On a slope north of Merzifon, looking down over the town, stands a small tomb with a lead-covered dome and a porch resting on heavy piers. Located today in the Nusratiye quarter, on the street that bears its name, the building is the grave of Pîrî Baba, a dervish generally held to have lived in Merzifon in the fifteenth century. Known among the people as a Bektashi dervish and described by scholars rather as a Qalandari, Pîrî Baba is remembered for the legends that have him living in the stokehole of a bathhouse and foretelling conquests to sultans. Over the centuries a dervish lodge, a small mosque, a pious endowment (waqf) and a tradition of pilgrimage grew up around the tomb. Behind the building's plain appearance today lies a layered history reaching from its foundation through the great rupture of 1826 to the restorations of the twentieth century.

The life and legends of the dervish are the subject of a separate article; the focus here is the tomb itself, the lodge and endowment that surrounded it, the architecture of the building and the customs of pilgrimage. Even so, the history of the tomb cannot be followed without a brief word on who Pîrî Baba was. What is known of his life rests mainly on two sources: the Menâkıb-ı Pîrî Baba, written by a disciple named Hoca İbrâhim, and the Seyahatnâme (Book of Travels) of Evliya Çelebi. Evliya counts him among the dervishes whom Ahmed Yesevî sent to Anatolia together with Hacı Bektaş-ı Veli, and says he lived from the reign of Orhan Gazi to that of Mehmed II (the Conqueror). A comparison of the sultans named in the legends, however, suggests that the dervish actually lived in the mid-fifteenth century, most probably into its second half.

Location and Surroundings

The tomb stands on Pîrî Baba Street in the Nusratiye quarter, on high ground in Merzifon. The old name of the quarter is Tekke Mahallesi, "the Lodge Quarter", taken directly from the Pîrî Baba Lodge. Older records also use the name Sarı Bayındır for the area. In the seventeenth century Evliya Çelebi wrote that the dervish had settled on a high place north of the town, overlooking it. The description matches the present site: the road up to the tomb is steep, and from the porch one looks out over the roofs of Merzifon and towards the plain.

Eighteenth-century documents show that the lodge then stood near the town, that is, somewhat outside the settlement. As Merzifon grew, the lodge and tomb were absorbed into the town and a quarter formed around them. Today the building is one of the stops on the town's heritage trail, together with monuments in the historic centre such as the Kara Mustafa Paşa Mosque, the bedesten (covered market), the Taşhan and the Sultaniye Madrasa. West of the tomb lies a garden planted with trees, and below it, reached by a flight of steps, the Pîrî Baba Mosque.

Who Built the Tomb

There is no building inscription giving the date of construction, and the sources point in different directions as to who built the tomb. According to the account in the Menâkıbnâme, in the last period of his life Pîrî Baba came every day to the spot where his lodge would later stand, sat there until sunset, and returned to the old bathhouse in the evening. One day he died there. The people of his native village of Narince wished to carry him back to the village, but the scholars (ulema) of Merzifon would not allow it, and the dervish was buried where he died. The site of the tomb was thus fixed by the dervish's death.

The same source says that the tomb was built by the author himself. As Hoca İbrâhim tells it, after Pîrî Baba's death a disciple named Kara Baba was sent to Istanbul to inform the sultan of the dervish's passing and to ask that villages be endowed in his name; but Kara Baba died in Istanbul after his audience with the sultan. The people of Merzifon then began to press the dervish's nephew Ali Dede to have a tomb and lodge built. Meanwhile Şamlıoğlu Hoca İbrâhim had been caught in a storm at sea and had vowed to build a tomb over Pîrî Baba's grave if he survived. According to the story, the ship was about to sink when Pîrî Baba, in the guise of a dove, saved it. Hoca İbrâhim came to Merzifon, bought a plot from a man named Bezircioğlu, had the tomb and lodge built, and married a girl of his family to Ali Dede, placing her in the service of the lodge. Pîrî Baba's line is held to have continued through the child born of this marriage. Scholars also read the story as Hoca İbrâhim's attempt to tie himself to the dervish's family.

