He is known above all as a historian, especially for Künhü'l-ahbâr, and was a prolific poet who left five divans, four in Turkish and one in Persian. In the TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, Ömer Faruk Akün writes that he brought into his poetry the injustices he suffered, his dismissals and his ambition to rise, and that in this respect he is one of the most socially engaged poets of divan poetry.
Âlî's link with Amasya was brief but concrete. When Mehmed III came to the throne (1595), Âlî asked for the treasurership of Egypt, where he hoped to find plenty of books for Künhü'l-ahbâr; when the influential aghas of the palace blocked this, he had to content himself with the sanjak governorship (sanjak-bey) of Amasya and the treasurership of Rum. Before long, because the palace troops in his service had oppressed the people, he was removed from the treasurership of Rum (September 1595) and transferred from the governorship of Amasya to Kayseri. His last post was the sanjak governorship of Jeddah, where he probably died in 1600.
Structure of the Poem
The poem is a müseddes of seven stanzas. The müseddes is a verse form in which each stanza has six lines. In Âlî's poem the first four lines of each stanza rhyme among themselves (mümtâzam / şâh-bâzam / hümâ-pervâzam / hem-râzam; muhteşemem / haşemem / mugtenemem / muhteremem, and so on), while the last two lines are a refrain repeated unchanged in every stanza: "Cây-gâh olmagıla şehr-i Amâsiyye baña / Muttasıl feyz olınur kuvvet-i kudsiyye baña." The rhyme of the refrain is "Amâsiyye / kudsiyye" and its redif (refrain word) is "baña". This structure recalls forms such as the terci-bend, in which every stanza returns to the same couplet. The metre is the pattern Fe‘ilâtün Fe‘ilâtün Fe‘ilâtün Fe‘ilün of the remel family of aruz (quantitative metre).
The word "ünsiyye" in the title derives from "üns", intimacy and familiarity; the title can be understood as "A Müseddes of Intimacy on the Description of the City of Amasya", and it brings forward the closeness the poet felt for the city. Âlî is known to have liked giving special names to his longer poems, and this title fits that habit. Mehmet Arslan, classifying the poems written for cities in the divans, identifies city eulogies as the largest group. Âlî's müseddes belongs to this group, but it differs from the familiar city eulogies in one respect: it does not describe the city's vineyards, waters or beauties, but makes the city the support of the poet's own inner state. Arslan also notes that at the head of his Gelibolu şehrengiz Âlî praised his native town in eighteen couplets; the Amasya müseddes, by contrast, was written for a city that was not the poet's home and where he served only briefly.
Meaning and Figures of Speech
The first four stanzas speak less of Amasya than of the poet himself. Âlî likens himself to birds of prey that fly high: the "şâh-bâz" is a falcon, while the "hümâ" is the legendary bird believed to raise to fortune anyone on whose head its shadow falls. The phrase "taşlu yerlerde karâr eyleyici", describing a falcon that settles on rocky places, also calls to mind Amasya's position among steep cliffs.
The third stanza is built on a contrast: outwardly (sûretâ) the poet is a bey with drum and banner, horses and retinue; inwardly (ma‘nide) he resembles a dervish in a woollen cloak, a pilgrim wrapped in an old ihram. "Tabl u ‘alem", drum and banner, are the insignia of a bey and reflect the actual position of the poet, who came to Amasya as sanjak governor. In the fourth stanza this contrast turns into a complaint: the hypocrites do not know his wisdom, the usurers ("ribâ-hâr") envy his gnosis, and he himself is a dervish with an empty purse in the seat of honour of a ruin. This stanza agrees with the assessment in the TDV that Âlî carried his dismissals and his failure to reach the place he felt he deserved into his poetry.
In the second stanza and in the last, the poet's pen name is used as a double entendre (tevriye). The phrase "‘âlî-nazarın" (of lofty sight) is both an address to the reader and an allusion to the poet's name. The expression "hüner mülkine oldum vâlî" (I have become governor of the realm of talent) in the last stanza gains a further meaning if one considers that it was written in the days when Âlî really was the administrator of a city: the poet says that the true realm he governs is the realm of talent. The words "vâlî", "‘âlî" and "Âlî" stand side by side in the rhyme. The similarity of sound between "kevkeb" (star, fortune) and "kevkebe" (pomp, retinue) is also a play that may be counted as paronomasia (cinas).
The sixth stanza carries the poem's densest wordplay. In the old poetry the heart is a mirror; since metal mirrors rusted over time, the cleansing of the heart's mirror from rust is a well-known image of Sufism. The tomb of Pîr İlyâs is presented as the place where this rust will be wiped away. Then comes the name "Gümüşî-zâde", and all the words of the stanza form a congruence of images (tenasüp) drawn from metals: silver (gümüş), "nakd" (coin, cash), "kalb" (both heart and debased, counterfeit coin), "nahhâs" (coppersmith) and "pâs" (rust). In urging an offering of the heart's coin to a member of the Gümüşlüzâde family, the poet draws on the fact that silver is a metal of true standard and copper a worthless one. The syntax of the last line is obscure, and it does not seem possible to give a definite reading.
