In the Bâyezid Paşa quarter of Amasya, beside the Taşova road, stand two adjoining structures: the mosque known locally as the Azeris Mosque or the Şirvanlı Mosque, and the Tomb of Mîr Hamza Nigârî on its eastern side. The complex was built by Azerbaijani Turks who had migrated to Anatolia from Karabakh and Shirvan. Nigârî was a well-known Naqshbandi sheikh and poet of the nineteenth century. He died in exile in Harput and, in accordance with his will, was brought to Amasya and buried there. The mosque rose beside his grave with donations from his disciples, and the tomb was designed as an integral part of it.

The Azeris Who Came to Amasya

Migrations from Azerbaijan to Anatolia took place at various times during the Ottoman period. After the Ottoman-Russian War of 1877-1878, known as the War of '93, and the Ottoman army's defeat, some of the Azeris living in the region took refuge in Anatolia, which they regarded as safe, and part of these refugees settled in Amasya. Nigârî's connection with Amasya, however, goes back much earlier than that war. His disciples are known to have migrated to Anatolia in large groups after the Ottoman-Russian War of 1853 and to have settled across a broad belt stretching from Amasya to Muş and Kars. Most of them were Karapapak (Terekeme) Turks.

The yearbooks (salname) of the province of Sivas, to which the sanjak of Amasya belonged, reflect this population movement only indirectly. The yearbooks of 1870, 1871, 1872, 1876 and 1881 contain no record of immigrants arriving in Amasya. The yearbook for Hijri 1301 (1883), however, records, in addition to the Muslim and Christian population, 1,239 people in 308 households as "Muhacirin-i Cedide" (new immigrants). The yearbook for Hijri 1304 (1887) reduces this to 200 people in 65 households, while later yearbooks again give 308 households and 1,239 people. The records do not say where the immigrants came from, but since there was as yet no migration to Amasya from the Balkans in those years, it is highly likely that these people were of Caucasian origin. The first Azerbaijani migrations to Amasya began from the Shirvan districts of Kürdemir, Şamahı, Kuba and Şeki, and later arrivals came from Dagestan, Karabakh, Ganja, Kazakh, Borçalı, Ahıska, Karayazı, Ahılkelek, Ağbaba and Gökçe. Some of those from Shirvan and Karabakh lived in the quarter named after Mîr Hamza himself.

Mîr Hamza Nigârî

Nigârî was born in the village of Cicimli in the district of Zangezur in Karabakh. Sources give different birth years, among them 1797, 1805 and 1815; studies of the buildings in Amasya adopt 1797 (Hijri 1212). His family was a seyyid house known in the region as the Cicimli Seyyids, believed to descend from Hasan, the grandson of the Prophet, and held in great esteem. His father was Seyyid Rükneddin Efendi, known as Mîr Paşa. His father was killed when he was only six months old. In childhood he showed little interest in reading and preferred riding and playing with weapons. At his mother's insistence, after the age of fifteen he left his village and studied with a scholar named Mahmud Efendi in Karakaş, and then with Şikest Abdullah Efendi in Şeki. It is said that he took the pen name Nigârî out of gratitude to a woman named Nigâr who had helped him during his studies.

His Sufi path was set by his attachment to İsmâil Sirâceddin Şirvânî, who had received the caliphate from Khalid al-Baghdadi and had begun guiding disciples in Shirvan. According to tradition, while he was a student of Şikest Abdullah Efendi, Ali appeared to him in a dream and told him to go to Sivas and join Şirvânî; when he came into the sheikh's presence, the sheikh said to him, "Blessed is the one whose guide is the sovereign of sainthood." There is no certain information on when and where he joined the order. When it became known that Şirvânî had been the guide of Sheikh Shamil, the Russians imprisoned him for a time; after his release he went to Ahıska in 1827 and, the same year, to Anatolia, stayed four years in Amasya, then moved to Sivas and lived there for nine years. From this sequence it can be said that Nigârî joined him at some point after 1830.

