The real trace Pîrî Ahmed Çelebi left in Amasya lies in the entries on the pupils he trained. In Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar's Amasya Tarihi, whenever a secretary or a poet is described, one meets again and again the sentence "he learned learning, letters and the secretarial art from Mü'eyyedzâde Pîrî Ahmed"; in the early seventeenth century many of the city's men of the pen passed through his lessons. He himself came from the Müeyyedzâde family, one of the city's old houses of learning; after teaching in the city for many years he served as judge in various places, among them Trabzon and Erzurum, and died in Ramadan 1017 (December 1608-January 1609). The entry Hüsameddin devoted to him, Pîrî Ahmed Çelebi-Müeyyedzâde el-Hâc, calls him a man of letters, poet, calligrapher and secretary. His pen name (mahlas) is unknown, and no example of his poetry survives.

Hüsameddin's Record

The entry comes in the seventh volume, among the people of Amasya named Pîr and Pîrî, immediately after Pîrî Ahmed Baba, founder of the Bektashi lodge in Merzifon:

Amasyalıdır. Yahyâ Çelebi bin Abdülvâsi' Çelebi bin Şemseddîn Ahmed Çelebi bin Mehmed Çelebi bin Mü'eyyed Çelebi bin Yârî Alî Çelebi mahdûmudur. Şeyhü'l-harem el-Hâc Sinâneddîn Yûsuf, fuzalâdan Mü'eyyedzâde Alî Efendilerden tahsîl-i ulûm edib ders-i âm oldu.
Yıllarca Amasya'da tedrîs-i ulûm edib üstâdı ve ammizâdesi Alî Efendi'nin vefâtında irsen Pervâne Bey vakfına mütevellî ve 994'de Şeyhülislâm olan Mü'eyyedzâde Abdülkâdir Şeyhî Efendi'nin himmetiyle Hüseyin Ağa müderrisliğinden Trabzon kadısı oldu.
Ba'dehû sancâklara ve Erzurum'a kadı olup 1014'de Mehmed Paşa Medresesi'yle mütekâ'id olduğu hâlde 1017 senesi ramazânında vefât etdi. Meşâhîr-i udebâ ve fuzalâdan ve mevâlîden bir zât olup edîb, şâir, hattât, kâtib idi. Kitaplarını Sultân Bâyezîd kütüphânesine vakf etdi.
Mahdûmları Mü'eyyed, Habîb, Alî Çelebilerdir. Habîb Çelebizâde Abdülvâsi' Çelebi evlâdına Vâsi' Çelebizâdeler dendi. Bunlardan Hâfız Ebûbekir Efendi 1310 sâlinden sonra vefât etdi. Alî Çelebizâde Nişâncı Ca'fer Paşa vüzerâdandır. Bunun evlâdına da Nişâncızâdeler dendi.

Translated: A native of Amasya, the son of Yahyâ Çelebi; his line goes back through Abdülvâsi' Çelebi, Şemseddîn Ahmed Çelebi, Mehmed Çelebi and Mü'eyyed Çelebi to Yârî Ali Çelebi. He studied under the Şeyhülharem Hacı Sinâneddîn Yûsuf and the scholar Mü'eyyedzâde Ali Efendi and became a ders-i âm (licensed public teacher). For years he taught in Amasya; when Ali Efendi, his teacher and the son of his paternal uncle, died, the trusteeship of the Pervâne Bey endowment passed to him by inheritance. With the support of Mü'eyyedzâde Abdülkâdir Şeyhî Efendi, who became şeyhülislam in 994, he moved from the teaching post of the Hüseyin Ağa Madrasa to the judgeship of Trabzon. He then served as judge in sanjak centres and in Erzurum; in 1014 he retired with the rank of the Mehmed Paşa Madrasa, and he died in the month of Ramadan of the year 1017. He was one of the well-known men of letters and scholars, of the rank of the mevâlî (senior judges); he was a man of letters, a poet, a calligrapher and a secretary. He endowed his books to the library of Sultan Bayezid. His sons are Mü'eyyed, Habîb and Ali Çelebi. The descendants of Habîb Çelebi's son Abdülvâsi' Çelebi were called the Vâsi' Çelebizâdes; of these, Hâfız Ebûbekir Efendi died after 1310. Ali Çelebi's son, the chancellor (nişancı) Ca'fer Paşa, was among the viziers; his descendants in turn were called the Nişancızâdes.

