A Scholar from Gelibolu and Amasya

Muslihuddin Mustafa Sürûrî was one of the most prolific scholars of the reign of Süleyman the Magnificent. He wrote glosses on works of Qur'anic exegesis and jurisprudence, translated sections of Avicenna's book on medicine, and wrote commentaries on Rumi's Masnavi, on Sa'di's Gulistan and Bustan, and on the divan of Hafez. His contemporaries called him "the commentator of the Masnavi". The Bahrü'l-maârif, regarded as the first systematic book of rhetoric in Turkish literature, is also his. A large part of this broad body of work was written in Amasya, during the most eventful years of his life. Sürûrî came to Amasya in the late 1540s as tutor to Şehzade Mustafa (Prince Mustafa), the eldest son of Süleyman, and stayed at his side until the prince was strangled in 1553 at the army camp near Ereğli in Karaman. Besides teaching him, he became a confidant who drafted the prince's letters and knew his secrets.

Sürûrî was not a native of Amasya. He was born in Gelibolu (Gallipoli), spent most of his life in the Kasımpaşa quarter of Istanbul and was buried there. Yet his tie to Amasya amounts to more than a single record of appointment. His father, Hoca Şa'bân, had served as treasurer (defterdar) to Bayezid II during his years as prince in Amasya. Half a century later the son came to the same city as tutor to another prince. In the third volume of his Amasya Tarihi (History of Amasya), Hüseyin Hüsâmeddin Yasar mentions Sürûrî several times while recounting Prince Mustafa's years in Amasya: he records his arrival in the city, the letter of complaint he composed in the prince's name, the Gulistan commentary he completed in Amasya, and the fact that he was the prince's "both tutor and keeper of secrets". In the first volume, too, "the famous Sürûrî Efendi" is named among the teachers who gave lessons at the prince's summer pavilion on Karakaya.

Family and Name

In the sources his full name appears as Sürûrî Muslihuddin Mustafa b. Şa'bân el-Gelibolî er-Rûmî. His name was Mustafa, his honorific Muslihuddin, and his father's name Şa'bân. The TDV Encyclopedia of Islam gives his date of birth as 897 (1492), and the article İsmail Güleç wrote on his life also records the year 897/1491. Taken together with the date of his death, this agrees with Âşık Çelebi's statement that he lived seventy-two years.

His father, Hoca Şa'bân, was a wealthy merchant who kept his place in the Gelibolu market. The biographers of poets speak of this wealth in almost epic terms. Kınalızâde Hasan Çelebi writes that the ocean itself might be emptied, yet Hoca Şa'bân's fortune would not diminish, and adds that much of this wealth was spent on the education of his only son. Gelibolulu Mustafa Âlî likewise introduces him as "the peerless, worthy offspring of a merchant named Şa'bân from Gelibolu" and says the father was a rich trader who sat in the city's covered market. According to an account related by Güleç, when the boy memorized the Kâfiye, a work on Arabic syntax, his father showered both the teacher and his son with gifts out of joy, and whenever his son wrote a book he never failed to reward him. That Hoca Şa'bân also held office, serving for a time as treasurer to Bayezid II in Amasya when Bayezid was a prince, appears in the TDV article and in Güleç's account based on Ali b. Bâlî. No details are given about the date or length of this post.

The pen name "Sürûrî" means "joyful, cheerful". Güleç suggests that it may derive from a comfortable youth spent in a wealthy family, or from an optimistic wish against the hardships he would later meet, and he recalls the poet's own couplet: "Didiler te'sîr ider ismi müsemmâda velî / Ey Sürûrî görmedüm âlemde handân olduğun." They said a name affects the one who bears it, yet, O Sürûrî, I never saw you laughing in this world. Âşık Çelebi reads the closing couplet of this ghazal as the poet's "account of his own state", an omen he cast upon his own unhappiness.

Education and First Posts

Sürûrî studied with well-known teachers of the age. The TDV article lists Kara Dâvud İzmitî, Nihâlî, Tâcîzâde Câfer Çelebi, Taşköprizâde Mustafa Efendi and Abdülvâsi Efendi. Güleç adds Kadrî Efendi and notes that Kara Dâvud was then teaching in Bursa. The presence of Tâcîzâde Câfer Çelebi among his teachers is noteworthy, for Câfer Çelebi was himself a native of Amasya who had spent his youth there, around the princely court of Bayezid II. Sürûrî completed his madrasa studies under Fenârîzâde Muhyiddin Çelebi and became his candidate for office (mülâzım).

