İshak Çelebi — Keçi Beyzâde

In Modern English

He was from Amasya. He was a descendant of Seyfeddîn Torumtay, beylerbeyi of Amasya, and the son of el-Hâc Ebûbekir Çelebi, son of Sirâceddîn Mehmed Çelebi, who was the vizier of Hacı Şadgeldi Paşa. His grandfather Sirâceddîn Mehmed Çelebi is famous as "Keçi Bey". This man was called Cemâleddîn İshak Çelebi. After his father he became trustee of his grandfather's waqfs and died in 834 [1430-31]. He was one of the notables of Amasya. His son was Ebûbekir Bey.

Notes and Research

Old Words in the Text

• beylerbeyi: the highest commander and administrator of a region
• ahfâd: grandsons, descendants
• vezîr: adviser and high-ranking statesman
• mahdûm: son
• ced: grandfather, ancestor
• evkâf: waqfs, pious foundations
• mütevellî: the person in charge of managing a waqf
• a'yân: the notables of a place, people with a say

Torumtay's Line

The Seyfeddin Torumtay of the entry was an emir who served in Amasya in the Seljuk period. He is the man who had the Gökmedrese Mosque in Amasya built; his endowment deed is dated 665 (1266-67), he is reported to have been appointed governor of Amasya in the time of the Seljuk sultan II. Gıyâseddin Keyhusrev, and he lies in his tomb dated 677 (1278-79). In the list of families in the introduction to the book, Hüsameddin calls the descendants of Torumtay, who died in 679, the "Torumtay Family" and writes that they divided into two branches, called "Keçizâde" and "Kaya Paşazâde", which survived until around 1100 [1688-89]. He names Ya'kûb Şâh, Kaya Paşa and Mustafa Paşa among the leading men of the two branches. The Keçi Beyzâde İshak Çelebi of the entry belongs to the Keçizâde branch of this line. Kaya Paşazâde İshak Çelebi of the other branch also has a separate entry in the seventh volume; he is mentioned as trustee of the waqf of Emîr Seyfeddîn Torumtay.

Who Keçi Bey Was

Who Keçi Bey was Hüsameddin states plainly in the sixth volume, in the entry of his grandson Ebûbekir Çelebi. According to it, Keçi Beyzâde Ebûbekir Çelebi was of Torumtay's line and the son of Sirâceddîn Mehmed Bey bin Süleyman Bey bin Ya'kûb Şâh, famous as "Keçi Bey" and vizier of Şadgeldi Padişah. He became trustee of his grandfather's waqf and died around 821 [1418-19]; he was buried in his grandfather's tomb, and while his name is written on the gravestone it carries no date of death. His sons were Cemâleddîn İshâk, Alâeddîn Ali and Nûreddîn Osmân Çelebis. This record confirms once more that the grandfather of the İshak Çelebi here, Sirâceddîn Mehmed Çelebi, was Şadgeldi's vizier.

Şadgeldi's last years are detailed in Hüsameddin's third volume. There it is written that a vizier of Hacı Şadgeldi called "Torumtayoğlu Sirâceddîn Muhammed" was among those who urged Şadgeldi to go to war with Kadı Burhâneddin. After Şadgeldi's death his son Fahreddîn Ahmed Bey kept his father's vizier Torumtayzâde Sirâceddîn Muhammed Çelebi in the post of vizier, although he had returned wounded from the war. According to one source, when Şadgeldi became emir for the second time he appointed the emir of Niksar, Sirâceddîn Mehmed Bey, as vizier, Nizâmeddin Mahmud as chief military judge, Cemâleddîn Muhammed Aksarayî as judge of Amasya, and Gümüşlüoğlu Hacı Sinâneddin Yusuf as treasurer. This vizier is to be expected to be the same person as the one called "Keçi Bey". Hacı Şadgeldi Paşa, son of Hacı Kutlu Şah, ruled Amasya from 1359 to 1381; as the Eretnids weakened his rule became an independent emirate, and it lasted until he was defeated and killed by Kadı Burhâneddin in 1381.

Waqfs and Trusteeship

The man of the entry is known by the name İshak Çelebi, and his only known duty is the trusteeship of his grandfather's waqfs. A mütevelli is the person who manages the property of a waqf; Hüsameddin's saying "after his father he became trustee" shows that the duty passed from father to son. What his grandfather's waqfs comprised is not listed separately in the book. The third volume mentions Ali Ağa, one of the Keçi Beyzâdes, who around 1579 had a mosque, a school and a bath built in Ziyâre and endowed his property to these charities; this shows that the Keçi Bey line kept the tradition of founding waqfs going for about a century and a half.

For İshak Çelebi's son Ebûbekir Bey there is a separate entry in the sixth volume. According to it Ebûbekir Bey was a sanjak governor of Torumtay's line and died in the Egyptian war in 893 [1488]; his daughters were Kamer and Fahrunnisâ Hatuns and his son-in-law Hoca Mehmed Çelebi. In 911 [1505-06] Kamer Hatun placed Qur'an portions in the mosque her husband had built and endowed her property, and Fahrunnisâ Hatun had a school built in the Ahi Sâbukuddîn Quarter.

No information was found in sources other than Hüsameddin's book on Keçi Bey, Ebûbekir Çelebi or İshak Çelebi; a madrasa or waqf building known by the name Keçi Bey is likewise not mentioned in those sources.

Bibliography

Primary sources

• Abdîzâde Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar, Amasya Tarihi, Amasya Belediyesi Kültür Yayınları, 2022, vol. 7, p. 283–283. amasya.bel.tr
• Abdîzâde Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar, Amasya Tarihi, 2022, vol. 6, entry "Ebûbekir Çelebi-el-Hâc Bedreddîn" (with the record of Keçi Beyzâde Ebûbekir Çelebi), p. 86; entry "Ebûbekir Bey-Keçi Beyzâde", p. 86; vol. 7, entry "İshak Çelebi-Kaya Paşazâde", p. 285; vol. 1, "Mukaddime (17)", section on families; vol. 3, entries "El-Hâc Seyfeddîn Şâdgeldi Paşa (3)", "Fahreddîn Ahmed Bey" and "Arslan Bey".

Academic studies

• "Gökmedrese Camii (Amasya)", TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, https://cdn2.islamansiklopedisi.org.tr/dosya/14/C14004966.pdf
• Mehterhan Furkani, "Siyasî ve İlmî Bir Kişilik: Amasya Emiri Hacı Şadgeldi Paşa ve ed-Dürerü'l-mensûretü fi'l-furûʻ Adlı Eserin Kendisine Nispeti", Uluslararası Amasya Âlimleri Sempozyumu Bildiriler Kitabı I, Amasya 2017, https://isamveri.org/pdfdrg/G00226/2017/2017_FURKANIM.pdf

Other sources

• "Shadgeldi", Wikipedia (citing Yasar 1927, III, p. 40), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadgeldi