For the twenty years in which Kudsî Hasan Dede was its sheikh, the Amasya Mevlevî lodge was the gathering place of the city's poets, preachers and dervishes in the later seventeenth century. Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar calls him "fâzıl-ı meşhûr" (a renowned man of learning) and "pîr-i muhterem" (a venerable elder); he was serving as a Mevlevî deputy (halife) when he became sheikh in Zilkade 1070 (July 1660), and he died in Şaban 1091 (August-September 1680). No work of his survives to show him as a poet; what is known is that the verse exchanges he held with his contemporaries passed from mouth to mouth in the city. There is no entry under his own name in Amasya Tarihi; his life has to be assembled from sentences scattered across the chronicle of the city and the entries of some ten other people. His poems have not come down to us.

Life

His year and place of birth are unknown. His family was a line of Mevlevî dedes attached to the Şeyh Cû'î lodge west of Amasya. According to Hüsameddin, his brother Hacı Mehmed Çelebi was the son of Süleyman Dede bin Şeyh Mehmed Çelebi, one of the Mevlevî dedes; he was trained under Mehmed Ârif Dede, sheikh of the Amasya Mevlevî lodge, became sheikh, Mesnevî reader and endowment trustee of the Şeyh Cû'î lodge in 1057 (1647), repaired the ruined lodge and brought the village back to life, and died in 1067 (1656-57). The last sentence of that entry ties Kudsî to this family:

Amasya Mevlevîhânesi şeyhi meşhûr Hasan Kudsî Dede Efendi, Hacı Çelebi Efendi'nin birâderi idi.

If this sentence is correct, Kudsî too was a son of Süleyman Dede and belonged to a branch of the Mevlevî family known as the "Hacı Çelebizâdeler". Hüsameddin does not give his father's name separately, nor does he say on what source the brotherhood rests.

His appointment came in one of the most turbulent years in Amasya's history. In 1070 (1659-60) the trial of the mufti Hızır Efendi had turned into a great disturbance in the city: the people imprisoned and expelled the city steward (şehir kethüdâsı) Mumcuoğlu Seyyid Ahmed Ağa, and the governor Muslî Paşa fled the city under a hail of stones. Hüsameddin records the deaths and appointments of the middle of the month as follows:

Zilka'de evâsıtında tımârhâne kurbinde Nuh Bey Dâru'l-kurrâ'sı Şeyhi Reîsi el-Kurrâ Hâfız Abdurrahman Efendi, mevlevîhâne şeyhi Mahmûd Adnî Dede Efendi, irtihâl-i dâr-ı bekâ edib Hâfız Sun'ullah Efendi dâru'l-kurrâ şeyhi, hulefâ-yı mevleviyyeden Hasan Kudsî Dede Efendi de mevlevîhâne şeyhi oldu.

Rendered plainly: in the middle of Zilkade, Hâfız Abdurrahman Efendi, head of the Qur'an reciters and sheikh of the Nuh Bey school of recitation near the asylum, and Mahmûd Adnî Dede Efendi, sheikh of the Mevlevî lodge, died; Hâfız Sun'ullah Efendi became sheikh of the school of recitation, and Hasan Kudsî Dede Efendi, one of the Mevlevî deputies, became sheikh of the Mevlevî lodge.

Twenty-one years later the same chronicle gives his death in a single sentence:

Şa'bânda mevlevîhâne şeyhi urefâ-yı ümmetten pîr-i muhterem Hasan Kudsî Dede Efendi vefât edib sâdât-ı Aleviye'den es-Seyyid Alâeddîn Dede Efendi Amasya Mevlevihânesi şeyhi oldu.

That is, in Şaban the venerable elder Hasan Kudsî Dede Efendi, one of the gnostics of the community, died, and Seyyid Alâeddîn Dede Efendi, of the Alevî line of the Prophet's descendants, became sheikh of the Amasya Mevlevî lodge.

His Circle and His Pupils

Kudsî's name usually appears in Hüsameddin's work while someone else's life is being told, to show with whom that person kept company. When these scattered sentences are brought together, the sheikh is seen surrounded by men of the madrasa, of the dervish lodge and of the pen. His "verse exchanges and conversations" with the divan secretary İlhâmî Hasan Çelebi were famous; his exchanges with the Mesnevî reader Şeydâ Ahmed Çelebi are mentioned in the same words. Since both men died in 1078 (1667-68), these exchanges belong to the first eight years of Kudsî's sheikhdom or to the years before it. The jesting of the Hızır Paşa lodge sheikh and preacher Memi Dedezâde Burhâneddîn İbrâhim Efendi with him and with the mufti Hızır Efendi, and the "mystical and literary" conversations of the Halvetî sheikh Hüdâyî Ahmed Efendi with him, were the talk of the town.

