Tâceddîn İbrâhim Bey, known as Küçük Tâc Bey ("Little Tâc Bey"), was the grandson of the chancellor Tâcî Bey and the nephew of Câfer and Sa'dî Çelebi. Born in Amasya, he worked in the chancery of the Imperial Council (Dîvân-ı Hümâyun) in Istanbul, returned home after the deaths of his uncles, and in the divan of Prince (Şehzade) Mustafa at Amasya became first secretary and then chancellor (nişancı). He died around 955 (1548). His nickname seems to refer to his grandfather's name "Tâc Bey": it appears that the grandson, who bore the same name and followed the same profession, was called "little" to distinguish him from his grandfather. In Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar's record he appears as a poet, secretary, prose stylist (münşî) and famous calligrapher, yet not a single example of his poetry survives.

Hüsameddin's Entry

His entry stands among the Tâceddîns of Amasya in the eighth volume of Amasya Tarihi:

Tâceddîn İbrâhim Bey-Küçük Tâc Bey Amasyalıdır. Tercemesi yazılan Tâceddîn Paşazâde İsmâ'îl Bey'in mahdûmudur. Amasya'nın Mâverâü'n-nehri olan İçerişehir'de ikâmet etdiğinden "Mâverâü'n-nehrli" demekle meşhûr oldu. Hattât-ı meşhûr Ebu'l-Fazl A'rec Efendi'den hutût-ı mütenevvi'ayı ahz etdi. Ba'dehû ulemâdan tahsîl-i ma'ârif ederek Sultân Selîm Han-ı Evvel'in cülûsunda İstanbul'a gitdi. Büyük amcası olan Tâczâde Ca'fer Çelebi'nin himmetiyle dîvân-ı hümâyûn kalemine girdi. Orada bir müddet çalışdı. 921'de Ca'fer Çelebi'nin i'dâmı ve 923'de küçük amcası Sa'dî Çelebi'nin irtihâli üzerine kendisine bir vehm ü haşyet ârız oldu. Bu ârızadan dolayı Amasya'ya avdet edib pederinin irtihâlinde Tâceddîn Paşa vakfına mütevellî oldu. 945'de Sultân Süleyman'ın şehzâdesi Sultân Mustafa Amasya'ya vâlî olup geldikte bunun hatt ve iktidârını, letâfet-i tab'ını beğenip ma'iyyetine aldı. Az müddet zarfında kâtib-i dîvânı, sonra nişâncısı olup "Küçük Tâc Bey" demekle iştihâr etdi. Şehzâdenin teveccühâtını celb ederek mevki'ini muhâfaza edib 955 hudûdunda vefât etdi. Ma'ârif erbâbından halûk, şâir, kâtib, münşî, hattât-ı meşhûr idi. Hatt-ı siyâkat u dîvânîde mahâreti fazla idi. Mahdûmu Alî Çelebi olup birâderi Mehmed Bey mütevellî oldu.

In plain English: he was from Amasya, the son of Tâceddîn Paşazâde İsmâil Bey, whose biography has already been given. Because he lived in İçerişehir, the "Transoxiana" of Amasya, he was known as "Mâverâünnehirli", the man from Transoxiana. He learned the various styles of script from the famous calligrapher Ebü'l-Fazl A'rec Efendi. Then he acquired learning from the scholars and went to Istanbul at the accession of Selim I. Through the support of his elder uncle Tâczâde Câfer Çelebi he entered the chancery of the Imperial Council and worked there for some time. After the execution of Câfer Çelebi in 921 and the death of his younger uncle Sa'dî Çelebi in 923, he was seized by apprehension and fear. Because of this he returned to Amasya, and on his father's death he became administrator (mütevelli) of the Tâceddîn Paşa endowment. In 945, when Prince Mustafa, son of Sultan Süleyman, came to Amasya as governor, he admired his handwriting, his ability and the refinement of his nature and took him into his retinue. Within a short time he became secretary of the divan and then its chancellor, and became famous as "Küçük Tâc Bey". He kept the prince's favour, held on to his position and died around 955. He was a man of learning, good-natured, a poet, secretary, prose stylist and famous calligrapher; his skill in the siyakat and divanî scripts was especially great. His son was Ali Çelebi; his brother Mehmed Bey became administrator of the endowment.

To the end of the entry Hüsameddin adds a passage from the biographical dictionary of calligraphers, Tuhfe-i Hattâtîn, by Müstakimzâde Süleyman Sa'deddîn Efendi. He quotes it in order to correct it, and his objection falls on two points.

Life

The year of Küçük Tâc Bey's birth is unknown. Since in 918 (1512), the year Selim I came to the throne, he was old enough to go to Istanbul and enter the chancery, his birth falls before the 1490s; the estimate is worked out from the dates Hüsameddin gives. The family's house in Amasya was in İçerişehir. Hüsameddin calls this old part of the city, lying on the northern bank of the Yeşilırmak, "the Transoxiana of Amasya", comparing it to Mâverâünnehir, the land beyond the Oxus (Ceyhun). The nickname resembles a joke at the expense of someone living on the far bank of the river; as we shall see below, two centuries later it may also have led a biographer to take him for a man from Bukhara.

Ebü'l-Fazl A'rec, from whom he learned to write, was a master who taught calligraphy at Prince Ahmed's court in Amasya and trained many secretaries in the city; his life has its own page, Ebü'l-Fazl Mehmed Çelebi. Among those who practised writing under the same teacher was Zârî Mehmed Çelebi, who would serve as a secretary in Prince Mustafa's divan alongside Küçük Tâc Bey.