He entered public service late compared with his peers. Güleç attributes this to his father's wealth: a young man with no need to earn a living had been content to study until the age of twenty-nine. In 927 (1521), when Fenârîzâde Muhyiddin Çelebi became qadi of Istanbul, he appointed Sürûrî deputy judge (nâib) of the newly founded bab court. The bab deputies were assistants who heard cases and gave judgments on behalf of the heavily burdened qadi of Istanbul. Two years later, in 929 (1523), when his teacher became chief military judge of Anatolia (kazasker), Sürûrî moved into his service as clerk (tezkireci). He did not last long in this post. According to Nev'îzâde Atâî, he was accused of passing confidential information of the office to his former teacher Abdülvâsi Efendi through the latter's son, who worked in the grand vizier's office. He then abandoned the official career.

This break turned him toward Sufism. He made his vow of repentance (inâbe) to Şeyh Mahmud Çelebi, son-in-law of Emîr Buhârî, who had brought the Naqshbandi order to Istanbul, and deputy of Abdullah-ı İlâhî; then he went on pilgrimage to Mecca. On his return he regained Fenârîzâde's favour. In 930 (1524) he became teacher (müderris) at the Sarıca Paşa Madrasa in Gelibolu at twenty akçe a day. According to Güleç, he succeeded Muhaşşî Sinan Efendi in this post. In Hüsâmeddin's records, the scholar known by the nickname Muhaşşî Sinan is a native of Amasya named Şeyh Hüsâmeddin Efendizâde Sinâneddin Yûsuf.

Teaching and the Dervish Path in Istanbul

In 933 (1526-27), when Cemâl Efendi, sheikh of Pîrî Mehmed Paşa's dervish lodge (zâviye) in Istanbul, died, the founder of the endowment, still alive, converted the lodge into a madrasa, and Sürûrî became its first teacher at twenty-five akçe. In time he rose to the forty-akçe rank (rütbe-i erbaîn), and he also took on the office of sheikh of the lodge. By Güleç's reckoning he stayed there eleven years. In 944 (1537-38) he became, at fifty akçe, the first teacher of the madrasa that Vizier Güzelce Kasım Paşa had built near Galata, in the quarter later named after him. He wrote his Şerhu'l-Misbâh on Arabic syntax in that year, during his first period of teaching there.

Âşık Çelebi was Sürûrî's student and refers to him in his biographical dictionary as "my master". As one who knew his Kasımpaşa years closely, he describes them: Sürûrî taught at the madrasa four days a week and read the Masnavi after Friday prayers and every day after the afternoon prayer. By the time he finished and went home, night had fallen. The door of his cell was open to any student who wished to learn in any science. So was his table; he offered something to whoever came and went, even if only bread and cheese, and never ate without a guest. Âşık Çelebi adds that his master taught exegesis, Bukhari and the Hidâye, wrote ghazals, composed books on astronomy and medicine, solved riddles (muamma) and corrected the verses of poets.

In 954 (1547-48) his teacher Fenârîzâde Muhyiddin Çelebi died. Sürûrî was deeply grieved by this death; he resigned his teaching post and, attaching himself to Abdüllatif Efendi, sheikh of the Emîr Buhârî lodge, turned once more to the dervish life. Kasım Paşa, who had built the madrasa, was then governor (sanjak-bey) of the Morea. According to Atâî, he wrote Sürûrî a letter saying: "We built that madrasa in your honour; if it is not accepted, it is resolved to demolish it, for we cannot bear to see a stranger in your place." Faced with such insistence, Sürûrî returned to his post on condition that he keep his dervish dress, continue his Masnavi lessons and teach only on certain days of the week. Güleç thinks that besides Sürûrî's standing among the people and students, a bond of common origin may have played a part in the pasha's insistence, since Kasım Paşa is also buried in Gelibolu.

In these years Sürûrî sold all his property and built a small mosque (mescid) near his house. Kınalızâde reports him as saying that "for those who have cut themselves off from the world, it is easy to break their ties". The mosque was later known by his name. He then went on pilgrimage a second time. Güleç describes this period as Sürûrî's first retreat. According to Âşık Çelebi, his master devoted himself to the outward and inward sciences from 944 until 955.

The Exchange with Gubârî

One of the liveliest stories of Sürûrî's life is the exchange of verses between him and the poet Gubârî, his companion on the Naqshbandi path. Âşık Çelebi, Gelibolulu Âlî and Kınalızâde all tell it. In 941 (1534-35), while Süleyman was on his campaign of the Two Iraqs, Gubârî composed a ghazal beginning "Ne bilür ışkı her Mecnûn sen ol ahvâli benden sor" and sent it to the poets. At its close he challenged them to find a sweet-tongued poet in the world who could match this enchanting poem. Sürûrî wrote a reply in the same form and answered in its closing couplet: "Bir iki Türkî beyt ile gurûr itmek revâ mıdur / Sen insâf eylemezsen bâri bir ehl-i sühandan sor." Is it fitting to grow proud over a couple of Turkish couplets? If you will not be fair, at least ask a master of words.