When Şirvânî returned to Amasya in 1839, Nigârî came to the city with his guide, spent a period in seclusion at the Gümüşlü Saraçhane Madrasa, and in the same year made the pilgrimage at his guide's order. On the way back he travelled through Basra, Baghdad, Aleppo and Damascus, stopped in Istanbul, and then returned to Amasya. In 1841, again at his guide's order, he went to Karabakh to see his mother, teach and guide disciples, and he stayed there until 1852. His fame spread over a wide area in these years, and he gained many disciples, especially among the Karapapak Turks. He married during this period, and his son Sirâceddin, a gifted poet whom he lost at the age of twenty, was born in Karabakh. He then returned to Anatolia, lived three years in Erzurum, and moved to Istanbul in 1855, where he stayed until 1858. Little detail is known about his activities in this period; it is recorded that he met Mustafa Reşid Pasha, that he was offered the sheikhdom of the Emîr Buhârî Lodge in Fatih, and that he declined and had his deputy Mustafa Sabri Efendi appointed in his place. During these years he also had his wife and son, whom he had left in Karabakh, brought to Erzurum.

The Years in Amasya and Merzifon

In 1866 Nigârî came from Erzurum with some of his friends and settled in Amasya. Soon afterwards he moved to Merzifon and continued his teaching there until 1883, giving lessons in Quranic exegesis and hadith. His circle of disciples in Amasya and its surroundings had grown so large that most of the residents of the quarter where he lived were people attached to him. This crowd multiplied his enemies as much as his admirers. His constant expressions of love for Ali and the Ahl al-Bayt in his talks and poems, and his remarks that the Umayyads and Marwanids, who had wronged the Ahl al-Bayt, were enemies of Islam, disturbed certain circles. Rumours spread that he cursed the Companions and worked against the state and the nation. A petition was drawn up asking for his removal from Amasya on the grounds that he could rise in rebellion at any moment with disciples ready to die for him, and a complaint was lodged with the Sublime Porte. His Turkish divan was also examined by a committee on the grounds that it contained harmful ideas, and it was decided to collect its copies.

Following an order that came from the sanjak governorate of Amasya to the district governor of Merzifon, Nigârî left Merzifon with his family on 28 February 1885. After a few days in Samsun he went to Istanbul, probably at the telegram of Izzet Efendi of Erzurum, who seems to have been one of his followers. Kâzım Paşa, the author of Mekâlid-i Aşk, intervened with the Porte to have the exile stopped, but without result. On 30 April 1885 he was put on a steamer bound for Harput, the place designated for his exile. On the way he stopped at Amasya and took with him his wife, his brother-in-law, his nephew and his deputy Mahmud Efendi, who were exiled together with him, and travelling by way of Tokat, Sivas and Malatya he reached Harput on 30 May 1885. After a year and a half of exile he died there in September 1886. In accordance with his will, and with the permission of the governor of Harput, Hasan Pasha, his body was brought to Amasya and buried.

His Sufi Outlook and Poetry

Although Nigârî was a Naqshbandi-Khalidi sheikh, he was a singular figure standing almost wholly outside that line. He said that he had abandoned the views of the four schools of law and that he was neither Sunni nor Shia but simply a Muslim. For this reason his followers regard him as a "pîr," in the sense of the founder of an order. Divine love, devotion to the Ahl al-Bayt and the spirit of Malamatism are the basic elements that form his personality. He claimed the station of the qutb, and he saw the purpose of creation as loving God and the Ahl al-Bayt. Scholars regard him as an enlightened figure who defended Islamic unity against sectarian fanaticism.

He left two divans, one in Persian and one in Turkish. The poems in his voluminous Turkish divan differ considerably from the general style of Sufi poets. Nigârî appears as a classical divan poet who sings of divine love, and he resembles Fuzûlî most; he wrote tahmis (poems extending another poet's lines) on some of Fuzûlî's ghazals. The terms of Sufism and the concepts of his order's spiritual journey are almost never found in his poetry. Most of his poems are in aruz meter and a small number in syllabic meter, and the features of Azeri Turkish are clear in his language. The line "Sana Kur'an demese ben sana insan demezem" is one of his best-known verses expressing the reality of the Prophet. Besides Fuzûlî, he admired and regarded as masters Rûhî-yi Bağdâdî, his contemporary Nebâtî, Hafez, Khwaju Kermani and Saadi of Shiraz.

