Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: fā‘ilātün mefā‘ilün fe‘ilün

Bir dem idi cihânda Pinti Ḥamîd
Añılurdı kemâl-i ḫisset ile
Şimdi evden eve berü oldı
Kimse añmaz anı bu töhmet ile

In English

1. Once upon a time Pinti Hamîd was spoken of in the world for the utmost degree of stinginess.

2. Now he has been acquitted of it from house to house (everywhere); no one any longer speaks of him with this charge. ("Berü" is this text's spelling of "berî", which means free of guilt, cleared. The exact meaning of "evden eve" (from house to house) here is not certain; it can be understood as "in every house, in everyone's eyes". What the kıt‘a means to say is that once Revânî appeared, Pinti Hamîd's reputation for stinginess was wiped out.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a kıt‘a (fragment) of two couplets; the second lines of the couplets rhyme "ḫisset ile / töhmet ile", the word "ile" repeating like a redif (refrain word). The metre is the hafif family of aruz (quantitative metre), in the pattern "fā‘ilātün mefā‘ilün fe‘ilün"; the biographical anthology (tezkire) does not state the metre, which emerges from scansion. The kıt‘a is not among the Turkish poems in Basîrî's divan manuscript and is known only from Latîfî's tezkire. Latîfî gives it, again headed "Ḳıṭʿa", immediately after "Revânîyle meger Pinti Ḥamîdüñ", the kıt‘a in which Basîrî satirizes Revânî. Revânî's name does not occur in the kıt‘a; but its place in Latîfî and the mention of Pinti Hamîd show that it is part of the same series of satires.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The kıt‘a is an indirect satire built around a person whose name had become identified with stinginess. Pinti Hamîd, as his nickname (pinti, miser) shows, was known for his meanness; in his earlier kıt‘a Basîrî had compared him with Revânî and found Revânî twice as mean. In this kıt‘a the same comparison becomes a story. The first couplet says that Pinti Hamîd was once spoken of for "kemâl-i hısset", the utmost degree of stinginess. In the second couplet no one speaks of him with this offence any longer; he has been cleared.

The subtlety of the satire lies in Revânî's name never being mentioned. The reason for Pinti Hamîd's acquittal is not stated; the reader completes it for himself: a greater miser has appeared and the reputation has passed to him. The word "töhmet" presents stinginess as an offence and an accusation; "berî olmak", to be acquitted of guilt, is an expression taken from the language of the court. So the kıt‘a is built like a trial scene: the old defendant has been acquitted and the guilt laid on someone new. The contrast in time between "bir dem" (once) and "şimdi" (now) is the antithesis that binds the two couplets of the kıt‘a together.

Historical Context

According to Latîfî, Basîrî presented a qasida to Revânî, and when he received in return ten coins, five of copper and five of lead, he was deeply offended and satirized Revânî's stinginess in kıt‘as. In the continuation of this story Latîfî lists several of Basîrî's kıt‘as on Revânî one after another; this kıt‘a is one of them. Revânî did not remain without an answer either, and replied with a kıt‘a mocking Basîrî's "alaca", the blotches left by the disease of leucoderma. Revânî was a poet from Edirne; after the accession of Selim I he served as clerk and superintendent of the palace kitchen, and he died in 930 (1523-24). That a man in charge of the palace kitchen should be spoken of for stinginess lends these satires a flavour of their own.

Bibliography

Primary sources

  • Latîfî, Tezkiretü'ş-şu'arâ ve Tabsıratü'n-nuzamâ, ed. Rıdvan Canım, Ankara: Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Yay., 2018 (e-book), p. 150, entry on Basîrî. ekitap.ktb.gov.tr

Academic studies

Books

Online sources