Original Ottoman Turkish Text
Bu âdem düzdi 'âlemde düzenler
Bilür misin niçün düzdi düzenler
Ya kendü güvene ya gayra ola
Bu niyyetlen düzen düzgün düzenler
Ne düzseñ eseri kala cihânda
Velî âsârı budur kanı düzenler
In English
1. This man has set up orders in the world; do you know why he set up those orders.
2. Either for his own security or for others; with this intention an order is properly set up.
3. Whatever you set up, let its work remain in the world; but these are the works, where are those orders.
Literary and Historical Commentary
A Chapter's Preface
The heading of the thirty-first chapter is "This tells what he wore and what he introduced"; the chapter will describe what Orhan Gazi brought in after becoming ruler that had not existed in his father's time. The prose begins with a single sentence and passes at once to the verse, so these three couplets stand as the chapter's preface. Then the white cap, the office of kadı, the foot soldiers and the twisted turban will be described.
Order and Intention
"Düzen", order or arrangement, appears twice in every couplet, and the whole piece is built on this word. Düzen here means both an institution or custom and a structure. The second couplet distinguishes two intentions in setting up an order: man sets one up either for his own security or for the good of others. The third leaves a contradiction: man wants his work to remain, but the orders that owned the surviving works have vanished. This ambivalent view reminds the reader from the start that the innovations about to be praised are also transient. Rhyme and refrain lie in the word "düzenler"; repetitions of the same root such as "düzdi düzenler" and "düzen düzgün düzenler" in the first couplet are a play on words between pun and derivation.
Bibliography
- Âşık Paşazade, Osmanoğulları'nın Tarihi, ed. Kemal Yavuz, M. A. Yekta Saraç, Istanbul: K Kitaplığı, 2003, p. 364 (transliterated text, bâb 31).
