Münîrî, Muamma 5: The Name Sultan Bayezid

Muamma 5 (name riddle) — Salṭanat bāġında ḳaddüñ bir nihāl-i tāzedür

Amasya05 Editorial Board • Editor: Mevlüt Erdem Öztürk • 01 October 2026 • Updated: 07 October 2026 • 3 min reading

Münîrî's fifth muamma shows kings bowing before a fresh sapling in the garden of sovereignty; the edition gives its solution as "Sultan Bayezid".

Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: fā‘ilātün fā‘ilātün fā‘ilātün fā‘ilün

Salṭanat bāġında ḳaddüñ bir nihāl-i tāzedür
Baş ḳor ayaġuna şehler kim vire bir ṣūret el

In English

1. In the garden of sovereignty your stature is a fresh sapling; kings lay their heads at your feet in the hope that some way may open to them (or: so that they may somehow lay a hand on that sapling). (The end of the second line can be read in two ways; both are our readings.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The fifth muamma (name riddle) of the edition is a single couplet in the metre "fā‘ilātün fā‘ilātün fā‘ilātün fā‘ilün". Its lines do not rhyme ("tāzedür" and "el"); since a muamma is a single couplet, this is not counted a defect. The muammas are found in all three manuscripts of the divan (VT 179b-180b, VY 151a-152b, Ü 63b-65b) in the same order; only in Ü are the 10th and 11th muammas transposed, and the 12th muamma and those after it are missing from Ü.

The edition's heading gives the solution as "Sulṭān Bāyezīd"; Ersoy cites the name in his introduction as "Sultan Bayezit".

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The couplet is built in the language of praise for a ruler. The Kubbealtı Lugatı explains "nihal" as sapling and as a beloved fresh and straight-limbed like a sapling. The stature of the one praised is a newly grown sapling in the garden of sovereignty; kings lay their heads at its feet. There is a congruence of images (tenasüp) joining palace and garden among the words "salṭanat" (sovereignty), "bāġ" (garden), "nihāl" (sapling) and "şehler" (kings). That the word "salṭanat" and the word "sulṭān" in the solution come from the same root is hard to miss (our observation), but the edition does not show the letter calculation of the riddle and we have not been able to reconstruct it.

Historical Context

The edition says only "Sulṭān Bāyezīd". Given that Münîrî was a member of Bayezid II's circle and that Bayezid II is named in the headings of thirteen of the kasides in the edition, the name hidden in the riddle is very probably that of Bayezid II (our inference). There is no information on when or on what occasion the muamma was written.