The Amasya historian Abdîzâde Hüseyin Hüsâmeddin gives a different account. In his version the dervish is called Pîrî Ahmed Baba; he came from Bukhara and, in the reign of Murad II, settled in Merzifon and served Sheikh Abdürrahîm-i Merzifonî. Prince Bayezid, then governor of Amasya and later Sultan Bayezid II, admired his conduct, and in 863 (1458-1459), after the death of Sheikh Abdürrahîm, built a separate lodge (zâviye) for the dervish and endowed some large estates for its upkeep. According to Hüsâmeddin, Pîrî Baba died around 879 (1474-1475) and was buried in the tomb Sultan Bayezid had built. His successor Ali Baba is also buried outside the tomb. Quotations from another edition of Hüsâmeddin's work give 1464 as the year the lodge was founded.

The documents do not settle which of the two accounts is correct, but they do prove that the lodge existed at an early date. An Ottoman tax register (tahrir defteri) of the early sixteenth century records "the zâviye of Pîrî Baba in Merzifon"; the register is dated 1515 in some studies and 926 (1520) in others. At that time the lodge was headed by Şahkulu Baba (or Şahkulu Dede) b. Bâyezîd, and the register of 982-983 (1574-1575) shows that the same man was still in office. According to Murat Çerkez, who studied the Turkish-period architecture of Merzifon, the plan and architectural features of the building also point to the second half of the fifteenth century. Machiel Kiel, on the other hand, states that the tomb was rebuilt in 1731. Which parts of the present building survive from the fifteenth century and which from later rebuildings cannot be clearly distinguished.

The Lodge Evliya Çelebi Saw

The most vivid description of the tomb's former appearance comes from Evliya Çelebi, who passed through Merzifon in 1057 (1647). The traveller describes the lodge of the dervish, whom he calls Pîr Dede Sultan, as a larger building than the Koyun Baba Lodge in Osmancık. The lodge is of masonry, very large and roofed with lead. With its ritual halls (meydan odası), kitchen, storeroom and dervish cells it is spacious enough to house two or three hundred dervishes. Its public kitchen feeds all who come and go, and the soup of Pîr Dede Sultan is famous. In Evliya's words the lodge is furnished with very precious objects, the like of which is not to be found even in the lodge of Imam Musa Rıza. At that time more than two hundred barefoot and bareheaded dervishes served there.

Evliya Çelebi relates that he entered the tomb, recited the Yâsin beneath the dervish's "luminous dome" and asked for the help of his spirit. The tomb is filled with sweet scents. All around the grave are precious objects such as lamps, candlesticks, oil lamps, censers and rosewater sprinklers. The cloak, staff, standard, drum, kettledrum, cymbals, Bozdoğanî crown, Davidic sling and Mosaic belt-stone said to have belonged to Pîr Dede are kept in cupboards. The sheikh of the lodge, Memi Dede Can, with the consent of the dervishes, places the dervish's Bozdoğanî felt cap on Evliya's head amid cries of "God is great", and the dervishes recite the gülbank prayer and bless him.

Alongside the lodge, another building is important in the traveller's description: the bathhouse in which the dervish was believed to have lived. According to Evliya it was a great place of pilgrimage where the sick found healing, and the spot where the dervish had entered the wall, as well as the stones from the bath's marble that he was said to have kneaded into bread, were still being shown. Until the seventeenth century Merzifon had only one bathhouse, built in 1388, towards the end of the reign of Murad I. Until recent times the hottest corner of this building, known locally as the Old Bath (Eski Hamam), next to the stokehole, was called "Pîrî Baba's retreat". Lodge, tomb and bathhouse thus formed three distinct places in Merzifon bound to the memory of the dervish.

Evliya Çelebi also writes that after the conquest of Istanbul Mehmed II endowed the lodge with 366 villages, so that the town of Merzifon itself became an endowment of the Pîr Dede Lodge. The figure is regarded as a legendary exaggeration; since the lodge's endowment deed (vakfiye) has not survived, the actual terms of the endowment are unknown. According to the Menâkıbnâme, when Mehmed II sent word that "I have endowed Merzifon to you", Pîrî Baba replied that he needed no endowment and asked that it be founded for the scholars of the town instead, and that they in turn pray for his soul.