In Âlî's words, Gubârî could not swallow this "morsel of reproach". Years later, while living as a resident in Mecca, he heard that Sürûrî had accepted the post of tutor to the prince and sent him a verse letter in masnavi form. In this piece, beginning "Ey Sidre-nişîn-i arş-pervâz", he likened his old friend to a bird whose wings had been broken while soaring at the throne of heaven, telling him that he had left his sacred nest and fallen into the snare of the world, that he had sunk into the sleep of heedlessness and been caught in the net of the hunter of ambition. Âlî relates that Sürûrî wrote a verse reply as well. In it Sürûrî says that his wings were not broken, that the prince had heard of his qualities and asked for him when he met his father, and that when the sultan's order came he set out without choice, as an ant obeys a command; and he closes with a prayer: "Sizden umaruz duâ vü himmet / Bu şâha müyesser ola devlet / Adliyle cihânı ide pür-nûr / Ola bu Sürûrî sırrı mesrûr." We hope from you prayer and spiritual aid, that this prince may attain the throne, fill the world with light through his justice, and that this Sürûrî may rejoice in his heart.

The story also has an ending remembered as a turn of fate. Gubârî, who had rebuked Sürûrî for accepting the post of tutor to a prince, some time later passed through Kütahya on his way back from Mecca and there accepted the post of tutor to Şehzade Orhan, son of Şehzade Bayezid. Âlî interprets this as Gubârî "soiling his own face with the very thing he had condemned". After the Bayezid affair Gubârî was imprisoned for a time in the fortress on the Bosphorus.

The Invitation to Tutor Prince Mustafa

Prince Mustafa had been removed from Manisa and sent to the sanjak of Amasya on 21 Safer 948 (16 June 1541). In Amasya a large circle of scholars and men of letters formed around him. According to Hüsâmeddin, the prince's first teacher was Seyrek Muhyiddin Mehmed Efendi. On his death in 947 (1540), Hayreddin Hızır Efendi of Merzifon became tutor. Hayreddin Hızır Efendi in turn died in 953 (1546).

The sources differ as to when Sürûrî filled this vacancy. Hüsâmeddin, in his year-by-year narrative, says under the year 953: "In his place Gelibolulu Surûrî Mustafa Efendi came from Istanbul." Gelibolulu Âlî also writes, in his entry on Gubârî, that the post of tutor to the prince was offered to Sürûrî in 953. Âşık Çelebi, by contrast, says that his master was suddenly invited to become the prince's tutor when the sultan set out on campaign to conquer Van and march against Shah Tahmasp, that is, in 955 (1548). The TDV article and Güleç's study also adopt the date 955 (1548) and state that the invitation was made by an imperial rescript (hatt-ı hümâyun). Güleç notes that the date 953 in Hüsâmeddin does not agree with the other sources; he accepts that 953 was the year of Hayreddin Hızır Efendi's death, when the post fell vacant. The wording of Sürûrî's reply to Gubârî, namely that the prince asked for him when he met his father on campaign, matches an event recorded by Hüsâmeddin: in Rebîülevvel 955, Süleyman, on his way to the Persian war, came to Sivas, and Prince Mustafa travelled from Amasya to Sivas to visit his father, returning in Rebîülâhir with the sultan's permission. In this light the date 955 appears the stronger. The TDV article and Güleç also write that Sürûrî accepted the invitation and went "to Karaman". Prince Mustafa, however, was governor of the sanjak of Amasya from 1541 until his death, and the dated records of the works Sürûrî wrote for the prince point to Amasya.

A scholar who had turned to the dervish path entering the service of a prince was not well received by those around him. Âşık Çelebi relates that some of his intimates played the devil's part by urging him to accept, while those who wished him well advised him to refuse. He himself went to his master and asked, "Have you accepted?" Sürûrî's answer is striking: "I am counted among the dead; acceptance and refusal are the business of the living, and the dead have no say either to resist or to incline." Âşık Çelebi understood that his master saw himself as a corpse in the hands of the one who washes it, meaning that he would lie down if they laid him down and turn if they turned him. He kept silent and gave no reply, but inwardly grieved at his master's state. In the end Sürûrî accepted the post. Kınalızâde criticizes this choice in a single line: "Âleme sultân iken kendüsini kul eyledi" (He was a sultan over the world, yet made himself a servant).