The edition of the divan published by A. Azmi Bilgin contains 644 ghazals, 119 rubais, forty-eight qit'as, fourteen tercibends, two terkibibends, three mustezads, a "Sâkînâme" of twenty-eight stanzas, five tahmis on Fuzûlî's ghazals, the 521-couplet masnavi-style "Çaynâme," and a 210-couplet poem found after his death. In the "Çaynâme" he speaks of the samovar and tea while offering Sufi interpretations, and describes his homeland Karabakh and its notables. The Nigârnâme (Istanbul 1305), a religious and mystical masnavi, tells how the poet makes his heart fall in love with the beloved (nigâr) of a spiritual world he saw in a dream. The cover of the book does not carry the author's name; it bears only the phrase "These are the exalted works of a perfect master." His ghazals, koşmas and qasidas are still recited today not only among his disciples but among the people at large; as a continuation of old Turkish traditions, these poems are sung in gatherings with the rhythm kept by hand. His name is spoken with respect in eastern Anatolia and northern Azerbaijan, and various legends are told about him. His principal deputies include Gazi Osman Efendi of Maraş, Hacı Mustafa Efendi of Erzurum (Şaşı Hoca), Hacı Zekeriyyâ Efendi of Tokat, Hacı Mustafa Efendi of Taşova, Hacı Tayyib Efendi of Rize, Ahmed Hulûsi Efendi of Istanbul and two different men named Hacı Mahmud Efendi.

The Upper Tomb and Şirvânî

The first of the two important buildings the Azeris raised in Amasya is the tomb of Nigârî's guide, İsmâil Sirâceddin Şirvânî. Known locally as the Upper Tomb (Yukarı Türbe), this structure stands on a high point of the Şamlar quarter, built together with a small mosque. Şirvânî was born in 1786 in the village of Kürdemir in the township of Şamahı in Shirvan; the years 1782-83 and 1785 have also been proposed for his birth, but the year Hijri 1200 is clearly legible in the tomb's inscription. He studied in Shirvan, Erzincan, Tokat, Baghdad and Burdur, settled in Istanbul in 1813, attached himself to Khalid al-Baghdadi, and was appointed caliph to Shirvan at his request. When the Russians took Shirvan and then Ahıska, he settled in Amasya, spent his last years there, and died in 1848, in the month of Ramadan, during a cholera outbreak.

The tomb was built in 1283 (1867) by his son Şirvanizade Mehmed Rüşdü Pasha, who served as grand vizier in 1873-1874 under Sultan Abdülaziz; the inscription states this clearly. Some official publications date the construction to 1870, while Abdî-zâde Hüseyin Hüsameddin dates it to 1869. In the tomb lie Şirvânî, his son Seyyid Ahmed Hulusi Efendi, judge of Istanbul, and his son-in-law Hacı İsa Ruhi Efendi. The gravestones in the graveyard show that his descendants were buried in the same ground for a century. Şirvânî's presence in Amasya is a necessary link for understanding Nigârî's tie to the city, because Nigârî first came to Amasya in the footsteps of his guide.

Building the Mosque

The mosque was built under the leadership of Sheikh Hacı Mahmut Efendi, himself from Karabakh, with aid sent from the Karabakh and Shirvan regions of Azerbaijan and with donations from those who had come from these regions and settled in Amasya. Official records give the construction date as 1873-1895. Another record states that the construction took place in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, while the entry on Nigârî mentions the mosque as built in 1894 on the site of Nigârî's grave. These differences in date suggest that the building rose over a long period in stages. According to inventory records, the ablution fountain and the tomb were added after the mosque was built; yet the date on the tomb's inscription shows that this addition fell in the years after Nigârî's death.

