Original Ottoman Turkish Text

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

Çıḳar bir mıṣra‘ ile Maẓhar anıñ tām tārīḫi
Muḥammed Ni‘metullāh Seyyid olsun ḳavm-i a‘lāma (1237)

In English

1. Mazhar produces his complete chronogram in a single line: "May Muhammed Ni'metullah be seyyid (chief, master) to my exalted people."

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

This single couplet, too, is not by Vâzıh but by his friend Mazhar Efendi. Babaarslan states that chronogram no. 9 in the Dîvânçe was written by Mazhar for the birth of Seyyid Muhammed Ni'metullah; for the same birth Mazhar also sent a Persian-Arabic chronogram (Chronogram 8). The couplet is in the hezec pattern "mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün mefā‘īlün" and gives the year 1237 (1821-22). 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 first line says that the chronogram is "tām", complete, and is given "in a single line"; the chronogram is the whole of the second line.

Written as "محمد نعمت الله سید اولسون قوم اعلامه", the line gives "Muḥammed" 92, "Ni‘metullāh" 560+66=626, "Seyyid" 74, "olsun" 153, "ḳavm" 146 and "a‘lāma" 147; the total is 1238, one more than the edition's 1237. If the last word is spelled "اعلاما", the total falls to 1234. Without seeing the manuscript's spelling, the source of the one-unit difference cannot be determined. The calculation is ours; as it stands, the chronogram could not be fully verified.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The couplet is both a chronogram and a prayer. The child's name, "Muhammed Ni'metullah", and his title "Seyyid" stand within the chronogram line. The word "Seyyid" is used here in two senses: since the family descends from the Prophet, the child is a seyyid by birth; the prayer, however, wishes that he become master and head of his people, that is, of his family and community. The reading of "ḳavm-i a‘lāma" is not entirely clear; we have understood it as "a‘lā" (most exalted) with the first-person possessive and dative suffixes, "to my exalted people". This reading is ours. Mazhar uses his pen name in the first line and, by saying that he "produces" the chronogram, lightly draws attention to his skill.

Historical Context

Seyyid Muhammed Ni'metullah was born on a Friday, the fourth day of the month of Cemâziyelevvel in 1237; this information is given in the Dîvânçe in the heading of Mazhar's other chronogram. Vâzıh himself also wrote an eight-couplet chronogram for this birth (Chronogram 7). That three separate chronograms for the same birth were recorded in the Dîvânçe shows the value the poet placed on this son and on the attention shown by his friends. Three years later Mazhar Efendi would also send a chronogram for the birth of Vâzıh's second son, Ahmed Tayyib (Chronogram 10).

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. 1975; Mustafa Vâzıh, Dîvânçe, Ankara University, Department of Manuscripts, Mustafa Con A 495/III, fol. 73b). 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 and those by other poets: 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, pp. 262 and 275.

Online sources