Tutor to the Prince in Amasya

The Prince's Circle

The Amasya to which Sürûrî came was a small capital that held all the bustle of a princely court. Hüsâmeddin lists this circle in detail. The prince's chancellor (nişancı) Hamdî Hamdullah Çelebi, his treasurer Lutfî Bey and his divan secretary Kara Fazlî were poets. Kâmî Mehmed Çelebi, Seyrekzâde Ânî Ahmed Çelebi, Edâyî Bey, Zamânî Mahmud Çelebi and Emânî Mehmed Çelebi were among the prince's companions. Scholars such as Koca Hüsâmeddin Hüseyin, Molla Bahşîzâde Kemâleddin İbrâhim and Köprücükzâde Sinâneddin Yûsuf took part in his gatherings. In 951 Kemâleddin İbrâhim Efendi presented to the prince his work Masârif-i Beytü'l-Mâl, which criticized the prince's extravagance, and was nonetheless rewarded. In the year Sürûrî arrived, Sun'ullah Bey had been appointed lala (tutor-guardian) to the prince. In 954, when Velî Paşa, guardian of Amasya and manager of the prince's affairs, died, Ca'fer Paşa of Manisa replaced him. In 955 the poet Senâyî Mehmed Efendi of Manisa became qadi of Amasya. Güleç writes that until the prince's murder Sürûrî formed the prince's poetic circle in Amasya together with Senâyî, Kara Fazlî, Zârî, Zamânî of Edirne and Edâyî.

A place described by Hüsâmeddin in his first volume gives some idea of the daily life of this circle. The eastern face of Karakaya, the rock across from Amasya, belonged to the properties of the Ottoman dynasty and served the princes as a hunting ground. When Prince Mustafa became governor of Amasya he built a "sayfiyye", a summer pavilion, there. According to Hüsâmeddin, Seyrek Muhyiddin Efendi, then Hayreddin Hızır Efendi of Merzifon, and after them "the famous Sürûrî Efendi" taught in this pavilion. Poets such as Hamdî, Zamânî and Edâyî were there too, along with young boon companions known by the nicknames Gonca (Rosebud), Benefşe (Violet), Çiğdem (Crocus), Gül (Rose) and Lâle (Tulip). The prince granted some of them, and his lala Hamza Bey, a plot of vineyard each on this slope. In Hüsâmeddin's day, the places called "Hamza Düzü" and "Goncalık" still preserved the memory of these grants.

Another of those in Amasya who grew close to Sürûrî was Şâhidî Ali Bey. According to Hüsâmeddin's entry in the ninth volume, Şâhidî was a native of Amasya, son of Güzel Ahmed Bey, one of the men of Şehzade Ahmed. He had attached himself to Prince Mustafa and become steward (kethüda) of the cavalrymen; he was a man inclined to learning and poetry, of open disposition. Hüsâmeddin writes that he had "conversations and witticisms with Sürûrî Efendi, the prince's last tutor", and that he too wrote a commentary on the Gulistan in Amasya. After the prince was killed at Ereğli, Şâhidî was executed together with the prince's son-in-law Ahmed Paşa.

Bahrü'l-maârif

The first major work Sürûrî completed in Amasya was the Bahrü'l-maârif. The book was finished on 11 Safer 956 (11 March 1549). The copy in the author's own hand is in the Manisa Provincial Public Library. In the preface Sürûrî says that he had earlier prepared a book explaining prosody and rhyme, and that after he became the prince's tutor the prince began lessons from the book on prosody and rhyme and asked for a book to be compiled on the subject; upon this he rewrote the old draft and inscribed the prince's name upon the page. The same preface contains a quatrain praising the prince: "Ol ki vasfında dinilmiş sâhib-i sıdk u safâ / Fahr-ı ashâb-ı Hüdâ, hem-nâm-ı Fahr-ı Enbiyâ / Ol Ebûbekr-kerem, Fârûk-hak, Osmân-hayâ / Ol Ali-sîret, velâyet ehli Sultân Mustafâ." The prince bore the same name as the Prophet, and Sürûrî praises him as one who carried the virtues of the four caliphs.

The work consists of an introduction, three treatises and a conclusion. The introduction deals with the science of prosody and with poetic terms, the first treatise with the metres of aruz. The second treatise is devoted to rhetorical figures, and its examples are largely an abridged translation of Rashid al-Din Vatvat's Persian Hadâiku's-sihr; the Turkish examples are mostly taken from Şeyhî. At the end of this treatise stands an ode (kaside) written for Sultan Mustafa, each couplet of which exemplifies a rhetorical figure. The third treatise, modelled on Sharaf al-Din Rami's Anis al-'ushshaq, explains with Persian, Arabic and Turkish examples the similes used for the beloved's hair, face, eyebrows and other features. The conclusion defends poetry from a religious standpoint, answering its opponents with verses of the Qur'an and hadith.

The Bahrü'l-maârif became Sürûrî's most widely read book. Among the copies Güleç identified in libraries are many made in 956 (1549), the very year of composition, numerous copies dated 969 (1561), and copies reaching into the nineteenth century. Faik Reşad considers it both the first and the most perfect of the works of its kind in our language. Yakup Şafak and Güleç, on the other hand, draw attention to the incomplete and mistaken information in the prosody section, to example couplets faulty in metre, and to inconsistencies of method. Despite these flaws, the work is regarded as the first systematic book of rhetoric in Turkish literature and keeps its value as a reflection of the poetics of its time.

