Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Heading: ṬAŞKÖPRİLİ ŞEYḪ ḤĀFIẒ ‘ABDULLĀH EFENDİNİÑ VEFĀTI TĀRĪḪİDİR

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

Dirīġā ḥasretā vā fürḳatā yā Şeyḫ ‘Abdullāh
Göçi ḳaldırdıñ āḫir şehr-i Şa‘bānü’l-mu‘aẓẓamdan
Didiler ehl-i mātem işbu vaḳ‘a tām tārīḫin
Yumup gözini Ṭaşköprili geçdi cisr-i ‘ālemden (1244)

In English

1. Alas, what longing, what separation, O Şeyh Abdullah; at last you struck your tent in the exalted month of Şaban.

2. The mourners gave the complete chronogram of this event thus: "Closing his eyes, the man of Taşköprü crossed the bridge of the world."

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

Its heading in the manuscript is "Ṭaşköprili Şeyḫ Ḥāfıẓ ‘Abdullāh Efendiniñ vefātı tārīḫidir" (chronogram of the death of Şeyh Hâfız Abdullah Efendi of Taşköprü). Babaarslan records it as "chronogram for the death of Taşköprülü Şeyh Hâfız Efendi (1244)"; the year 1244 corresponds to 1828-29. The two couplets are in the hezec pattern "mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün". 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. The date is given by the last line, "Yumup gözini Ṭaşköprili geçdi cisr-i ‘ālemden". The first couplet tells that the sheikh died in the month of Şaban.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The whole invention of the poem rests on the dead man's epithet. "Taşköprülü" means a man from a place called Taşköprü, "Stone Bridge"; in the last line the name is set against "cisr-i ‘ālem", the bridge of the world. The idea that the world is a bridge over which man passes and goes on presents death as a crossing. That the sheikh from the Stone Bridge has crossed the bridge of the world turns his epithet into a double entendre (tevriye). "Closing his eyes" means both dying and closing one's eyes to the world. The cries of lament in the first line, "dirīġā, ḥasretā, vā fürḳatā" (alas, what longing, what separation), are the set opening of the elegiac tradition.

Historical Context

Neither the poem nor its heading says to which order Şeyh Hâfız Abdullah Efendi belonged, where he served as sheikh, or which Taşköprü he came from. Since most of the other poems in the chronogram section concern people and buildings in Amasya, the sheikh probably also lived in Amasya, but no record confirming this could be found.

Bibliography

Online sources