Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: mefā‘īlün / mefā‘īlün / mefā‘īlün / mefā‘īlün

Cenāb-ı feyleḳos-tedbīr ol Seyyid Ḥasan Beg kim
Yanında Arsiṭāṭālīs oḳun atdı yayın yaṣdı
Ẓuhūr itdi mübārek cum‘a bir mevlūd-ı ẕī-şānı
Raṣadber (?) ḫānedānı gibi ‘ālem-gīrlik ḳaṣdı
Ḫıż(ı)r mir’āt-ı kevne yazdı baḳ taṣvīr-i tārīḫin
Ḥayāt-ı ‘āleme Seyyid Sikender Beg ayaḳ baṣdı (1214)

In English

1. His excellency Seyyid Hasan Bey, wise and prudent as a philosopher, beside whom even Aristotle shot his last arrow and laid down his bow (admitted he could not compete with him).

2. On a blessed Friday a glorious birth took place, with the intent of conquering the world like the Rasadber (?) dynasty.

3. Khidr wrote the picture of his chronogram on the mirror of being, look: "Seyyid İskender Bey has set foot in the life of the world."

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

It is a three-couplet birth chronogram in the hezec pattern "mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün". Babaarslan records it as "chronogram for the birth of Seyyid İskender Beg, son of Seyyid Hasan Beg (1214)"; the year 1214 corresponds to 1799-1800. The rhyme falls between "yaṣdı, ḳaṣdı, baṣdı". The word "Raṣadber" in the second couplet is read in the edition with a question mark and its meaning is unclear. A chronogram (tarih) gives the year of an event through a phrase or line whose letters, added up by their numerical values (the ebced system), yield that year; here the chronogram is the whole of the last line.

Written as "حیات عالمه سید سکندر بگ ایاق باصدی", it gives "ḥayāt" 419, "‘āleme" 146, "Seyyid" 74, "Sikender" 334, "Beg" 22, "ayaḳ" 112 and "baṣdı" 107; the total is exactly 1214. The calculation is ours and assumes that the manuscript spells the words in this way.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

All the wordplay of the poem rests on the child's name, İskender, that is, Alexander the Great. In the first couplet the father's intellect is shown to be high enough to defeat Aristotle, who is known in Islamic sources and in divan poetry as Alexander's teacher. The word "‘ālem-gīrlik" (world-conquest) in the second couplet recalls Alexander's conquests, and Khidr in the third couplet recalls Alexander's companion in the search for the water of life (âb-ı hayat). The word "mir'āt" (mirror) is also an allusion (telmih) to "Alexander's mirror", often mentioned in divan poetry. The last line's opening, "ḥayāt-ı ‘āleme" (into the life of the world), creates a further congruence (tenasüp) with the water of life.

The poet thus sets father and son among the figures of the Alexander story: the father is wiser than Aristotle, the son will be a world-conqueror like Alexander, and his chronogram was written by Khidr. "Shooting one's arrow and laying down one's bow" in the first couplet seems to be used in the sense of giving up the lead in a contest. This analysis is ours.

Historical Context

Who Seyyid Hasan Bey and his son Seyyid İskender Bey were cannot be learned from the poem or the edition; Özçakmak, too, says only "3 couplets dated 1214 said for the birth of Seyyid İskender Bey". That the birth took place on a Friday is stated plainly in the poem.

Bibliography

Academic studies

  • Giyasi Babaarslan, "Amasyalı Vâzıh ve Dîvânçesi", Akademik Dil ve Edebiyat Dergisi, 5(4), 2021, pp. 1922-1984 (text of the poem: p. 1978; Mustafa Vâzıh, Dîvânçe, Ankara University, Department of Manuscripts, Mustafa Con A 495/III, fol. 74b). https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/pub/akaded/article/993264
  • Giyasi Babaarslan, "Amasyalı Vâzıh ve Dîvânçesi", Akademik Dil ve Edebiyat Dergisi, 5(4), 2021, pp. 1924-1930 (life and description of the Dîvânçe; chronograms: pp. 1929-1930). https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/pub/akaded/article/993264
  • Fatma Özçakmak, "Mustafa Vâzıh Efendi ve Dîvânçe'si", Kesit Akademi Dergisi, 7(26), 2021, pp. 255-278, p. 275.

Online sources