Those raised within the lodge make a longer list. Bilâl Efendi, muezzin of the Kocacık mosque, was in Hüsameddin's phrase "nurtured" (perveriş-yâb) in his company, turned to Sufism and literature, and became sheikh of the Mevlevî lodge in 1112 (1700-01). The leader of the chanting (zâkirbaşı) Ebû Sa'îd Ahmed Dede was trained in his service, and it was Kudsî who gave him this agnomen (künye). Tab'î Ahmed Dede died in 1084 (1673-74) while serving as a pillar of the lodge during his sheikhdom; Sâbir Ahmed Dede was formed in the service of Şeydâ Ahmed and Kudsî and became a Mesnevî reader; the Mevlevî deputy Derviş İbrâhim Çelebi is also mentioned in the period of his sheikhdom. It is recorded that Sâkıb Osman Efendi took his literary learning from Kudsî and his learning in the sacred law from the mufti Hızır Efendi. That most of these names are described as "poets" suggests that Kudsî's circle regarded poetry as part of the training of the lodge; this is an impression drawn from the sources taken together.

His son Zarîf Ahmed Efendi took another road: he studied with the Qur'an commentator Hızır Efendi, became a judge, returned to Amasya on retiring from the judgeship of Canik, and died in 1131 (1718-19). The byname "Kudsîzâde" shows that his father's pen name was used in the family like a surname.

The State of the Sources

Hüsameddin writes the name in two orders: "Hasan Kudsî Dede" in the chronicle and some entries, "Kudsî Hasan Dede" in others; in the entry on Ebû Sa'îd Ahmed Dede the spelling "Kutsî" occurs. That Kudsî was a pen name follows from his son being called "Kudsîzâde" and from his conversations being described as verse exchanges; whether the sheikh used the name within the lodge or in his poetry is unclear. Although the order of the name varies, "Hasan Kudsî Dede" and "Kudsî Hasan Dede" are the same person: in both forms he is sheikh of the Amasya Mevlevî lodge, he is mentioned with the same people, and the entry on his son Zarîf Ahmed gives him as "Kudsî Hasan Dede".

The chain of sheikhs is not consistent in the source. The history of the Mevlevî lodge in the first volume lists the sheikhs after Bayram Paşa's enlargement of the building as "Mehmed Ârif Dede, his son-in-law Mahmûd Dede, Abdülkâdir Dede, Alâeddîn Dede" and does not mention Kudsî at all. The chronicle of the fourth volume, by contrast, makes Kudsî sheikh after Mahmûd Adnî Dede and Alâeddîn Dede after him. There is a contradiction for the years after his death as well: according to the entry on Ebû Sa'îd Ahmed Dede, he became sheikh of the Amasya Mevlevî lodge in 1096 (1684-85) and gave way to Alâeddîn Dede in 1099 (1687-88), while the entry on Sâbir Ahmed Dede says that Sâbir himself became sheikh in 1097 (1685-86). Which of these records is correct cannot be settled from Hüsameddin.

The absence of an entry of his own also calls for an explanation. The biographical part of Amasya Tarihi is arranged alphabetically and breaks off in the twelfth volume, at the letter 'ayn. An entry that would have fallen under the letter kâf by the pen name Kudsî may never have been written because the work did not reach that letter; nor does he appear among the entries arranged under the name Hasan. This explanation is a possibility. Metin Hakverdioğlu, who compiled the poets in Hüsameddin volume by volume, does not count Kudsî either; he shows only his son Zarîf Ahmed Efendi.

His Poetry

The poems of Kudsî Hasan Dede have not come down to us. Although his exchanges with İlhâmî and Şeydâ were famous, Hüsameddin did not record a single line of them. He writes that two ghazals of Şeydâ Ahmed Çelebi had been in his hands but were burned, and he notes the same loss for the poems of Tab'î Ahmed Dede and Zarîf Ahmed Efendi that he had held. The texts left from Kudsî's circle may also have perished in such a fire; Hüsameddin says nothing on the matter. Outside his work, too, no poem bearing the pen name Kudsî that could be tied to the Amasya sheikh has turned up.

Chronology

1057 (1647): His brother Hacı Mehmed Çelebi becomes sheikh of the Şeyh Cû'î Mevlevî lodge.

1067 (1656-57): Hacı Mehmed Çelebi dies.

Zilkade 1070 (July 1660): On the death of Mahmûd Adnî Dede he becomes sheikh of the Amasya Mevlevî lodge.

1078 (1667-68): İlhâmî Hasan Çelebi and Şeydâ Ahmed Çelebi, with whom he exchanged verse, die.

1084 (1673-74): Tab'î Ahmed Dede, a pillar of the lodge, dies.

Şaban 1091 (August-September 1680): He dies; Seyyid Alâeddîn Dede succeeds him.

1131 (1718-19): His son Zarîf Ahmed Efendi dies in Amasya.

Bibliography

Primary sources