The Lodge's Passage to Bektashism and Its Sheikhs

There is no clear evidence that Pîrî Baba himself was a Bektashi. The fact that the Seyahatnâme calls him an "ışık", that he is said to have gone about naked, and his behaviour in the legends bring him closer to a Qalandari dervish. That the lodge came to be attached to the Bektashi order over time, however, is certain. There are two views on when this happened. Some scholars think the lodge was transformed in the sixteenth century, when Balım Sultan gave the Bektashi order an organised structure and attached many Qalandari lodges to the centre at Hacıbektaş. Hüsâmeddin, by contrast, writes that the lodge was long administered by the dervish's descendants and successors, but in 1008 (1599-1600) passed under the control of the Bektashi dervishes through the influence of the rebels who rose that year. According to Faroqhi the lodge was under Bektashi control in the seventeenth century, and in 1647 Evliya Çelebi also presents it as a Bektashi lodge.

The list of sheikhs given by Hüsâmeddin shows in detail how the lodge was run in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Abdî Dede b. Osman Dede, recorded in the registers as a descendant of Pîrî Baba, became sheikh and trustee (mütevelli) of the lodge with the support of Köprülü Mehmed Pasha. Abdî Dede, known as Pîroğlu or Pîrli, had an elder son, Osman Ağa, who was one of the close associates of Merzifonlu Kara Mustafa Pasha and rose from master of the horse to beylerbey (governor-general). After Abdî Dede, his sons Timur Baba and Derviş Mehmed Baba, and then his grandson Hacı Ali Baba, served as sheikh. When Timur Baba's son Bektaş Baba became sheikh in 1131 (1718-1719), the lodge became openly a Bektashi hearth (ocak) and, in Hüsâmeddin's words, entered into rivalry with the hearth of Hacı Bektaş itself.

Ottoman archival documents also make it possible to follow the appointments of the eighteenth century. Sheikhs were appointed to the lodge on the recommendation of the head (postnişin) of the Hacı Bektaş Lodge, the centre of the Bektashi order. In 1707 Hacı Ali, and in 1712 Derviş Himmet, on the recommendation of Sheikh Elvan of Hacıbektaş, were appointed to the post. It appears that in 1766 the lodge was damaged through the negligence of its keeper (zâviyedar) Derviş Ali, and that Derviş Mehmed, appointed in his place, had it repaired. Derviş Mehmed was in turn dismissed on various charges in 1768, returned in 1778 when his innocence was established, and was finally removed in 1781 on the grounds that he had driven the dervishes out of the lodge. After his successor Süleyman Dede, Seyyid Ahmed Dede became keeper in 1783 on condition that he feed all comers; on his death without children in 1799 his brother Seyyid Mahmud Baba took over. These frequent changes and the struggles over the posts of sheikh and trustee show that control of the lodge's endowed property was of considerable value at the time.

Appointments continued at the beginning of the nineteenth century: Seyyid Hacı Hüseyin b. Hızır Dede in 1805, Seyyid Derviş Hasan in 1813, and in 1823, on the nomination of Sheikh Feyzullah of Hacıbektaş, another Derviş Mehmed became keeper. According to Hüsâmeddin, Süleyman Baba, who had been "father" to the Bektashis for twenty-eight years, died in 1223 (1808) and was succeeded by his deputy İbrâhim Baba. This İbrâhim Dede was the sheikh at the head of the lodge when it was closed.

The Closure of the Lodge in 1826

When the Janissary corps was abolished in 1826, the Bektashi order, closely bound to it, was banned as well. Bektashi lodges were demolished, closed with their doors locked, or converted to another religious use such as a mosque, madrasa or school. Lodges more than sixty years old, considered "ancient" (kadîm), were to be turned into mosques, masjids, madrasas or schools for the Muslim public rather than pulled down. Although the Pîrî Baba Lodge was an ancient lodge, it was hit hard because of its close ties with the central lodge. The imperial decree, however, had explicitly required that tomb chambers be spared, and so Pîrî Baba's tomb was left untouched.

The closure was carried out in Merzifon step by step. The order (buyruldu) of Mehmed Pasha, governor of Sivas, was brought to the town by an official and read out in the Merzifon court before the town's scholars and notables. A small commission formed at the court came to the lodge and recorded its land, furnishings and other property. The keeper İbrâhim Dede, being "of the Bektashi faction", was removed from the lodge to have his belief corrected, and was most probably exiled to a place where scholars were numerous. The ritual hall where the dervishes gathered for their ceremonies was demolished. Osman Efendi, one of the scholars of Merzifon and a member of the Naqshbandi order, was appointed keeper of the tomb (türbedar). The lodge's assets were to be confiscated for the treasury, but since its income was meagre and certain services of the tomb had to continue, its land, furnishings and endowment revenues were left to Osman Efendi. The document recording this transfer is dated 16 Ramazan 1244 (1829); Hüsâmeddin likewise writes that İbrâhim Baba was dismissed on 24 Receb 1244. It thus appears that the decision of 1826 was carried out in Merzifon in 1828-1829.