Above the central arch of the narthex is an inscription in Ottoman Turkish, four lines on white marble, dated Hijri 1325 (1907). According to the inscription, the tomb and mosque were built under the leadership of Mahmud el-Karanî, one of Nigârî's deputies in Kazakh, and the narthex was completed in 1325 through the efforts of Mahmud el-Karanî's sons Veys, Muhammed and Ahmed Efendi. Thus the last part of the complex was completed in 1907. Although one inventory record states that the mosque has no inscription, this marble plaque above the narthex remains in place and has been read in scholarly studies. There is no written or oral information about the mosque's architect and craftsmen.

Architecture

The mosque has a square plan, a single dome and a minaret with a single balcony. Four small domes stand at the four corners of the dome. The north, south and west facades are built of rough-hewn and rubble stone with brick laid in between. Smooth-cut stone is used at the corners and in the tomb on the east facade. The dome drum is built of thin flat brick. The narthex on the north facade has four columns and three bays and is built entirely of smooth-cut stone. The pointed arches above the classical column capitals are worked in two colors with red and white marble, and this section is covered by three small domes. The arches are also recorded as having hedgehog-style (kirpi) eaves.

The marble main portal is round-arched, with a muqarnas hood above the arch. On either side of the entrance are hourglass motifs and small niches, and on the two sides of the hood are wheel (çarkıfelek) motifs. An older study wrote that the stonework and motifs of this portal do not conform to traditional Turkish architecture. Later research states that what is seen here consists of motifs and techniques of Azerbaijani Turkish art carried to Anatolia. The prayer hall is arranged quite plainly. The mihrab niche has a hood of six rows of muqarnas and, as at the portal, a relief wheel motif on each side. Above the hood, a phrase from verse 37 of Surah Âl-i İmrân, "...whenever Zechariah entered the sanctuary..." (kullemâ dehale aleyhâ Zekeriyyâ'l-mihrâb), is carved in Arabic in the marble. The border around the mihrab carries vine branches and flower motifs, and the crown is decorated with vine branches and bunches of grapes.

On the mihrab wall is a symbolic mihrab motif in a style approaching mural painting, in dark cherry red, dark green, brown and blue; above it are a curtain drawn to both sides and a hanging lamp, and below it the word Allah and, under that, another lamp. The decoration of the marble minbar is graceful and balanced; the minbar gives the impression of having been modeled on the minbar of the Mehmed Paşa Mosque of 1486. The pulpit in the southeast corner is a quarter-circle in plan, with a wooden railing and a conical form from bottom to top. The decoration of the mihrab and pulpit, and the flat C-shaped ornaments above the muqarnas hood, show that the Baroque influences seen so strongly in Ottoman art in the last quarter of the nineteenth century were applied in this mosque as well.

The Tomb and Its Graveyard

The tomb has a square plan and adjoins the east facade of the mosque. It is connected to the mosque by a wide arch, and one enters it from inside the mosque through an arched door. The main door on the east facade is reached by five steps. The building is entirely of smooth-cut stone, and two-color pink and yellowish stonework appears from above the lower row of windows upward. The keystones of the lower window arches carry crescent motifs, and those of the upper windows carry marble motifs in the form of swelling domes; similar motifs repeat beneath the eave moldings. The transition to the dome is made with squinches, and the dome rests on an octagonal drum. The five-line Arabic inscription above the arch of the tomb's entrance is badly damaged; only the date Hijri 1304 (1886/87) can be read in the middle of the last line. Given that Nigârî died in 1886, it is concluded that the tomb was built about a year after his death.

Inside are three sarcophagi surrounded by iron railings. The southern one belongs to Nigârî, the middle one to his son Seyyid Sirâceddin, and the northern one to Mîr Hasan, Nigârî's cousin on his father's side. Examinations made in 2009 found mostly floral kalem işi (painted) decoration on the walls, in the dome and on the skirts; still lifes and bouquets of flowers were depicted, and bell motifs were used on the arches carrying the dome. Yellow, green, blue, claret, pink and purple stood out in the decoration, which reflected the characteristics of the Westernization period. In the rectangular cartouche above the arch leading from the tomb to the mosque, "Seyyid Hamza en-Nigârî" was written in black on a pink ground, with the words "Seyyid Sirâceddin" and "Mîr Hasan" beside it.

