Original Persian Text

Metre: Mefʿûlü fâʿilâtü mefâʿîlü fâʿilün (metre identified by us)

Mânî ki bûd u ṣûret-i bî-maʿniyeş çi bûd
Mânî menem ki çihre-küşây-ı maʿâniyem

In English

1. Who was Mânî, and what was his meaningless picture? I am the true Mânî, for I am the one who unveils the face of meanings. (In the Iranian tradition Mânî is remembered as the legendary master of painting.)

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The couplet is in Persian and appears in Âşık Çelebi's biographical anthology of poets (tezkire), in the entry on the Tabriz painter Şahkulu, that is, Penâhî. Since its two lines do not rhyme with each other, it cannot be the opening couplet (matla) of a ghazal (gazel) or kaside (qasida); it must be one of the inner couplets of such a poem or a couplet composed on its own. The edition of the tezkire does not indicate the metre; we have established that the lines fit the pattern "mefʿûlü fâʿilâtü mefâʿîlü fâʿilün" of the muzâri metre in aruz (quantitative metre). The edition gives the couplet only in Latin transliteration; its text in Arabic script could not be obtained. The footnote placed beneath the couplet in Filiz Kılıç's edition gives its Turkish rendering as follows: "Mânî kim oluyor, onun anlamsız resmi neyin nesi? Asıl Mânî benim. Çünkü anlamların yüzünü ortaya çıkarmaktayım." The translation above is based on this rendering. According to the edition's note on manuscript variants, the couplet is missing from the copy of the tezkire designated F.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The whole art of the couplet rests on the likeness of sound between the name "Mânî" and words derived from the Arabic root of "maʿnâ" (meaning). In the first line the legendary painter's picture is called "bî-maʿnî", that is, meaningless; in the second the poet presents himself as the one who unveils the face of "maʿânî", meanings. The juxtaposition of Mânî, maʿnî and maʿânî is an example of cinas, the figure built on likeness of sound. The poet thus sets painting against poetry: Mânî drew only visible forms, whereas Penâhî is both a painter and a poet who brings meanings to light. The phrase "çihre-küşây" (unveiler of the face) also evokes, in the art of painting, the bringing of a face onto paper. This association is our own interpretation, but it suggests itself once one remembers that the couplet is spoken by a painter. The couplet belongs to the fahriye, the kind of verse in which the poet praises his own skill, common in divan poetry.

Historical Context

In describing Penâhî, Âşık Çelebi first praises his painting at length and calls him "s̱ânî-i Mânî", a second Mânî. He then says that, not content with painting, he was the painter of the gallery of meanings and the florist of the arts of rhetoric, and quotes this couplet with the words "dir idi", he used to say. The expression shows that the couplet was a saying Penâhî often repeated. The tezkire does not state explicitly that the couplet is his own poem; but the context of the entry, and the statement in the TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi that Şahkulu also wrote Persian poems, suggest that it belongs to him. When it was composed is unknown. For the poet's life and his connection with Prince Ahmed's court at Amasya, see the article Penâhî (Nakkaş Şahkulu).

Bibliography

Online sources