Among the earliest poets of Amasya named in Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar's book, Emîneddîn Mehmed Çelebi, known by the kunya Abu'l-Fazl, had his life bound up with the fortunes of a pupil. According to Hüsameddin he taught in Amasya at the beginning of the fourteenth century and became tutor to Altunbaş, son of the Anatolian Seljuk sultan Mesud II; when Altunbaş fled and went into hiding in 718 (1318-19) he left for the Arab lands, stayed for a while in Damascus and Aleppo, settled at last in Egypt, and died there in 726 (1325-26) while teaching in a madrasa. The nisba "el-Ummâsî" added to his name is a form of al-Amâsî, "of Amasya", and shows that he carried the name of his home town with him into the Arab world. Hüsameddin calls him "edîb, şâir, mecîd", a man of letters, a poet and a master, but records not a single line of his and does not say where his information came from. For a closer discussion of who Altunbaş was, see the study Emîneddîn Mehmed Çelebi-Ebu'l-Fazl el-Ummâsî.

Hüsameddin's Entry

Amasyalıdır. Abdürrahim bin Mehmed bin Yûsuf mahdûmudur. Türk ve Arap ulemâsından tahsîl-i ilim ve edeb edib Amasya'da bir müddet tedrîs-i ulûm ederek iştihâr etdi. Sultân Mes'ûd-i Selçûkî şehzâdesi Sultân Altunbaş Gâzi Çelebi muallimi oldu. 718'de Sultân Altunbaş'ın firâr ve ihtifâsı üzerine Arabistan'a gitdi. Şâm ve Haleb'de bir müddet oturup sonunda Mısır'a giderek orada ikâmet etdi. Orada müderris olup 726'da vefât eyledi. Ulum-i Arabiyye ve nakliyyede kâmil, fünûn-ı edebiyyede fâzıl, edîb, şâir, mecîd idi.

In language readers can follow today: he came from Amasya, and his father was Abdürrahîm bin Mehmed bin Yûsuf. He studied learning and letters with Turkish and Arab scholars and became known by teaching for a time in Amasya. He became tutor to Sultan Altunbaş Gazi Çelebi, son of the Seljuk Sultan Mesud; when Altunbaş fled and hid in 718, he went to the Arab lands, lived for a while in Damascus and Aleppo, and then settled in Egypt. There he became a madrasa teacher and died in 726. He was accomplished in the Arabic-language sciences and the transmitted sciences, distinguished in the literary arts, a man of letters, a poet and a master.

Tutor to Altunbaş

Tâceddîn Altunbaş owed his place in Amasya to his father's second reign. Mesud II, one of the last Seljuk sultans, gave Amasya, together with Gedegra and Sinop, to this son, also known as "Gazi Çelebi", after returning to the throne for the second time in 1302. How the city was governed under the Seljuks and Ilkhanids is traced in the article Governors of Amasya in the Anatolian Seljuk Period, and the principality Altunbaş later founded around Samsun in the article A Mosaic of Principalities. According to one account Altunbaş ruled in Amasya between 1308 and 1318 as a sultan subject to the Ilkhanids; the year 718, in which Hüsameddin says he "fled and went into hiding", falls at the end of this period.

Damascus, Aleppo and Cairo were at that time cities of the Mamluk sultanate. Hüsameddin does not say in which madrasa Emîneddîn Mehmed taught in Egypt, whom he taught, or whether he left any work in Arabic. No entry under this kunya and nisba turned up in the biographical dictionaries of the Mamluk period; the searches made for this page came to nothing.

The State of the Sources

The details of the entry, its exact dates and the information about his teaching in Egypt give the impression that Hüsameddin had a written source in front of him; but the book does not name it, and it cannot be confirmed from any other document. Altunbaş's presence in Amasya appears in other studies too, but no record mentioning a tutor of his was found. The information on this page therefore rests on a single source.

His Poetry

No poem of his is known. The fields in which Hüsameddin praises him are the Arabic-language sciences and letters; the poetry of a life spent in Damascus, Aleppo and Cairo was very probably in Arabic, but not a single couplet survives to show it.

Chronology

1302: Mesud II gives Amasya to his son Altunbaş; Emîneddîn Mehmed's tutorship must fall in the years after this.

718 (1318-19): After Altunbaş flees and goes into hiding, he leaves Amasya for Damascus and Aleppo.

726 (1325-26): Dies in Egypt while teaching in a madrasa.

Bibliography

Online sources