Places in the Poem
The city of Amasya. The fifth stanza calls the city "the home and refuge of many princes". According to Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn, the palace in the city remained a palace of the Ottoman dynasty for about three hundred and fifty years, and Murad II and Selim I were born in it. The stanza's descriptions of the city as "the gathering place of saints" and "the prayer ground of the poles" point to Amasya's reputation as a city of dervish lodges and zaviyes; the mention of Pîr İlyâs in the sixth stanza is a concrete example of this description.
The Tomb of Pîr İlyâs. Gümüşlüzâde Pîr Şücâ'eddîn İlyâs el-Halvetî was one of the first sheikhs of the Halveti order in Amasya. Hüsameddin describes his tomb (türbe) as "a magnificent, lofty tomb" on a small hill at the head of the cemetery west of the Beyler Sarayı (Palace of the Princes): it was first built as a single cell by Gümüşlüzâde Ahmed Paşa and then, in 890 (1485), in the reign of Bayezid II, rebuilt in masonry with domes. Because Pîr İlyâs, his son-in-law Pîr Celâleddîn Abdurrahmân Çelebi and his grandson Pîr Hayreddîn Hızır Çelebi are buried there, it is also called the "Pîrler Türbesi" (Tomb of the Masters). Gümüşlüzâde İbrâhim Paşa repaired the tomb in 1100 (1688-89); weakened by earthquakes, the building was completely demolished in 1312 (1894-95) and rebuilt with the help of the townspeople and a contribution from Abdülhamid II. The tomb stands today in the Pirler Park in the centre of Amasya as the Pir Sücaeddin İlyas Türbesi, also known as the Yukarı Pirler Türbesi; over its entrance are the original building inscription and a repair inscription from the reign of Abdülhamid II.
The Gümüşlüzâde family. The "Gümüşî-zâde" of the poem refers to the Gümüşlüzâdes, one of Amasya's oldest families. In Hüsameddin's account the family goes back to Emîr Gümüşlü (Emîneddîn Yûnus el-Müstevfî), brother-in-law of the Seljuk vizier Muînüddin Pervâne. Gümüşlüzâde Tâceddîn Mahmûd Çelebi, emir of Amasya, built a mosque in the city in 725 (1325), and the quarter where the mosque stands was recorded in official registers as the Gümüşlüzâde Mahallesi after him. Pîr İlyâs also belonged to this family; according to Hüsameddin, the trustees of the tomb were Gümüşlüzâdes descended from Pîr İlyâs's brother. Who the Gümüşîzâde addressed in the poem was is unknown; he may have been a living member of the family in 1595, perhaps someone connected with the tomb, but the source does not say so.
Historical Context
Mehmet Arslan states that Âlî wrote the poem "while he was governor in Amasya". Âlî's official post in Amasya was the sanjak governorship, and according to the biography in the TDV this post began in 1595 and ended within the same year; the poem must therefore be a product of this short period. Two signs within the poem support this dating: the drum and banner of the third stanza and the word "vâlî" in the last. If one considers that Âlî was sent to Amasya against his wishes, in place of the treasurership of Egypt, the praise of the city as a refuge and a source of grace can also be read as the poet's attempt to offset his disappointment with the city's spiritual worth.
The only accessible source for the text of the poem is Arslan's paper of 2018, and Arslan does not indicate from which divan edition or manuscript he took it. According to the TDV, the poems Âlî wrote from 1591 until his death were collected in his fourth divan, compiled by Hisâlî; some of the poems in this divan are headed by notes on where, when and on what occasion they were written. A poem dating from 1595 would be expected to appear in this divan, but no comparison with the divan manuscripts could be made for this study.
Bibliography
Primary sources
- Abdîzâde Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar, Amasya Tarihi, vol. 1, transliteration: Mehmet Arslan; eds. Songül Keçeci Kurt, Recep Orhan Özel, Metin Hakverdioğlu, Amasya: Amasya Belediyesi Kültür Yayınları, 2022, e-book pp. 90-91 (Gümüşlüzâde Garden and the palace), 130 (Gümüşlüzâde Quarter), 137-138 (Tomb of Pîr İlyâs). amasya.bel.tr
Academic studies
- Mehmet Arslan, "Divan Edebiyatında Şehirler Üzerine Yazılan Şiirler ve Bunlar Arasında Amasya Şiirleri", Uluslararası Amasya Şairleri Bilim Şöleni Bildiriler Kitabı (4-6 Ekim 2018), eds. M. Fatih Köksal, Sibel Murad, Mevlüt İlhan, Ankara: KIBATEK, 2018, pp. 47-70; poem on pp. 58-59 (transliteration: Mehmet Arslan).
Official sources
- Republic of Türkiye Ministry of Culture and Tourism, Türkiye Kültür Portalı, "Pir Sücaeddin İlyas Türbesi" (kulturportali.gov.tr). kulturportali.gov.tr
Books
- Bekir Kütükoğlu, Ömer Faruk Akün, "Âlî Mustafa Efendi", TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, vol. 2, Istanbul 1989, pp. 414-421. islamansiklopedisi.org.tr
Online sources
