Original Ottoman Turkish Text
Metre: Mef‘ūlü fā‘ilātü mefā‘īlü fā‘ilün
Bir ṣubḥ-ı ḥüsn-i ġoncayı fetḥ eyleyince bād
Tārīḫ-i fetḥini didi bülbül-i güşāde-bād
In English
1. When on a morning of beauty the breeze conquered (opened) the rosebud, the nightingale gave the chronogram of its conquest as "güşâde bâd" (may it stay open).
Literary and Historical Commentary
The conquest of a fortress and the opening of a rosebud meet in a single word. "Feth" in Arabic means both to open and to conquer. When the morning breeze opens the rosebud it is as if it had conquered a fortress; and the nightingale composes the chronogram of this conquest. In Ottoman poetry the year of conquests, of the opening of buildings and of notable events was recorded in chronograms, and one of the blessings often used in them is "güşâde bâd", "may it be open, may it stay open". The nightingale's chronogram is this blessing: may the opened rosebud stay open for ever.
Sâhib, whose divan contains thirteen chronograms, here carries the language of the genre into a scene of spring. The thesis does not say whether the letters of "güşâde bâd" give a particular year by the abjad reckoning; the couplet can be read as a chronogram jest. The matla appears in the Ali Emîrî and T. 1710/6 copies and is the last of the matlas in the thesis.
Bibliography
- Meral Topal, Pîrî-zâde Mehmed Sâhib Hayatı, Edebî Kişiliği, Eserleri ve Divanı'nın Tenkitli Metni, MA thesis, Fırat Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü, Elazığ 2004, p. 230, matla 24 (Millet Library, Ali Emîrî Manzum 243, fol. 37b; Istanbul University Library T. 1710/6, fol. 18b). https://openaccess.firat.edu.tr/handle/11508/16014
Online sources
