Sivas ve Kayseriyye Emîri Alâeddîn Ali Bey bin Emîr Nâsıreddîn Mehmed Bey bin Sultân Alâeddîn Eretna Bey’in ikinci mahdûmudur. Gâzi Bey demekle meşhûrdur. 781’de pederinin irtihâlinden sonra birâderi Mehmed Bey’le beraber küçük yaşında Amasya hükümdârı Hacı Şadgeldi Paşa’ya ilticâ etdi.
Amasya‘da büyüdü. 791’de Amasya’ya ilticâ eden amcazâdesi Abdullah Bey bin Eretna Bey bin Mehmed Bey’e dâmâd olup Çelebi Sultân Mehmed Hân devrinde ağır zeâmetle kayırıldı. Ba’dehû ümerâdan olup 829’da vefât etdi. Mahdûmları Ali, Abdullah Beylerdir. [52]
In Modern English
He was the second son of Alâeddin Ali Bey, Emir of Sivas and Kayseri. Ali Bey was the son of Emir Nâsıreddin Mehmed Bey, who was the son of Sultan Alâeddin Eretna Bey. He is famous as Gâzi Bey. In 781 [1379-80], after the death of his father, he took refuge as a small child, together with his brother Mehmed Bey, with Hacı Şadgeldi Paşa, ruler of Amasya.
He grew up in Amasya. In 791 [1389] he became son-in-law of his cousin Abdullah Bey, who had taken refuge in Amasya. Abdullah Bey was the son of Eretna Bey, who was the son of Mehmed Bey. In the time of Çelebi Sultan Mehmed Han, Gâzi Bey was favoured with a large zeamet. Later he became one of the emirs and died in 829 [1425-26]. His sons are Ali Bey and Abdullah Bey.
Notes and Research
Old Words in the Text
- mahdûm: son
- irtihâl: death
- ilticâ: taking refuge
- dâmâd: son-in-law
- amcazâde: son of a paternal uncle, cousin
- zeâmet: a military fief of high annual income
- ümerâ: emirs, beys
The Eretnids
Gâzi Bey's forebears descend from Eretna, who founded a state centred on Sivas and Kayseri in Anatolia. Eretna had been governing Anatolia as deputy of the Ilkhanid governor of Anatolia, the Jalayirid Great Şeyh Hasan. After the death of the Ilkhanid Khan Abu Said in 1335 he took the administration of Anatolia into his own hands, declared his independence in 1341, had the khutba read and coins struck in his own name, first at Sivas and then at Kayseri, and established authority over most of the former Anatolian Seljuk lands. When he died at Kayseri in March 1352 he was buried in the tomb in the courtyard of the Köşkmedrese. At his death places such as Sivas, Kayseri, Amasya, Tokat, Çorum, Ankara, Niğde, Aksaray and Erzincan were under his rule. His son Mehmed Bey was killed at Sivas in October 1365 by statesmen including Hacı Şadgeldi and Hacı İbrâhim. In his place his thirteen-year-old son Ali Bey was proclaimed sultan with the title Alâeddin. In this period the emirs began to act independently in their own regions, and Hacı Şadgeldi did so in Amasya.
Hacı Şadgeldi and Amasya
Şadgeldi was the second son of Hacı Kutlu Şah, one of the Eretnid emirs. According to some sources he was made emir of Amasya in 1359, was driven out of the city for a time in 1361 after his father's death, and regained control a few months later. He is the person the text calls the "ruler of Amasya". In 1381 Kadı Burhâneddin put an end to the Eretnid dynasty and soon afterwards removed Şadgeldi. After Şadgeldi's death his son Ahmed defended the city with the support of the Ottoman Sultan Yıldırım Bayezid. Amasya was finally annexed to Ottoman lands in 1398, and Bayezid left its administration to his son Çelebi Mehmed. The date at which Amasya passed to Ottoman rule is given in some sources as earlier years; this detail could not be verified with the sources available to us.
Comparison with Hüsameddin's Account
The dates and persons in the text broadly agree with Eretnid history. It is related that Gâzi Bey's father Alâeddin Ali Bey was struck by plague and died in 1380 during his second campaign against Amasya; Hüsameddin gives the date of death as 781, that is 1379-80. The two dates are very close. A striking point is that the children took refuge with the emir against whom their father had campaigned. On the other hand it is recorded that after Ali Bey's death his seven-year-old son Mehmed II was placed on the throne at Sivas. The Mehmed Bey whom Hüsameddin names as Gâzi Bey's brother may be this child, but that is an inference and could not be verified. About Gâzi Bey's sons Ali and Abdullah there is no further information in the sources available to us.
The Zeâmet
The phrase "heavy zeâmet" describes a fief of large income granted to Gâzi Bey. In the Ottoman land system, fiefs with an annual income between 20,000 and 100,000 akçe were called zeamet; they were given to members of the Divan and to mid-level bureaucrats, and from the 1430s onward appear among the fiefs. That a person of Eretnid descent was granted such a fief in the time of Çelebi Mehmed shows that members of this dynasty found a place in Ottoman administration.
Bibliography