Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Vâcibdür dôstlık itmek konşı-y-ılan
Sakın kim konşıñı olmaya yılan
Kime kim dôstlık itseñ it hazer sen
Hazersüzdür başı yollarda kalan
Hâssa kim kâfir olsa dôst idinmez
Dilinde dîni bâtıl kavli yalan

In English

1. Friendship with one's neighbour is a duty; take care that your neighbour is not a snake.

2. With whomever you make friends, stay on guard all the same; the head of the unwary is left lying on the roads.

3. Above all, an infidel does not take a friend; on his tongue his faith is false and his word a lie.

Literary and Historical Commentary

"They Are Our Neighbours"

After the raids on Göynük and Mudurnu the infidels of the district begin to be wary of Osman; yet Osman still shows great respect to the infidels of Bilecik. When someone asks him why, he answers: "They are our neighbours. We came to this land as strangers and they treated us well. So it is our duty too to respect them." The couplets take up this answer at once, echoing the word "vâcib", duty, in their first line.

Counsel Facing Two Ways

The couplets both endorse the answer and set limits to it. The first line puts neighbourly conduct as a religious obligation; the second at once brings in the image of a snake. The second couplet urges caution in every friendship, and the third draws the line plainly: an infidel does not take a friend. Read together with the counsel "use cunning with the enemy" in the previous verse, this duality shows that Âşıkpaşazâde wants to draw Osman both as a good neighbour and as a frontier lord on his guard. In the following chapters the tekfur of Bilecik's plan to trap Osman at his wedding is the narrative counterpart of this caution. The sound "-lan" returns four times in the rhyme: konşı-y-ılan, yılan, kalan, yalan. In the first couplet the sound likeness between "konşı-y-ılan", with the neighbour, and "yılan", snake, lets the word itself suggest that a neighbour may turn into a snake.

Bibliography

  • Âşık Paşazade, Osmanoğulları'nın Tarihi, ed. Kemal Yavuz, M. A. Yekta Saraç, Istanbul: K Kitaplığı, 2003, p. 334 (transliterated text, bâb 10).