Within the lodge, beside the ritual hall, there already stood a masjid named after Pîrî Baba; documents show that imams were appointed to it in the eighteenth century. When the ritual hall was demolished, the masjid was enlarged, a pulpit (minbar) was installed and a preacher appointed, and the lodge thereby became a mosque. The lodge's endowment was assigned to this mosque and to the tomb. In 1840, on the accession of Sultan Abdülmecid, the imam's warrant for the Pîrî Baba Mosque was renewed; Seyyid Hâfız Abdurrahman became imam in 1844 and Sâdık Efendi b. Mustafa in 1887. The present Pîrî Baba Mosque, reached by steps down from the garden west of the tomb, is regarded as the continuation of this conversion.

The Revival of the Tomb

After the death of Mahmud II, the pressure on the Bektashis gradually eased under Abdülmecid. The Bektashis who had been driven out of Merzifon began to come back to the tomb. According to Hüsâmeddin's list, Osman Efendi died in 1248 (1832) and Naqshbandi sheikhs succeeded him. When Zilelizâde Ebûbekir Vahdetî, a judge (kadı) of Bektashi affiliation, became sheikh of the tomb in 1263 (1847), in Hüsâmeddin's phrase "the old order returned". The lodge building was never restored to its former state, but over time the tomb, enlarged with additions, began to function as a small lodge.

In the second half of the nineteenth century the post of sheikh at the tomb passed back and forth between Bektashis and Naqshbandis. Ebûbekir Vahdetî's sons Hamdullah and İbrâhim Selâmet became joint keepers in 1871. Hüsâmeddin writes that this appointment was made through the influence of the Şeyhülislam Ahmed Muhtar Bey, known for his sympathy with the Bektashi path. When Hamdullah was imprisoned over a killing and his brother was still young, Sheikh Hacı Hamza Efendi of Bukhara, a scholar and a Naqshbandi, was appointed in 1886. In 1896 Hamza Efendi was appointed sheikh of the Hacı Bektaş Lodge and gave power of attorney to the lodge's resident head, Maraşlı Mehmed Efendi, to collect the rents of the Merzifon lodge. Hüsâmeddin records that when he went to Merzifon in 1317 (1899-1900) he visited Şirvânî Hacı Yûsuf Efendi, then sheikh of the lodge; elsewhere in his work the name of the lodge's last sheikh is given as Şirvânî Yûnus Efendi.

The English scholar F. W. Hasluck, who visited the tomb at the beginning of the twentieth century, wrote that it held the grave of Pîrî Dede, one of the companions of Hacı Bektaş, that Bektashi dervishes still lived there, and that the settlement of refugees from the Caucasus, from the region of Kars, had brought new life to the area. In the same period an American named White, then living in Merzifon, is known to have been on terms of personal friendship with the sheikh of the tomb. In 1915 Hasan Tahsin Efendi was appointed keeper and trustee as the deputy of Hüseyin Rıza Efendi; in 1920 the Council of State (Şûrâ-yı Devlet) ruled that Hüseyin Rıza Efendi should use the harem section of the lodge and Hasan Tahsin Efendi the selamlık section. Among the folk poets who grew up around the tomb in the late Ottoman period, Âşık Kul Fakır (1873-1938) is remembered. This activity lasted until 1925, when dervish lodges, zâviyes and tombs were closed.

The Lodge's Endowment

Since the endowment deed of the lodge has not been found, the founding terms of the endowment are unknown, but the appointment documents show how its income was spent. The endowment was a family endowment (evladiyet). Its revenues went first to the needs of the sheikh and dervishes of the lodge and to the imams and preachers of its masjid, while the food and lodging of travellers and the repairs of the building were also met from them. When its property was confiscated in 1826, the income was found to be meagre and was left to the tomb keeper.

