Esrarî was a minstrel (âşık) of the Alevi-Bektashi tradition who lived in the Merzifon area in the second half of the nineteenth century and the first quarter of the twentieth. His real name and his dates of birth and death are not known. He is also named in the lists of the âşıks of Gaziler Ovacığı; the information about him rests on a short entry in Ali Cem Akbulut's 2010 book Gazilerovacığı Âşıkları and on two of his deyiş first published in the same book. Each of the two deyiş has its own page in this category, with the text, a modern rendering and commentary.

His Life

According to the information quoted from Akbulut's book, there is no certain information about Esrarî's life. According to local accounts and surviving manuscripts he lived in the Merzifon area in the second half of the nineteenth century and the first quarter of the twentieth. His deyiş are recorded in the local cönks, the poetry notebooks of minstrels and their devotees. He belonged to the Alevi-Bektashi tradition and was one of the âşıks of Feyzullah Çelebi (1811-1878), head of the Hacı Bektaş lodge, and of his son Cemalettin Çelebi (1862-1921). From his deyiş "Gidiyor", dedicated to Cemalettin Çelebi, it is understood that he was still alive after 1914. Where he died and where he was buried is not known.

There is a slight tension within this information. While Esrarî is said to have lived from the second half of the nineteenth century, his being counted among the âşıks of Feyzullah Çelebi suggests that he was an adult by the 1870s at the latest. His eulogy of Feyzullah Çelebi was also most probably composed before 1878. In that case Esrarî must have been born around the 1850s and lived a long life; this is our inference and does not appear in the source.

His Connection with Amasya

The Merzifon area is given as the place where Esrarî lived. His name also appears in the list counting the âşıks of Gaziler Ovacığı: Two works drawing on the Gümüşhacıköy book of Ahmet Ankaralı, Sedat Cin and Galip Tuncay, Şerife Özer and Mustafa Topal's 2021 article and Fatih Çelebi's 2026 study, count the best-known âşıks of Amasya and give the name "Esrarî" after Kul Hasan and before Derviş Edna. The site's article The minstrel tradition in Amasya reproduces this list too. His relation to the çelebis of Hacı Bektaş places him in the milieu of the Alevis of Merzifon and Gümüşhacıköy attached to the çelebis; Fedai Şahin's 2024 thesis also relates that Cemalettin Çelebi was deeply revered in the region and that most of the region's âşıks composed deyiş for him.

His Poetry

Two deyiş of Esrarî survive, and both are addressed to the çelebis of Hacı Bektaş. The first is a koşma of five quatrains praising Feyzullah Çelebi with the refrain "Hak Muhammet Ali nuru Feyzullah"; it is built on the idea that the light handed down from eternity appears in God, Muhammad and Ali and reaches the pirs descended from the Prophet's line. The second is a koşma of seven quatrains with the redif "gidiyor" (is going), telling of a pir who girds Zülfikar at his side, takes the banner of tawhid in his hand and marches against the enemy. This deyiş names the year "three hundred and thirty-one"; the Rumi year 1331 falls between March 1915 and March 1916. Since Cemalettin Çelebi is known to have formed a volunteer Bektashi regiment in 1915 and gone to the Caucasian front, it is very likely that the deyiş was composed on this campaign; this connection is our interpretation. Both deyiş are in the eleven-syllable syllabic metre. Although Esrarî's date of death is unknown, since he is reported to have lived in the first quarter of the twentieth century and his deyiş have circulated in the cönks for more than a hundred years, the texts are published here in full.

The State of the Sources and His Namesakes

The only source on Esrarî is Akbulut's book; this book was not available to us, and we give the information and the texts of the deyiş as reported in an online collection of deyiş that cites the book. According to Akbulut the deyiş are published for the first time in his research. The pen name Esrarî was also used by other poets in Turkish literature. The Türk Edebiyatı İsimler Sözlüğü records a divan poet named Esrârî Çelebi, of the learned class, known from a single couplet in a poetry anthology compiled between the last quarter of the sixteenth century and the first quarter of the seventeenth; this poet has no connection with the minstrel of Merzifon. Fedai Şahin's thesis also relates that a zakir living in Merzifon was given his pen name by "Ozan Esrari"; this ozan appears to be a person living today and should not be confused with the nineteenth-century âşık described here.

Chronology

Before 1878: He composes his eulogy of Feyzullah Çelebi; Feyzullah Çelebi dies in 1878.

1915-1916: He composes the deyiş "Gidiyor", which names the Rumi year 1331; Cemalettin Çelebi's Bektashi Regiment is on the Caucasian front in these years.

2010: His two deyiş are first published in Ali Cem Akbulut's book Gazilerovacığı Âşıkları.

Bibliography

Academic studies

Books

Online sources