İdris Ağa (Şeyhîzâde)

In Modern English

He was from Amasya. He was the son of Şeyhî Mehmed Beyzâde Ömer Bey, a descendant of Cemaleddin Bey Yazarî, who had charitable works and waqfs in the village of Ermiş (Vermiş). A zeamet holder, he took part in many wars. In 1118 [1706-07] he became Türkmen ağası; in 1120 [1708-09], upon the death of his uncle Osman Bey, he became mütevelli (waqf trustee) of his grandfather's waqfs. However, this matter of the trusteeship led to a dispute because of the influence of Sivaslı Seyyid Mehmed Ağa, one of his cousins on his uncle's side; he was dismissed and reappointed several times. He died in office as trustee in Muharrem 1129 [December 1716-January 1717]. He was also called İdris Bey.

Notes and Research

Old Words in the Text

• hayrât ve evkâf: charitable works and waqfs
• ahfâd: grandchildren, descendants
• züemâ: holders of zeamet, cavalrymen who held a fief of high annual income
• muhârebât: wars
• ceddi: his grandfather
• mütevellî: the administrator of a waqf
• tevliyet: the duty of carrying out the trusteeship
• nizâ'a müeddî: leading to a dispute
• azl ve nasb: dismissal and appointment
• ammizâde: son of a paternal uncle

The Village of Ermiş (Vermiş)

The Ermiş of the text is, as Hüsameddin notes in parentheses, Vermiş by its old name. The village today belongs to the central district of Amasya and its population in the 2021 count is 371. Vermiş appears to be a village connected with waqf revenues from the sixteenth century on: according to the survey registers of 1576, the produce of the village of Vermiş, in the kaza of Geldiklanâbâd in Amasya, together with its hamlet of Hızırlık (Hıdırlık), was assigned to the Hoca Sultan Zâviye (Sufi lodge). The malikâne and divanî shares of the village and the hamlet were also counted as belonging to the lodge, and this was documented through the testimony of the local notables (ayan). In later hurufat records Vermiş is again named among the villages whose produce was endowed for the lodge's expenses; these records show that the village belonged to the Ezine Bazarı nahiye. The same records also reveal that the lodge had functionaries such as a sheikh, a clerk, a lamp-keeper, a doorkeeper, a cook, a prayer-reciter and a tanner (debbağ).

These records do not show the relationship between the waqfs of Cemaleddin Bey Yazarî that Hüsameddin mentions and the waqf of the Hoca Sultan Zâviye. The name Cemaleddin Bey Yazarî does not appear in the studies read, and no record of his waqfs was found. We have no basis for linking the Hoca Sultan Zâviye and the Yazarî waqf.

The person from whom the Hoca Sultan Zâviye takes its name is Şemseddin Ahmed Çelebi, teacher of Prince Bayezid, governor of Amasya. Çelebi had a zâviye with a guesthouse and a kitchen built in the Dârüsselâm quarter in 880 [1475-76]; in later times the lodge was run by Halvetî sheikhs. According to the study that relays this information from Hüsameddin's book, there is one more lodge of the same name in Amasya, but whether it belonged to Hoca Sultan could not be established.

The Trusteeship Quarrel

Short as the text is, it describes a dispute over the management of a waqf. In the Ottoman waqf system the mütevelli is the person who collects the waqf's income, carries out its expenditures and ensures that the waqf's conditions are observed; in the event Hüsameddin reports, the post passes to İdris Ağa when his uncle dies, and then, because of the influence of his cousin Sivaslı Seyyid Mehmed Ağa, there are several dismissals and reappointments. The hurufat records contain a similar example: while the post of zâviyedar of the Şeyh Elek Zâviye in the Geldiklanâbâd nahiye of Amasya was being held generation after generation by descendants of the waqf's founders, on 15 Safer 1217 [17 June 1802] a man named Zeynelabidin took the post upon himself with documents he obtained from the postnişin of Hacı Bektaş Veli and from the Anatolian kazasker. Waqf posts changing hands within a family, and disputes arising with persons appointed from outside, may therefore be regarded as a usual situation. The name of the same Seyyid Mehmed Ağa appears in Hüsameddin's next entry (İdris Ağa-Bekir Beyzâde), together with the year 1127 [1715] when he was "Hasekî" in Istanbul; how Mehmed Ağa became involved in the waqf affairs in Amasya could not be determined in the sources read.

The Türkmen Agaship

What the office in Hüsameddin's phrase "Türkmen ağası in 1118" covered, and which tribes it oversaw in and around Amasya, could not be verified in the sources read.

What Could Not Be Read

No information was found in other sources on Şeyhî Mehmed Beyzâde Ömer Bey, Cemaleddin Bey Yazarî, or İdris Ağa himself.

Bibliography

Primary sources

• Abdîzâde Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar, Amasya Tarihi, Amasya Belediyesi Kültür Yayınları, 2022, vol. 7, p. 275–275. amasya.bel.tr

Academic studies

• Murat Alandağlı, "Hurufat Kayıtlarında Amasya Zaviyeleri", Turkish Studies, 19/1, 2024. https://dx.doi.org/10.7827/TurkishStudies.72905

Other sources

• "Ermiş, Amasya", köy kaydı, TÜİK adrese dayalı nüfus kayıt sistemi sonuçları, 2021.