Later account books show the endowment to have been a small but orderly concern. In 1842 it owned three mills, a garden and some fields. The five-year income of these properties up to 1845 was 3,657 kuruş; of this, 1,250 kuruş went on the mills, 150 kuruş on repairing the garden wall, 810 kuruş on the imam's post and 1,447 kuruş on meals for guests of the lodge. In 1850-1851 the endowment's income in wheat, barley and rye amounted to about 1,258 kuruş 20 para, and this too was left to the keepers to feed guests. In the 1880s the income had fallen to 295 kuruş 20 para. In the 1890s the endowment owned two mills at a place called Paşaderesi, thirty plots of land around the lodge and a hundred houses in the town of Merzifon. The lodge's fields were watered from the water of the endowment of Çelebi Sultan Mehmed; in 1893 the cutting off of this water was under discussion.

Architecture

The Pîrî Baba Tomb is a square, single-domed, two-storey building. Its walls are of rubble stone, brick and Khorasan mortar. The dome rests on an octagonal drum and is covered with lead on the outside. The lower storey holds the burial chamber with the dervish's body, the upper storey the cenotaph (sanduka). Today visitors use the upper storey as a place of prayer and the lower storey as a room for candles. The arrangement is a plain example of the division between burial crypt and visiting chamber common in Anatolian tombs.

Exterior and Porch

In front of the south façade is a forecourt resting on three heavy piers and covered by a roof. It is open at the front and sides and forms a porch reached by steps. In this front section, described in some accounts as a two-bay portico, brick was used along with rubble stone. In later repairs the east side of the forecourt was closed with a wall and a wooden addition was built in front of it. The pediment of the south façade is decorated with glazed brick and turquoise hexagonal tiles, most of which have fallen. Of the turquoise İznik tiles on the dome drum, only a few remain in place.

The tomb is entered through an arched doorway in the south wall, near its west corner. The wooden door is decorated with interlocking woodwork and door knockers; its leaves, with their geometric pattern, are painted green. Above the door arch is a single-line inscription on marble. It shows that the tomb was repaired in 1322 (1904-1905) and that its interior was decorated with painted ornament (kalem işi).

Interior and Cenotaph

In the exact centre of the tomb floor stands an unusually large wooden cenotaph said to be that of Pîrî Baba. It is covered with an embroidered cloth. The inner walls and the dome drum are decorated with flower, rosette and fan motifs. On the walls, within frames painted in natural madder dyes, are flowers rising from vases, and the underside of the dome is also decorated mainly with floral motifs. The lamps, candlesticks and belongings of the dervish that surrounded the grave in the seventeenth century are no longer there.

Wall Paintings and Inscriptions

The tomb is most notable for its wall paintings, which are counted among the finest examples of late Ottoman mural painting. On the west wall, at the head of the cenotaph, a square panel shows the symbols of the Bektashi order: two facing teber, the dervish axe, with two Zulfiqar swords hanging from them, a keşkül (dervish begging bowl) hanging in the centre and two rosaries on either side. In each corner of the panel a Bektashi cap (sikke) is depicted. Above the keşkül motif is written "destûr" (by your leave), and beneath it is a two-line verse inscription:

Zâir gir bu makama bâ-hulûs bâ-ihtirâm
Kıl ziyaret merkad-ı Pîrî Baba zîr bu makâm

The couplet tells the visitor to enter this shrine with a pure heart and with reverence, and to visit the grave of Pîrî Baba that lies beneath it. The wall paintings are said to have been made by the painter Nakkaş İbrâhim during the repair of 1906. The small gap between this date and the year 1322 on the door inscription may reflect different stages of the same repair; the sources give no detail on the matter.

Repairs

Although it is not known exactly how many times the tomb was repaired, some repairs are documented. The building is reported to have been rebuilt in 1731. After 1766 the keeper Derviş Mehmed had the damaged lodge repaired. At the beginning of the twentieth century the tomb underwent a major repair; the date 1322 (1904-1905) on the door inscription and the wall paintings of 1906 belong to this phase. The present appearance of the tomb largely bears the marks of this repair, and the building owes much of its survival and its being open to visitors to this work. The last comprehensive repair was carried out in 1977 by the General Directorate of Pious Foundations (Vakıflar Genel Müdürlüğü). The tomb is protected as a registered monument and its upkeep is the responsibility of the General Directorate of Pious Foundations.

