The catalogue spells the name of this deyiş in two different ways, "Leylü Neha" in the title and "Lehlü niha" in the first line; behind both stands the Arabic pair "leyl ü nehâr", "night and day". The deyiş opens with thanks for reaching the "beğler" at the end of a plea voiced night and day. Of the piece that Davut Aslan and Mehmet İnan, both of the village of Girap, sang together to two saz in Zigala on 5 July 1943, only this first line is in hand today.

Catalogue Data

  • Repertoire no.: none; not registered under the Amasya region in the TRT repertoire
  • Source persons: Davut Aslan (saz; born Rumi 1308, i.e. 1892-1893; farmer) and Mehmet İnan (saz; born Rumi 1327, i.e. 1911-1912; farmer); both from the village of Girap, Ezine subdistrict, central Amasya
  • Place and date of collection: village of Zigala (today Aydınca), 5 July 1943 (place in square brackets in the catalogue)
  • Collected by: Halil Bedii Yönetken, Muzaffer Sarısözen, Rıza Yetişen (Ankara State Conservatory)
  • Genre: deyiş
  • Mode, rhythm: not recorded
  • Words and music: registered as anonymous; the poet is unknown
  • Location in the archive: Folklore Archive, disc 1110/B-4
  • Source publication and link: Kaya's catalogue, no. 3606; full text of the thesis. There is no TRT link

Lyrics

Lehlü niha arz ederdim şükür beğlere kavuştum

In English: "Night and day I would lay out (my plight); thank God, I have reached the beys." "Arz etmek" here means to present a wish or one's condition to a superior, and "beğ" is the word "bey" as it reached the card in its spoken form. Who the "beğler" are cannot be told from one line. The lines that would show what followed the reaching of the beys never passed into any publication, and the notation was not printed either. The sound is on disc 1110 of the Folklore Archive, in the last place on side B.

Story

To whom the deyiş belongs, and which minstrel's pen name it carries, is not written on the card. Kaya states that for minstrel poetry the minstrel's name was often written in the "title of the piece" field of the card, and that where it was not, he himself added the name to the title on the basis of the pen name in the words. The absence of a name in this title raises the possibility that no pen name was seen in the words taken down on the card. There is no record of the story of its making either.

Musical Features

According to the list of performers, both Aslan and İnan played the saz in the recording; the card does not say which of them sang, and gives no mode or metre either. Side B of the disc consists from start to finish of recordings by these two villagers: "Sarcalan Köyünden Molla Mustafa ve Oğlu", "Keklik", "Söyleyim Dinleyim" and, last, this deyiş.

Performers and Recordings

The deyiş does not turn up again in any other collection. The lament "Molla Mustafa ve Oğlu", which opens the same side, found its way into the TRT repertoire as Değirmen Önünde Bir Böyük Tarla, and Cemal, sung by the two singers that day, is also described on the site. The melodies collected in Zigala and other villages are discussed together with all the folk songs and long songs of Amasya in The Melody of Yeşilırmak.

Bibliography

Online sources