Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mefâʿîlün mefâʿîlün feʿûlün. The source does not indicate the metre; this pattern has been inferred from the text and requires lengthening of a few syllables.

Kuşandı dîn kılıcın bile 'Osmân
Ki ikrâr itdüre her dile 'Osmân
İde İslâm'ı izhâr 'âlem içre
İde rûşen cihânda nûrı 'Osmân
Çü küfr ü zulmeti Rûm'ı alupdur
Diler kim 'âlemi nûr ide 'Osman
Açıldı fursat-ı İslâm kapusı
O kilde kim miftâh oldı 'Osmân
Muhammed ümmetinüñ serveridür
Olupdur mu'cize mazharı 'Osmân

In English

1. Osman girded on the sword of the faith, so that he might make every tongue confess (the faith).

2. So that he might make Islam manifest throughout the world, and the light of Osman might illuminate the world.

3. Since unbelief and darkness have covered Rûm, Osman wishes to flood the world with light.

4. The gate of Islam's opportunity has opened; Osman became the key to that lock. ("Kilde" has this form in the intermediary source; it has been read as "kilide", lock.)

5. He is the leader of the community of Muhammad; Osman has become the place where a miracle appears.

Literary and Historical Commentary

The Key and the Gate

At the centre of the piece stands the image in the fourth couplet: the gate of Islam has opened, and it is Osman who is the key to its lock. Emine Sonnur Özcan reads these couplets as the place where Âşıkpaşazâde turns the concept of gazâ (holy war) into a discourse of sovereignty. In her view the author had until then presented gazâ as a means by which Ertuğrul and his sons gained a foothold in Anatolia, while with Osman's election as bey he began to present Osman's raids directly as "the key to the gate of Islam". Girding on the sword, shedding light and opening the gate are like three successive steps in the couplets: first the weapon, then the light, then the conquest.

In the third couplet Rûm, that is, Anatolia, is shown as a land covered by "küfr ü zulmet", unbelief and darkness; Osman's wish is to flood the world with light. The contrast of light and darkness is tied to the phrase "nûr-ı 'Osmân", the light of Osman, in the second couplet. The last couplet names Osman as the leader of the community of the Prophet Muhammad and as the person in whom a miracle became manifest; this is a typical expression of the menâkıbnâme language, which presents a frontier lord as one appointed to a religious mission.

Refrain and Form

In all five couplets the second line ends with the word "'Osmân"; in the first couplet the first line also closes with the same refrain (redif). That the refrain is a proper name shows clearly that the piece is a poem of praise. In the third couplet the name is written in the intermediary source without the lengthening mark, as "'Osman"; it has been left as it stands here too.

Context, Attribution and Text

As Özcan relates it, this piece is immediately preceded by the account of Ertuğrul Gazi's coming to Rûm: Ertuğrul sends his son Saru Yatı to the Seljuk sultan Alâeddin and asks for a homeland where they can wage holy war; the sultan gives them Söğüt as their homeland and Domaniç and the mountain of the "Ermeni Beli" as summer pasture. After Ertuğrul, his son Osman is chosen as bey, and the poem follows this election. Whether the piece belongs to Âşıkpaşazâde or to a source he used is not discussed in the intermediary source; its structure, running on a single refrain, suggests that it was not taken from Ahmedî's İskendernâme section, which is in mesnevi form, but this is an inference. Özcan quotes the couplets from page 323 of the 2003 Yavuz-Saraç edition and places three couplets in the left column and two in the right; here the couplets have been read row by row, so the order may differ from that of the edition. The poet's life is told under Âşıkî (Âşıkpaşazâde).

Bibliography

Academic studies

Books

  • Âşık Paşazade, Osmanoğulları'nın Tarihi, ed. Kemal Yavuz, M. A. Yekta Saraç, Istanbul: K Kitaplığı, 2003, p. 323 (as quoted by Özcan).

Online sources