The Gulistan and Bustan Commentaries

The work of Sürûrî's most often associated with Amasya is his Arabic commentary on Sa'di's Gulistan. Hüsâmeddin says that at the end of a printed copy of the commentary it is written that Sürûrî completed the work in Amasya while tutor to Sultan Mustafa, and he gives the date of completion as 958 (1551). Güleç also found, in the opening of a copy in the Süleymaniye Library, the note that the work was written in Amasya while its author was the prince's tutor. There Sürûrî says that Sultan Mustafa delighted in elegant and pleasant witticisms, that the Gulistan is full of fine and curious stories and poems, and that he wrote the commentary in Arabic for students. The TDV article also records that the work was written in Amasya for students.

The Bustan commentary followed. As Güleç relates, Sürûrî undertook it while serving as Prince Mustafa's tutor, when friends and students who had seen his Arabic commentary on the Gulistan asked him this time to comment on the Bustan in Persian, and he dedicated the work to the prince. These works also gave rise to debate in later generations. Kınalızâde writes that Sürûrî's weakness in the subtleties, idioms and proverbs of Persian was plain, and that he fell short even in explaining vocabulary. At the end of the sixteenth century Sûdî of Bosnia, in his own commentaries on the Gulistan and Bustan, frequently objected to Sürûrî's explanations.

Other Works Written for the Prince

According to Güleç's findings, the works Sürûrî wrote in his Amasya years or presented to the prince are not limited to these. He dedicated his gloss on Baydawi's Qur'anic commentary to Sultan Mustafa. His Arabic work Hâşiyetü'l-Bidâye, dated 955, is likewise dedicated to the prince, whom he praises as "the source of virtue and the spring of beneficence". His Turkish commentary on the riddles of Seyyid Hüseyin Ahlâtî, as Güleç relates, was completed by writing a portion in each lesson, and the drafts were fair-copied for Prince Mustafa. He translated and commented on Fettâhî of Nishapur's Şebistân-ı Hayâl when it was requested of him in the prince's presence.

A work in the field of medicine is also connected with the prince's court. When one of Prince Mustafa's physicians wished to learn the recipe of a drug, Sürûrî explained to the prince the importance of Avicenna's Canon of Medicine and, at his command, translated into Turkish with commentary the part of the work known as the Mûcez. Âşık Çelebi also mentions that his master wrote a book on the Canon of Medicine "in concise terms".

The most notable of the translations Sürûrî made for the prince is the Zahîretü'l-mülûk, a Persian work in the mirror-for-princes genre by Amir-i Kabir Sayyid Ali Hamadani. Güleç relates that Sürûrî wished to raise the future sultan as a just ruler who loved his people, that for this purpose he thought of presenting a work on good morals and sound government, but that writing such a book himself might have been inadvisable, and so he chose to translate an older work. According to the account, the prince had shown the book to Sürûrî and asked him to translate it so that everyone might benefit. At the end of the copy in the Nuruosmaniye Library, Sürûrî says that he finished the book in two months in the year 960. The work consists of ten chapters, ranging from the rules of faith and the duties of worship, and the obligation of rulers to follow the way of the four caliphs and the rules of sovereignty and government, to the necessity of justice and beneficence and the evil of pride and anger. The translation must have been completed shortly before the prince's death.

The Letter of Complaint and the Confidant

Sürûrî's role in Amasya was not confined to lessons and books. According to Hüsâmeddin's account, after the Georgians attacked Erzurum in 956 and killed its beylerbey Mûsâ Paşa, and after the raids on the Persian frontier in 957, Prince Mustafa had written to Grand Vizier Rüstem Paşa asking for permission and help, without receiving an answer. In Muharrem 958, greatly disturbed that the Persians were performing the mourning rites of Karbala in the villages and towns along the frontier, the prince sent another moving letter of complaint, dated 19 Muharrem 958 (27 January 1551), "composed by Sürûrî Efendi". Rüstem Paşa paid no heed to this either, but when the letter arrived he summoned the prince's vizier, Lala Ca'fer Paşa, to Istanbul and sent in his place Boşnak Ahmed Bey, governor of Köstendil, with the rank of beylerbey. Hüsâmeddin notes that he had seen this letter and other letters of the prince in a miscellany in the Bayezid Library and copied them, but that the copies were burned and he could no longer remember the shelf number of the miscellany.

In the same passage Hüsâmeddin describes Sürûrî as the prince's "both tutor and keeper of secrets". The TDV article also states that Sürûrî was the prince's confidant. It has further been suggested that an unsigned letter published by Tayyib Gökbilgin and thought to have been written after the prince's death, a letter that insists that the prince harboured no treacherous intent toward his father and bore a grudge only against Rüstem Paşa and a few others, may have been Sürûrî's. This attribution remains a possibility.