His Circle of Pupils

When the records scattered through Hüsameddin's pages are put together, the list of those who passed through Pîrî Ahmed's lessons is long. The treasury secretary and poet Âbî Mehmed Çelebi learned "learning, letters and the secretarial art" from him; Âbî, one of the quartet of poets known in Amasya as "the four elements of letters", died in 1039 (1629-30). Emânî Ahmed Çelebi, divan secretary of the beylerbey Alîczâde Hüseyin Paşa, learned calligraphy and the secretarial art from him, and Hüsameddin presents him too as a secretary and poet. Şeyhzâde Abdî Efendi, sheikh of the Ya'kûb Paşa lodge, whose poems found their way into Abdî Efendi's tezkire (biographical anthology of poets), also completed his studies with him and with İbrâhim Efendi of Harşena. Among the teachers, Yağmurköylü İsmâil Efendi, Dilkî Bâlî Mehmed Efendi, Beyzâde Tâceddîn Mehmed Efendi, the Halveti sheikh Hüsâmeddîn Hüseyin Efendi and Hacı Bayramzâde Hızır Efendi, who later became mufti of Amasya, are also named among his pupils.

Most of these names advanced in the learned profession and some in the scribal offices. Two of the four qualities listed in the entry, calligraphy and the secretarial art, explain why the latter group turned to him. That his grandson Abdülvâsi' Çelebi, son of Habîb Çelebi, also became a secretary after practising calligraphy with the calligrapher İsmâil Kâtibî Efendi makes it clear that the craft continued within the family. Among his own teachers there is one more name: Hüsameddin gives Bahşîzâde Fâzıl Yahyâ and Mü'eyyedzâde Pîrî Ahmed as the two best known of the many pupils of Ca'fer Efendi of Zara.

Judgeship and Endowment

Mü'eyyedzâde Abdülkâdir Şeyhî Efendi, who played a part in the move to the judgeship of Trabzon, belongs to the branch of the same family that rose in Istanbul; other entries also show that when he became şeyhülislam in 994 (1586) he looked after his relatives and fellow townsmen from Amasya. The names of the sanjaks where Pîrî Ahmed served as judge are not given in the entry. The Mehmed Paşa Madrasa granted at his retirement is the name of a madrasa in Amasya and seems to be mentioned here as a retirement rank rather than an actual teaching post.

The Pervâne Bey and Yâkût Paşa endowments held by the family are the side of his life that remained tied to Amasya. In the fourth volume, where the sanjak governorship of Mehmed Paşa is described, the city's leading scholars are listed; at the head of the list stands "Müeyyedzâde Pîrî Ahmed Efendi", and in the same place his name appears again as trustee of the Yâkût Paşa and Pervâne Bey endowments. After his death the administration of the endowment passed to Ca'fer Çelebi, whom Hüsameddin calls his cousin; Ca'fer Çelebi died in 1048 (1638-39). Which books he endowed to the library of Sultan Bayezid has not been established today.

His Poetry

The word "poet" appears in the entry as one of four qualities, yet it stands with neither a pen name nor a couplet beside it; no poem by Pîrî Ahmed Çelebi is known today. Abdî Efendi's tezkire, which gathered the poets of Amasya between 1000 and 1081, also covered his last years, but Pîrî Ahmed's name does not appear in the quotations Hüsameddin made from that work; and the tezkire itself is no longer extant. The mastery of Persian poetry shown by Yârî Ali Çelebi, the first elder of the family, and the presence of several poets among his pupils point to letters as a tradition in this house; whether Pîrî Ahmed himself took part in that tradition with verse we know only from Hüsameddin's single word.

Bibliography

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