North of the tomb, within the mosque courtyard, is a small graveyard with an iron railing. It is entered from the mosque's narthex and holds four graves side by side. The first grave to the north is more imposing than the others; it belongs to Emine Hanım, who died in 1910, and her thirteen-line headstone specifically states that she was the mother of Seyyid Sirâceddin. The second grave is dated 1909, and its seven-line inscription shows that it belongs to Latife Hanım, another wife of Nigârî. No date could be determined on the stone of the third grave; it clearly belongs to another wife of Nigârî, but the name is worn and cannot be read, and some sources say it was Şehnaz Hanım. The fourth grave, according to its four-line Ottoman inscription, is that of Zeliha Hanım.

Restoration

The mosque and tomb were taken into restoration in 2013 under the supervision of the General Directorate of Foundations, and the work was completed in June 2014. According to reports in the press, the cost was met by Nermine İskenderova of Azerbaijan. In the work, the damp in the domes of the mosque and tomb was removed, the plaster on the outer facades of the mosque was stripped to reveal the original material, and the joints were renewed. Researchers, however, have found that a significant part of the wall paintings in both mosque and tomb disappeared during the restoration. In particular, the decoration above the arch of the tomb's east-facing entrance and the still-life ornaments on the dome, squinches and arches have been lost. In place of the still life and floral decoration on the yellow ground of the dome drum, names such as "Ya Shah-i Naqshband," "Ahmed Dehlevî" and "Hacı Mahmud Karanî" were written, and the phrase "Ve mâ tevfîkî illâ billâh" was removed and replaced with "Ya Mevlânâ Hâlid Bağdâdî."

Within Amasya's Architecture

The Azeris Mosque and the Tomb of Mîr Hamza Nigârî, together with the Upper Tomb and its mosque, were built by Azeri Turks after the second half of the nineteenth century and are notable examples among the buildings of Amasya. The design of mosque and tomb as a single unit in both complexes recalls the practice in Seljuk-period Amasya. For example, the Burmalı Minare Mosque of 1242 and the Cumudar Tomb adjoin each other, and the tomb can be entered only through the mosque door. The same holds for the Gök Medrese Mosque of 1267 and the Şehitler Tomb. Because six centuries separate the Seljuk buildings from those of the Azeris, it is hard to reach a firm judgment on whether this is an influence or a coincidence. In broad outline the buildings bear the marks of traditional Ottoman architecture. A parallel to the colored stonework of the narthex arches is seen in the decoration of the madrasa that Çelebi Mehmed had built in Merzifon in 1414-1417 by the Damascene architect Müşeymeş. It is known that, within the cosmopolitan population of the Ottoman period, immigrants other than the Azeris also shaped the city's architecture. The patrons of the buildings the Azeris raised are known, but the identity of the architects and craftsmen who built them is not. This holds for many buildings in Amasya; the naming of four masters in the inscriptions of the Bâyezid Paşa Mosque of 1414 is a rare exception.

The mosque is open for worship today, and Nigârî's ghazals and koşmas are still recited in gatherings around Amasya and in eastern Anatolia.

Chronology

1786: İsmâil Sirâceddin Şirvânî is born in the village of Kürdemir in Shirvan (according to the inscription).

1797: Mîr Hamza Nigârî is born in the village of Cicimli in Karabakh (other dates have also been proposed).

1839: Nigârî comes to Amasya with his guide and goes on pilgrimage the same year.

1841-1852: Nigârî teaches and guides disciples in Karabakh.

1848: Şirvânî dies in Amasya.

1866: Nigârî settles in Amasya and soon moves to Merzifon.

1873-1895: Construction period of the mosque (record of the Culture and Tourism Directorate).

1885: Nigârî leaves Merzifon and is exiled to Harput.

1886: Nigârî dies in Harput and his body is brought to Amasya; the tomb is built in 1886-87.

1907: The narthex is completed (inscription, Hijri 1325).

2013-2014: Restoration by the General Directorate of Foundations.

Sources

Academic studies

Official sources

Other sources

Online sources