In Mustafa İsen's study of elegies, Sürûrî is also counted among the poets of the prince's circle in his Manisa years. Çağatay Uluçay and Feridun Emecen, for their part, had attributed to Sürûrî a long ode expressing the prince's grief at his transfer from Manisa to Amasya in 1541. Güleç accepts neither view: between 1533 and 1541 Sürûrî was teaching at the Pîrî Paşa and Kasım Paşa madrasas in Istanbul, and he was made the prince's tutor years after that event. In Güleç's opinion the author of the ode must have been Küçük Mustafa Çelebi, whom the prince took with him when he went from Istanbul to Manisa.

1553 and the Second Retreat

Prince Mustafa set out from Amasya at the beginning of Ramazan 960, answering his father's summons for the Nakhichevan campaign. According to Hüsâmeddin, he left his lala Sun'ullah Bey behind as acting governor, while his vizier and son-in-law Ahmed Paşa went with him. On 27 Şevval 960 (6 October 1553), at the place called Aköyük near Ereğli in Karaman, he was strangled in his father's tent. According to an account register studied by Nejat Göyünç, gifts and money had been prepared to be given to the prince when he arrived at the imperial tent. Robes of honour and fabrics had also been set aside for his lala Sun'ullah Bey, his treasurer Hamza Bey and his tutor Sürûrî Efendi. All of these were cancelled, and the register was marked "hazîne mânde", that is, "remained in the treasury".

The prince's death was a heavy blow for Sürûrî. The TDV article and Güleç write that after this event Sürûrî withdrew once more into seclusion and spent the remaining nine years of his life in retreat. He abandoned halfway the translation of the Acâibü'l-mahlûkât (Wonders of Creation) that he was then making from Arabic for the prince, upon hearing that the prince had been killed. Ömer Faruk Akün notes that in this unfinished work Sürûrî expresses his love and devotion to the prince. Because of the reaction he showed to the prince's murder, he was deprived of official income. Kınalızâde relates that he lived for nine years "without stipend", that though poor he never confided his troubles to anyone, and that his table nonetheless remained open to all who came and went.

Âşık Çelebi describes these years in harsher language. In his view, after entering the prince's service his master had been drawn again into affairs of state, now corresponding with the great, now absorbed in talks with the prince. When the prince died, like a drowning man clutching at every weed, he found no one to guide him whomever he asked for help, and attained nothing whomever he told his troubles. Still, he did not close his mosque or cut the allowances of those who lived on it. According to the TDV article, he lived on the income from copying his books and on some assistance he received. Âşık Çelebi also names the source of this help: gifts from the captains of Galata, that is, the fighters of the sea. Güleç writes that men of the arsenal and the navy helped him because they regarded him as a holy figure. In this period Gelibolulu Mustafa Âlî, still a student, read exegesis with his fellow townsman Sürûrî and studied his treatises.

Death and Grave

According to the TDV article, Sürûrî died of cholera on 7 Cemâziyelevvel 969 (13 January 1562). Güleç, relying on Atâî, records the same date and an epidemic. Âşık Çelebi, however, writes that his master lived until the end of Cemâziyelâhire 969 and died after three or four days of illness. Some later sources give other dates: the Mir'ât-ı İstanbul, Bağdatlı İsmail Paşa and the Sicill-i Osmânî give 962, Evliya Çelebi 965. Güleç notes that the chronograms composed on his death show 969 to be correct. One of these is the line "Gitti cihan sürûru" (The joy of the world is gone), which plays on the meaning of joy in his name; the other is the phrase "Mî-reved be-behişt" (He goes to paradise).

Âşık Çelebi relates that when he died his shroud had been bought in advance, his grave dug in the courtyard of his mosque, and two thousand shining akçe set aside for his burial were found ready. Sürûrî was buried in the graveyard of the mosque he had built on the Beyoğlu side of Kasımpaşa, at the spot facing the prayer niche. According to Güleç, the grave lay in Kasımpaşa above the Mevlevi lodge, beside the road climbing to Aynalıçeşme, and its stone bore the poet's own couplet: "Her kim kabrümden du'â ide geçe / Cennete îmân ü Kur'ân ile göçe" (Whoever passes my grave with a prayer, may he go to paradise with faith and the Qur'an). For a long time the grave was a place of pilgrimage. The quarter in which he lived was named after him, and he was regarded as a saint by those around him. Today the mosque has been demolished and the grave has disappeared.

Character and Poetry

The sources describe Sürûrî as a virtuous, mature and learned man. He devoted his life to learning and never married. Güleç distinguishes three circles according to whom he wrote for: Turkish for his friends, Arabic for madrasa students, and Persian for the prince's literary gathering. He wrote his exegesis, glosses, and commentaries on morphology and syntax in Arabic, and the literary commentaries made at the prince's wish mostly in Persian. In Güleç's view, especially in the works he wrote while tutor to the prince, Sürûrî seems to have wanted to prove himself worthy of that position.

