Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: Mef‘ūlü Fā‘ilātün Mef‘ūlü Fā‘ilātün / Müstef‘ilün Fe‘ūlün Müstef‘ilün Fe‘ūlün

Ol ṣafder-i yegāne a‘nī ki Muṣṭafā Ḫān
K’oldur liyāḳat ile sulṭān-ı heft-kişver
Virmişdi Ḥaḳ o şāha bir dürr-i bī-bahā kim
Lāyıḳ ser-i sipihre ger olsa dürr-i efser
Burc-ı sa‘ādet içre bir māhdur ki el-ḥaḳḳ
Seyr itmedi naẓīrin nüh çerḫ ü heft aḫter
Çün nām[ı]dur Muḥammed yā Rab be-ḥaḳḳ-ı Aḥmed
Maḥmūd ‘āḳıbet ḳıl olsun cihāna server
Gördi çü gevherinde ol şāh-ı ḳābiliyyet
Ḳıldı mu‘allime sevḳ tā kim ola hüner-ver
Ol ṭıfluñ olmaġ içün ‘ilm ü edeb ṭufeyli
Mīr ehl-i fażlı ḳıldı ta‘līmine muḳarrer
Fażlī işitdüginde didi du‘ā vü tārīḫ
İclāl ü ‘ömr bāḳī ‘ilm ü edeb müyesser (sene 957)

In English

1. That peerless hero, I mean Mustafa Han, who by his merit is the sultan of the seven climes.

2. God had given that king a priceless pearl, such a pearl that, were it the pearl of a crown, it would be worthy of the head of the sky. (The pearl is the prince's son.)

3. He is a moon within the tower of felicity; truly, the nine heavens and the seven stars have never seen his like.

4. Since his name is Muhammed, O Lord, for the sake of Ahmed, that is, the Prophet, make his end praiseworthy; let him be the chief of the world. (Muhammed, Ahmed and Mahmud are names from the same root given to the Prophet.)

5. When that king saw ability in the child's nature, he sent him to a teacher so that he might become accomplished.

6. So that the child might follow learning and good manners, the emir appointed a man of virtue to his instruction.

7. When Fazlî heard of it, he spoke a prayer and this chronogram: "May majesty and life endure, may learning and good manners be granted" (957).

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a chronogram (tarih manzumesi) of seven couplets (beyit). A chronogram is a poem that places the year of an event within a line or word by means of the ebced system, which adds up the numerical values of the letters. Here the last line, "İclāl ü ‘ömr bāḳī ‘ilm ü edeb müyesser", is the chronogram line and, according to Mustafa Özkat, gives the year 957 by the "târih-i tam" method, that is, by counting all the letters of the line. The rhyme is the sound "-er": kişver, efser, aḫter, server, hüner-ver, muḳarrer, müyesser. The pen name (mahlas) appears in the last couplet. The metre is "mef‘ūlü fā‘ilātün mef‘ūlü fā‘ilātün" of the muzari family; Özkat shows that the same lines can also be scanned as "müstef‘ilün fe‘ūlün müstef‘ilün fe‘ūlün".

Özkat publishes this poem as the first of the chronograms in the divan. The text is found only in the Fazlî divan section (fol. 228a) of a miscellany in the Hazine collection of the Topkapı Palace Museum Library; according to Özkat, the chronograms and kıt'as of the divan exist only in this manuscript. In the edition the Arabic-script form of the chronogram line is also given under the last couplet. The suffix in square brackets in the word "nām[ı]dur" in the fourth couplet is Özkat's emendation for the metre.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The poem falls into two parts. The first four couplets praise Şehzade Mustafa and his son; the last three relate the event and give the chronogram. In the first couplet Mustafa is called "ṣafder", a hero who breaks the enemy's ranks, and "sulṭān-ı heft-kişver", sultan of the seven climes. Used of a prince who was not yet padishah, this epithet reflects the expectation in his circle that he would come to the throne. The prince's son is likened in the second couplet to a priceless pearl and in the third to a moon in the tower of felicity; the words pearl, crown and sky, and moon, zodiacal tower and star, are used in congruence of images (tenasüp).

The fourth couplet is a play on names. The child's name is Muhammed; the poet asks God, "for the sake of Ahmed", to make his end "Maḥmūd", that is, praiseworthy. Muhammed, Ahmed and Mahmud are names derived from the same root and used for the Prophet; the couplet uses the three names together to build both the prayer and the congruence. The expression "Maḥmūd ‘āḳıbet" is a formula of prayer meaning "with a good end". In the fifth and sixth couplets the words "gevher" (essence, talent) and "hüner", "‘ilm" and "edeb", and "ta‘līm" gather around the theme of education. The word "mīr" in the sixth couplet denotes the person who appointed the teacher; this may be Şehzade Mustafa himself or an emir of his court.

Historical Context

According to Özkat, the poem was written in 957 (1550) on the appointment of a teacher for Şehzade Mustafa's son Muhammed (Mehemmed). In that year Mustafa was sanjak governor of Amasya and Fazlî was his divan secretary; the chronogram therefore records an event at the prince's court in Amasya. The teacher's name is not given in the poem. According to Şerafettin Turan's article in the TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, Mustafa's young son Mehmed was strangled in Bursa, where he was with his mother Mâhidevran, after his father was killed in October 1553. Thus the child for whom Fazlî wished majesty and life with the words "İclāl ü ‘ömr bāḳī" lost his life three years after this date.

Bibliography

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