His years in Istanbul coincide with the brightest and darkest period of the family. His elder uncle Tâcîzâde Câfer Çelebi was chancellor to Selim I and one of the leading pens of Ottoman chancery prose; his patronage had brought the young man into the chancery of the Imperial Council. In 921 (1515) Câfer Çelebi was executed. According to Hüsameddin's record, two years later the younger uncle Sa'dî Çelebi also died; the page on Sa'dî Çelebi on this site gives the year of his death as 922 (1516). What Hüsameddin calls "vehm ü haşyet" means, word for word, apprehension and fear. It appears that the young secretary, having lost his patron and seen his uncle's fate, chose to put distance between himself and the capital.

After his return to Amasya, the administration of the family endowment passed to him on his father's death. According to Hüsameddin, the Tâceddîn Paşa endowment comprised the mosque, soup kitchen (imaret) and bath that his grandfather had built at Köprü, today's Vezirköprü. Hüsameddin does not say in this entry when his father İsmâil Bey died; after Küçük Tâc Bey's death the administration passed to his brother Mehmed Bey.

In Prince Mustafa's Divan

The second bright period of his life opened with the arrival of Prince Mustafa in Amasya. Hüsameddin dates this arrival to 945. According to Şerafettin Turan's article "Mustafa Çelebi" in the TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, however, the prince was sent from Manisa to Amasya on 21 Safer 948 (16 June 1541). The three-year difference between the two dates arises from Hüsameddin's chronology; Küçük Tâc Bey's entry into the prince's divan falls after 1541.

The prince made him first secretary of the divan and soon afterwards chancellor. The chancellor was the official who drew the sultan's monogram (tuğra) on documents issued by the divan and headed its writing office. The prince's divan in Amasya worked like a small model of the Imperial Council in Istanbul; more than half a century after his grandfather had held the chancellorship in Prince Ahmed's divan at Amasya, Küçük Tâc Bey sat in the same office beside another prince. This is also why Hüsameddin mentions the nickname "Küçük Tâc Bey" together with the chancellorship. Hüsameddin says that he died in this office without losing the prince's favour. The year 955 (1548) falls before Prince Mustafa's death in 1553 and the dispersal of his divan.

Müstakimzâde's Record and Hüsameddin's Objection

Hüsameddin quotes Müstakimzâde's entry in the Tuhfe-i Hattâtîn as follows:

Tâceddîn: Buhârî'dîr. Asr-ı Sultân Selîm-i Evvelde dimâğ-ı arzusun Buhâr-ı sevdâ-yı seyâhat tağşiye eyledikde geşt ü güzâr-ı diyâr-ı memleket ve vâsıl-ı dârü's-saltanat oldu. Hatt-ı sülüs ve nesih-i Bevvâbâne ve Yâkûtâneye mâlik ve bi'l-hassa kalem-i dîvânînin sebeb-i iştihârı bir zât-ı güzîde-mesâlik idi. Ferzend-i ercümendi Mehmed Efendi dahi zamânında ser-tâc-ı ehl-i ma'ârif re'îs-i tâc-verân-ı avârif olmuştur ki zikr olunur inşâ'allâh.

In English: Tâceddîn is from Bukhara. In the time of Selim I, when the vapour (buhâr) of a passion for travel clouded the brain of his desire, he wandered through the lands and reached the capital. He commanded the sülüs and nesih scripts in the manner of Ibn al-Bawwab and Yaqut, and was a man of distinguished ways who was in particular the cause of the divanî hand becoming famous. His worthy son Mehmed Efendi also became in his time the crown of the men of learning and the chief of the crowned, as will be mentioned, God willing.

Hüsameddin says that this record is wrong on two counts. First, Müstakimzâde's attribution "Buhârî" appears to have arisen from a misunderstanding of the Amasya nickname "Mâverâünnehirli". Hüsameddin does not write this explicitly; he only says that Müstakimzâde "missed the mark" in the biographies of this man and of his grandfather, but his explanation of the nickname at the head of the entry brings the connection to mind. The pun "Buhâr-ı sevdâ" also shows that the biographer understood Bukhara as a real homeland, not as a nickname. Second, the head of the chancery (reisülküttâb) Mehmed Çelebi, whom Müstakimzâde calls his son, was according to Hüsameddin not Küçük Tâc Bey's son but his grandson; this is established by Mehmed Çelebi's own signature, and all his contemporaries knew him as a member of the house of Tâc Beyzâde.

On one point Müstakimzâde's record complements Hüsameddin's: it shows that Küçük Tâc Bey was remembered as a calligrapher who had a share in establishing the divanî script. Hüsameddin too writes that he was most skilled in the siyakat and divanî hands. These two scripts were the scripts of financial records and official correspondence; this is exactly what was expected of the chancellor of a prince's divan.

His Poetry

Hüsameddin describes him as a "poet" but quotes none of his couplets. None of the tezkires (biographical anthologies of poets) that were checked has an entry or a poem for Küçük Tâc Bey; Müstakimzâde too speaks only of his calligraphy. His poems have not reached us. The family's poetic tradition can be traced in the couplets of his grandfather Tâcî Bey that survive in anthologies of response poems (nazire mecmuaları) and in the Hevesnâme of his uncle Câfer Çelebi; there is no text to show how far Küçük Tâc Bey took part in this tradition.

Chronology

918 (1512): At the accession of Selim I he goes to Istanbul and, through Câfer Çelebi's support, enters the chancery of the Imperial Council.

921 (1515): His elder uncle Câfer Çelebi is executed.

922 or 923 (1516-17): His younger uncle Sa'dî Çelebi dies; Küçük Tâc Bey returns to Amasya.

21 Safer 948 (16 June 1541): Prince Mustafa is sent to Amasya (945 in Hüsameddin).

Around 955 (1548): He dies while chancellor to Prince Mustafa.

Bibliography

Online sources