Recent arrangements have also altered the tomb's surroundings. According to the childhood recollections of the Merzifon writer Danyal Aşık, there was once a lean-to roof in front of the porch; it has been removed, and the place where wish candles are lit has been moved to the side of the tomb. The nearby Laleli Fountain has also been moved next to the tomb. According to the same account, a tree branch once rose from between the lead sheets of the dome, and if it came into leaf in spring the year was believed to be a fruitful one.

Graveyard, Garden and the Pîrî Baba Mosque

West of the tomb is a large garden with many trees. Behind the garden are outbuildings such as a grove and a kitchen. On the south side of the tomb is a small graveyard (hazire). Most of its graves bear no inscription, but one tombstone, dated 1794, belongs to Hacı Yusuf Baba. Another tombstone, dated 1818, is crowned with a Bektashi cap and has a badly worn inscription. These stones show that in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries the lodge was a burial place for Bektashi dervishes.

The Pîrî Baba Mosque, reached by steps down from the garden, takes the place of the part of the lodge converted into a mosque after 1826. The original building of the mosque, which belongs to the Pîrî Baba endowment, is dated to 1201 (1786-1787). The mosque was rebuilt in 1957 by Hacı Sabri Âşık and opened for worship in 1958. Together, the tomb, the mosque and the garden are the surviving parts of the lodge complex that once stood here.

Pilgrimage Customs

The Pîrî Baba Tomb is a regional centre of devotion visited, besides the people of Merzifon, by people of every background, Alevi and Sunni alike, from neighbouring provinces and districts such as Amasya, Çorum and Yozgat. Visitors kneel on their hands and knees before the tomb door and bow before entering, touch every part of the tomb with their hands in supplication, and on leaving walk out backwards, keeping their faces turned towards the tomb. Candles are lit in the tomb, wishes are made, and sacrificial animals vowed to God are slaughtered with prayers. It is widely believed that the tomb helps children who cannot walk or who cry a great deal at night, as well as the mentally ill. In this respect the tomb also serves a social purpose, bringing different religious communities together in one place.

Local memories record other customs as well. Unmarried people hoping to marry would write their names on headscarves, kerchiefs, muslins and handkerchiefs with lace edges and hang them on the inner wall of the tomb; these were removed after the tomb's restoration. Women hoping for a child would walk around the cenotaph three times anticlockwise, kiss its corners and its head end, then take a pinch of earth from beneath the cloth at its foot, moisten it in their mouths, rub part of it on their foreheads and swallow the rest. In the local dialect this earth is called "cöfer" or "cüfer".

On the porch, to the left of the entrance, is a raised stone platform. A wooden chest once stood on it; children were laid inside the chest and swept with a broom to rid them of bad habits. The deer antlers kept there were pressed against the children's shoulders, backs and arms as a charm. Wish candles were lit in the basin on the porch, and the small pebbles in it were pressed against the wall while making a wish; if a pebble stuck to the wall, the wish was believed to come true. Although the lean-to has been removed, the custom of sticking pebbles and making wishes continues today.

The Tomb Today

The Pîrî Baba Tomb is still open to visitors and is one of the most visited places of devotion in Merzifon. Steps lead up to the porch, where shoes are removed. Silence and respect are expected during visits; there may be people praying and lighting candles inside. Because of its elevated position the porch is also a good place from which to look out over Merzifon and the plain, so visits on clear days are best for seeing both the tomb and the view.

The tomb can be visited together with the monuments of Merzifon's historic centre. The Kara Mustafa Paşa Mosque and its fountain, the bedesten, the Taşhan and the Sultaniye Madrasa lie close to one another in the town centre. The tomb of Sheikh Abdürrahîm-i Rûmî, who lived in the same century as Pîrî Baba, is also among the stops on Merzifon's heritage trail. Seen together, these buildings also show traces of the law-abiding and the ecstatic dervish traditions that existed side by side in fifteenth-century Merzifon.

Chronology

1388: The Old Bath, Merzifon's only bathhouse until the seventeenth century, is built; it is thought to be the bathhouse in which Pîrî Baba is said to have lived.

1458-1459: According to Hüsâmeddin, Prince Bayezid builds a lodge for Pîrî Baba in Merzifon (1464 in other quotations).

1474-1475: Death of Pîrî Baba according to Hüsâmeddin; the date is not certain.

1515/1520: The tax register records "the zâviye of Pîrî Baba in Merzifon"; its sheikh is Şahkulu Baba b. Bâyezîd.

1574-1575: Şahkulu Baba is still sheikh.