The biographers of poets share a common opinion of his poetry. Âşık Çelebi and Kınalızâde write that he had three Turkish divans. His student Âlî, however, says that not even three ghazals from his three divans became known, and that although he read one of his divans from beginning to end, he could not find a single well-made ghazal of five couplets. In Âlî's view, his master's knowledge was like a deep sea, but his powers of thought in composition and writing were not so fine. Sürûrî himself was aware of this. In the conclusion of the Bahrü'l-maârif he says that his feeling for poetry was as great as that of the poets, but that beside his knowledge of the religious sciences, the poets' knowledge of poetry did not amount to a tenth of a tenth. In the same work he also relates that in his youth, out of love and longing, he composed some five hundred ghazals and arranged a divan so that they would not be lost. According to Güleç's findings, all that survives today is a small Turkish divançe of mystical tone. His works in the religious sciences, by contrast, are criticized in no biographical dictionary; the sources praise the number of his books and the breadth of his learning.

Works

Âşık Çelebi records that his master's works numbered thirty-six, half of his seventy-two years of life. Evliya Çelebi raises the number to one hundred and fifty. Güleç identified thirty-three works in libraries and, finding that three of them were sections taken from other works, gives the number of known works as thirty. The principal ones are these:

  • Bahrü'l-maârif: A Turkish book of rhetoric on prosody, rhyme, rhetorical figures and poetic terms. Completed in Amasya for Prince Mustafa (11 Safer 956 / 11 March 1549).
  • Şerh-i Mesnevî: The first complete Persian commentary on the Masnavi in Anatolia. It explains the couplets through 410 anecdotes and stories about the great figures of Sufism and earned its author the title "commentator of the Masnavi".
  • Şerhu Gülistân: An Arabic commentary on Sa'di's Gulistan. Written in Amasya for students and in the prince's name.
  • Şerh-i Bostân: A Persian commentary on Sa'di's Bustan. Written while he was Prince Mustafa's tutor and dedicated to him.
  • Şerh-i Dîvân-ı Hâfız: A Turkish commentary explaining the symbols and metaphors in Hafez's poems.
  • Tercüme-i Zahîretü'l-mülûk: A Turkish translation of Sayyid Ali Hamadani's mirror for princes. Translated in Amasya at the prince's wish in two months in the year 960.
  • Şerh-i Mûcez: A Turkish translation and commentary of a medical text based on Avicenna's Canon; made at the prince's command.
  • Şerh-i Şebistân-ı Hayâl: A translation and commentary of the work of Fettâhî of Nishapur; requested in the prince's presence.
  • Şerh-i Muammâyât: A Turkish commentary on the riddles of Seyyid Hüseyin Ahlâtî; fair-copied for the prince. He also wrote a commentary in rhymed prose on the riddles of Abdurrahman Jami.
  • Hâşiye alâ Envâri't-tenzîl: An Arabic gloss on Baydawi's Qur'anic commentary; dedicated to Sultan Mustafa.
  • Tercüme-i Acâibü'l-mahlûkât: A translation begun for the prince and left unfinished at his death.
  • Among his other works are the Tefsîru Sûrei Yûsuf, the Turkish Tefsîrü'l-Kur'âni'l-azîz, the Şerhu'l-Misbâh (944/1537), a translation of the Ravzü'r-reyâhîn, commentaries on the Kâfiye, the Emsile and the Binâ, the Risâle-i Penç Çînî translated from a Hindi original by way of Persian, and the Târîh-i Hıtâ vü Hoten ü Çîn ü Mâçîn, a translation made in 1516 from Ali Akbar Khatai.

His Place in the Memory of Amasya

Sürûrî's name did not remain attached to a building, a quarter or an endowment in Amasya. His trace in the city lives on in his books and in Hüsâmeddin's records. That the Bahrü'l-maârif, of which dozens of copies survive in libraries today, was completed in Amasya, with the quatrain praising Prince Mustafa in its preface and the ode written for him at its end, is one of the documents showing what kind of centre of learning and letters the princely court was in the middle of the sixteenth century. The note at the end of the Gulistan commentary, "while tutor to Sultan Mustafa, in Amasya", caught Hüsâmeddin's attention as well and brought it into the history of Amasya.

Sürûrî's story also shows the place of the princely court of Amasya between the provinces and the capital. His father was a Gelibolu merchant who had served as treasurer in the Amasya divan of Bayezid. The son, a scholar formed among the Naqshbandi lodges and madrasas of Istanbul, came to the same city half a century later as tutor to another prince. With the prince's death came the end both of his own official life and of that crowded literary gathering in Amasya. Poets of the circle such as Kara Fazlî wrote elegies; Sürûrî left an unfinished translation and withdrew to his mosque in Kasımpaşa.

Chronology

897 (1491-92): Born in Gelibolu.

927 (1521): Became deputy judge of the bab court during Fenârîzâde Muhyiddin Çelebi's term as qadi of Istanbul.

