Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: fe‘ilātün / fe‘ilātün / fe‘ilātün / fe‘ilün

Pek güzel mevżu‘ına düşdi bu a‘lā ḫayrāt
Hep görenler didi tārīḫine āyā ḫayrāt (1223)

In English

1. This lofty charitable work has fallen on a very fine site (was built in a most fitting place); all who saw it gave as its chronogram: "What a charity".

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

It is a single-couplet chronogram in the remel pattern "fe‘ilātün fe‘ilātün fe‘ilātün fe‘ilün". Babaarslan, listing the chronograms in the Dîvânçe, records it as "a chronogram for a charitable work (1223)"; Özçakmak likewise calls it "a couplet dated 1223 said on the building of a charitable work". The year 1223 corresponds to 1808-09. 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. In this couplet the date-giving phrase is "āyā ḫayrāt" at the end of the second line.

Written in Arabic script as "آیا خیرات", "āyā" (elif, ye, elif) gives 1+10+1=12 and "ḫayrāt" (khā, ye, re, elif, te) gives 600+10+200+1+400=1211; the total is 1223 and agrees exactly with the year given in the edition. The calculation is ours and assumes that the manuscript spells the words in this way. The rest of the line ("Hep görenler didi tārīḫine", all who saw it said as its chronogram) does not enter the count; it is an introduction pointing to the words that carry the date.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The couplet is a plain piece of praise. The word "āyā" is used here like an exclamation of admiration; those who see the building admire it and say "What a charity", and this utterance also gives the building's year. Presenting the chronogram as words spoken by onlookers is a frequent device of the genre. The word "mevżu‘" (site, position) praises the beauty of the building's location. What the charitable work was, where it stood and who had it built are not stated in the couplet.

In the Dîvânçe this couplet is immediately preceded by a fountain chronogram also dated 1223; the two couplets may have been written for different parts of the same charitable foundation, but this is a guess. The first line of the couplet reappears with a small change in the chronogram Vâzıh wrote four years later for the fountain of Benderli Hâfız Ağa (Chronogram 21): "Pek güzel mevḳi‘ine düşdi bu a‘lā çeşme" (this lofty fountain has fallen on a very fine site). The poet evidently reused a line he liked for another charitable building; this observation is ours.

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. 1973; Mustafa Vâzıh, Dîvânçe, Ankara University, Department of Manuscripts, Mustafa Con A 495/III, fol. 72b; Chronogram 21: pp. 1980-1981). 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