1599-1600: According to Hüsâmeddin, the lodge passes under Bektashi control.

1647: Evliya Çelebi visits the lodge and tomb; the sheikh is Memi Dede Can.

1718-1719: With Bektaş Baba as sheikh, the lodge becomes a Bektashi hearth.

1731: The tomb is reported to have been rebuilt.

1766-1768: The damaged lodge is repaired by Derviş Mehmed.

1794: Tombstone of Hacı Yusuf Baba in the graveyard.

1826: The Bektashi order is banned; the Pîrî Baba Lodge is closed.

1828-1829 (1244): Sheikh İbrâhim Dede is removed, the ritual hall is demolished, the Naqshbandi Osman Efendi becomes keeper of the tomb; the lodge masjid is converted into a mosque.

1847 (1263): With Ebûbekir Vahdetî as sheikh, the Bektashis return to the tomb.

1886-1896: Sheikh Hacı Hamza Efendi of Bukhara serves as keeper.

1904-1905 (1322): Repair and painted decoration, according to the door inscription.

1906: The wall paintings are made by Nakkaş İbrâhim.

1920: The Council of State divides the use of the lodge's harem and selamlık sections between two keepers.

1925: With the closure of lodges and tombs, the tomb ceases to function as a lodge.

1957-1958: The Pîrî Baba Mosque is rebuilt and opened for worship.

1977: The General Directorate of Pious Foundations repairs the tomb.

Bibliography

Primary sources

  • Abdîzâde Hüseyin Hüsâmeddin Yasar, Amasya Tarihi, Amasya Municipality Cultural Publications, vols. 6-8, pp. 452-455 (Pîrî Ahmed Baba and the sheikhs of the Pîrî Baba Zâviye).
  • Evliya Çelebi, Seyahatnâme, II, 206-208; VIII, 72.
  • Hoca İbrâhim, Menâkıb-ı Pîrî Baba, Topkapı Palace Museum Library, Hazine, no. 1313.

Academic studies

  • Haşim Şahin, "Pîrî Baba", TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, vol. 34, Istanbul 2007, pp. 279-280. https://islamansiklopedisi.org.tr/piri-baba
  • Fahri Maden, "Merzifon'da Bir Erenler Ocağı: Piri Baba Tekkesi, Türbesi ve Vakfı", Alevilik Araştırmaları Dergisi, no. 2 (2011), pp. 245-264. https://isamveri.org/pdfdrg/D04118/2011_2/2011_2_MADENF.pdf
  • Suraiya Faroqhi, "The Life Story of an Urban Saint in the Ottoman Empire: Piri Baba of Merzifon", Tarih Dergisi, no. 32 (1979), pp. 653-678.
  • Machiel Kiel, "Bektaşi Ocağı'nın Arnavutluk'taki Kuruluş Tarihine Dair Bir Not", Hacı Bektaş Veli Araştırma Dergisi, no. 13 (2000), pp. 37-42.
  • Harun Yıldız, "Amasya Yöresi Örneğinde Alevî/Bektaşi Kültüründe İnanç Merkezleri", Uluslararası Sosyal Araştırmalar Dergisi, IV/16 (2011), pp. 471-480.

Official sources

Other sources

  • Suraiya Faroqhi, Anadolu'da Bektaşilik (trans. Nasuh Barın), Istanbul 2003.
  • Murat Çerkez, Merzifon'da Türk Devri Mimari Eserleri I, doctoral dissertation, Ankara University, 2005.
  • Muzaffer Doğanbaş, "Merzifon'un Gönüller Durağı Piri Baba Türbesi", Cem, no. 87 (1999), pp. 46-47.
  • Muzaffer Doğanbaş, Kültürel ve Sanatsal Boyutuyla Amasya, Amasya 2003.
  • F. W. Hasluck, Bektâşilik Tedkîkleri (trans. Ragıb Hulûsi), Istanbul 1928.
  • Vehbi Cem Aşkun, Piribaba, Sivas 1947.
  • A. Aziz Taşan, Dünden Bugüne Merzifon, Istanbul 1979.
  • Danyal Aşık, "Bektaşi Dervişi Piri Baba ve Türbesi, Merzifon", Ayak İzlerim, 2020. https://danyalasik.com/2020/04/30/bektasi-dervisi-piri-baba-ve-turbesi-merzifon/

Online sources