Original Ottoman Turkish Text
Yalançı düzmelerüñ işi bitdi
Dili dönmez anı bir kişi tutdı
Didi bir hôr hakîr u kaltabansın
Buzagu ipini boynına takdı
Sürüp yayan getürdi han öñine
Anı begdür diyenler cümle bakdı
Didi bir sözüm var hana diyeyin
Hemân-dem cellâd agız yire kakdı
Kodılar bir niçe gün kim asıldı
Soñucı bir ışık delüge dıkdı
In English
1. The work of the lying pretenders is finished; his tongue cannot turn, a man has seized him.
2. He said, "you are a base, wretched ragamuffin"; he put a calf's rope round his neck.
3. He drove him on foot before the khan; those who had said "this is the lord" all looked on.
4. He said, "I have a word to say to the khan"; at once the executioner struck his mouth to the ground.
5. They left him hanging for some days; in the end a wandering dervish stuffed him into a hole.
Literary and Historical Commentary
The Crossing from Ece Ovası
With the ships hauled ashore, how Murad crossed to Rumelia is told in the eighty-sixth chapter. The intendant of Gallipoli is a man raised by İbrahim Paşa. An infidel ship is found at Ece Ovası; the intendant, as if doing business with the infidel, agrees for fifteen thousand florins that the ship will carry Murad and his household across to Ece Ovası. A man swims across by night from Kumburun, finds İbrahim Paşa's tent and reports the ship. That night many men are carried over until morning, and the paşas and Murad cross too. Mustafa, hearing that Murad has crossed, pretends to give battle but takes the road to Bolayır and goes. The people of Gallipoli receive Murad with respect. Mustafa reaches Edirne; the people pay him no heed, and he flees from Edirne as well. He is caught at Kızılağaç Yenicesi, brought back to Edirne and hanged from a tower of the fortress; the people watch in a body.
The End of a Pretender
What the prose passes over in a few sentences becomes, in five couplets, a detailed scene. The Pretender is seized by one man; he is reviled as "a base, wretched ragamuffin" and a calf's rope is put round his neck. He is brought on foot before the khan, and those who had recognised him as lord stare at him. The fourth couplet gives a bitter detail: the Pretender says he has a word to say to the khan, but the executioner at once strikes his mouth to the ground. In the fifth couplet the body, left hanging, is finally buried in a hole by a "ışık", a wandering dervish. In these couplets neither whether Mustafa was a real prince nor the severity of the punishment is discussed; the epithet "düzme", false, has decided everything in advance. The refrain is "-dı/-di": bitdi, tutdı, takdı, bakdı, kakdı, dıkdı.
Bibliography
- Âşık Paşazade, Osmanoğulları'nın Tarihi, ed. Kemal Yavuz, M. A. Yekta Saraç, Istanbul: K Kitaplığı, 2003, p. 437 (transliterated text, bâb 86).