929 (1523): Became clerk to Fenârîzâde as chief military judge of Anatolia; soon left the post, attached himself to the Naqshbandi Şeyh Mahmud Çelebi and went on pilgrimage.

930 (1524): Became teacher at the Sarıca Paşa Madrasa in Gelibolu.

933 (1526-27): Became the first teacher of the Pîrî Mehmed Paşa Madrasa in Istanbul.

941 (1534-35): During the campaign of the Two Iraqs, wrote a reply poem to Gubârî's ghazal.

944 (1537-38): Became the first teacher of the Kasım Paşa Madrasa; wrote the Şerhu'l-Misbâh.

953 (1546): Hayreddin Hızır Efendi of Merzifon, tutor to Prince Mustafa, died. Hüsâmeddin and Âlî date Sürûrî's appointment as tutor to this year.

954 (1547-48): Resigned upon the death of his teacher Fenârîzâde Muhyiddin Çelebi; returned to his post at Kasım Paşa's insistence and built a mosque beside his house.

955 (1548): According to the TDV article, Güleç and Âşık Çelebi, invited by imperial rescript to become Prince Mustafa's tutor.

11 Safer 956 (11 March 1549): Completed the Bahrü'l-maârif in Amasya.

19 Muharrem 958 (27 January 1551): Composed the letter of complaint Prince Mustafa sent to Rüstem Paşa.

958 (1551): According to Hüsâmeddin, completed his Gulistan commentary in Amasya and presented it to the prince.

960 (1552-53): Translated the Zahîretü'l-mülûk into Turkish for the prince in two months.

27 Şevval 960 (6 October 1553): Prince Mustafa was killed near Ereğli; Sürûrî withdrew into seclusion.

7 Cemâziyelevvel 969 (13 January 1562): According to the TDV article, died in Istanbul and was buried in the graveyard of his mosque in Kasımpaşa.

Bibliography

The following sources were used for this article:

  • İsmail Güleç, "Sürûrî, Muslihuddin Mustafa", TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, vol. 38, Istanbul 2010, pp. 170-172 (islamansiklopedisi.org.tr). islamansiklopedisi.org.tr
  • İsmail Güleç, "Gelibolulu Musluhiddin Sürûrî, Hayatı, Kişiliği, Eserleri ve Bahrü'l-Ma'ârif İsimli Eseri", Osmanlı Araştırmaları, no. 21 (2001), pp. 211-236.
  • Hüseyin Hüsâmeddin Yasar, Amasya Tarihi, vol. 1 (section on Karakaya and the princely summer pavilion), vol. 3 (section on Prince Mustafa's governorship of Amasya) and vol. 9 (entry on Şâhidî Ali Bey), modern Turkish script edition.
  • Şerafettin Turan, "Mustafa Çelebi", TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, vol. 31, Ankara 2020, pp. 290-292 (islamansiklopedisi.org.tr). islamansiklopedisi.org.tr
  • Funda Demirtaş, "Şehzade Mustafa'nın Öldürülmesi: Tahlili Bir Yaklaşım", Bilimname, XVIII (2010/1), pp. 205-227.
  • Âşık Çelebi, Meşâ'irü'ş-şu'arâ (ed. Filiz Kılıç), Ministry of Culture and Tourism of Türkiye, Ankara 2018 (e-book), entries "Sürûrî Çelebi" and "Gubârî".
  • Kınalızâde Hasan Çelebi, Tezkiretü'ş-şu'arâ (ed. Aysun Sungurhan), Ministry of Culture and Tourism of Türkiye, Ankara 2017 (e-book), entry "Sürûrî".
  • Gelibolulu Mustafa Âlî, Künhü'l-Ahbâr'ın Tezkire Kısmı (ed. Mustafa İsen), Ministry of Culture and Tourism of Türkiye, Ankara 2017 (e-book), entries "Surûrî" and "Gubârî".
  • Works cited through these sources: Nev'îzâde Atâî, Hadâiku'l-hakâik fî tekmileti'ş-Şekâik (ed. Abdülkadir Özcan, Istanbul 1989); Faik Reşad, Eslâf (Istanbul 1312); Yakup Şafak, Sürûrî'nin Bahrü'l-Ma'ârif'i ve Enîsü'l-Uşşâk ile Mukayesesi (doctoral dissertation, Atatürk University 1991); Ömer Faruk Akün, "Sürûrî", İslâm Ansiklopedisi (MEB), vol. XI; M. Tayyib Gökbilgin, "Rüstem Paşa ve Hakkındaki İthamlar", Tarih Dergisi, VIII/11-12 (1955); Nejat Göyünç, "Tarih Başlıklı Muhasebe Defterleri", Osmanlı Araştırmaları, X (1990); Mustafa İsen, Acıyı Bal Eylemek: Türk Edebiyatında Mersiye (Ankara 1994); Edith G. Ambros, "Surūrī", The Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd edition, vol. IX.

Online sources