Alîzâde Turâbî Mustafa Efendi was a madrasa teacher (müderris) and judge (kadı) who was counted the best-known poet of Amasya in the early seventeenth century. His pen name (mahlas) means "of the earth", and he was one of the four poets whom the literary circle of the city called the "anâsır-ı erbaa-i edeb", the four elements of letters: Âbî was water, Âzerî fire, Hevâyî air and Türâbî earth. Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar says that his poems and biography were recorded in the now lost tezkire (biographical anthology of poets) of Müderris Abdî Efendi. The only poem of his to survive from that tezkire is a three-couplet kıta written for Hüftâdî Ahmed Bey, a governor of Georgian origin who came to Amasya as sanjak-bey. He died in 1040 (1630), past the age of seventy.

Hüsameddin's Entry

The entry in the eighth volume of Amasya Tarihi opens by naming Turâbî's father:

Turâbî Mustafa Efendi-Alîzâde Amasyalı Mehmed Çelebi mahdûmudur. Amasya'nın anâsır-ı edebinden biri olan Turâbî Efendi, Allâme Sinan ve Fâzıl Yahyâ Efendilerden tahsîl-i ulûm edib hayli zamân ders-i âm oldu. Karayazıcı Eşkiyâsının savletinden ilm ü aklı sâyesinde kurtuldu. Onların devrinde fevka'l-âde iştihâr edib devr-i medâris ederek Mehmed Paşa müderrisi oldu. 1017'de kendisini Sadr-ı a'zam Kuyucu Murâd Paşa'ya sevdirdiğinden hem nâ'il-i ihsânı, hem de altmışlı derecesinde olan Hüseyin Ağa medresesi müderrisi oldu. Ba'dehû, ba'zı kasabât u bilâda kâdı ve aralıkda gelip müderris olarak Amasya'da ikâmet ederdi. 1038'de Amasya'da bulundu. Mîrlivâ Hüftâdî Bey'i hicv ü senâ ederek onun bile teveccühâtını kazandı. Mîr-i mûmâileyhin vak'a-i katlinde a'yân-ı memleket İstanbul'a i'zâm edildiği hâlde buna mevleviyyetle Çorum kazâsı virildi. 1040 senesi saferinde ma'zûlen vefât etdi. Fâzıl, kâmil, şâir, edîb, âkil, müdebbir, halûk, latîf, medh ü zemme kâdir, yetmiş yaşını mütecâviz bir pîr-i muhterem idi. Mahdûmları ricâlden Mehmed, Ömer Ağalar pek ma'rûf idiler. Âsâr-ı şi'riyyesi ve tercemesi Müderris Abdî Efendi'nin tezkiresinde mezkûr idi.

In English: he was the son of Mehmed Çelebi of Amasya. Turâbî Efendi, one of the elements of Amasya's letters, studied under Allâme Sinan and Fâzıl Yahyâ Efendi and for a long time taught as a ders-i âm (licensed public teacher). He escaped the onslaught of the Karayazıcı bandits through his learning and his wits. In their time he became exceptionally famous, and moving through the madrasas in turn he became müderris of the Mehmed Paşa Madrasa. In 1017, because he made himself liked by the grand vizier Kuyucu Murad Paşa, he both received his bounty and became müderris of the Hüseyin Ağa Madrasa, which was of the "sixty" grade. Afterwards he served as judge in some towns and cities and in the intervals came back to live in Amasya as a müderris. In 1038 he was in Amasya. By both satirising and praising the sanjak-bey Hüftâdî Bey he won even that man's favour. At the time of that governor's killing, while the notables of the city were sent to Istanbul, he was given the judgeship of Çorum with the rank of mevleviyet. He died in Safer 1040, having been dismissed from office. He was a virtuous, accomplished, poet, man of letters, wise, prudent, good-natured and witty old man, able both to praise and to censure, and past seventy, held in respect. His sons Mehmed and Ömer Ağa, men of state, were very well known. His poetic works and biography were recorded in the tezkire of Müderris Abdî Efendi.

Life

Hüsameddin gives no year of birth; counting back from the date of his death and his age puts it in 970 (1562-63) or earlier. His teacher Fâzıl Yahyâ Efendi is the Amasya scholar whom Hüsameddin calls in other entries "Bahşîzâde Fâzıl Necmeddîn Yahyâ Efendi". Temennâyî Hacı Bayram Efendi also studied with the same teacher; the two poets are two generations of the same madrasa circle.

The first test of his life was the Celali revolts. The Celalis under Karayazıcı Abdülhalim had thrown Central Anatolia into turmoil in the last years of the sixteenth century. Hüsameddin says that Turâbî escaped their onslaught "through his learning and his wits" and became very famous in this period; he does not describe what happened. His real rise came when he won the favour of the grand vizier Kuyucu Murad Paşa, who suppressed the Celalis. The year 1017 (1608) was the year of the pasha's Anatolian campaign; in this year Turâbî both received his bounty and was appointed to the Hüseyin Ağa Madrasa, of the "sixty" grade, that is, of the rank of sixty akçe a day. Over the next twenty years he moved back and forth between judgeships and teaching, returning to Amasya between his terms as judge.

In the fourth volume, listing the scholars and notables of Amasya in the year 1017, Hüsameddin also names "the famous poet Türâbî Mustafa Efendi" and adds that Turâbî was a distinguished figure for his learning, virtue, letters and fine character, and that after the death of Kelâmî Efendi he was considered the one poet of his age. The "Turâbî Çelebi" whom, in the third volume, the poet Şâmî Mustafa Bey, who came to Amasya as sanjak-bey in 993 (1585), admitted to his gatherings together with Kelâmî and Sükûtî is very probably the same man. If this record is correct, Turâbî entered the poetry gatherings of the city when he was at least twenty-three. The link between the two records is not Hüsameddin's; the identification is a guess based on the agreement of name and period.

Hüftâdî Ahmed Bey and His Last Years

The best-documented episode of Turâbî's life concerns Hüftâdî Ahmed Bey, who came to Amasya as sanjak-bey in 1038 (1628-29). Hüsameddin describes this governor at length in the fourth volume: he came of the line of the rulers of Kartli in Georgia, had become a Muslim together with his father, understood neither the language nor the religion, "knew nothing but wine and lust", and was a giant of a man. The Georgians in his retinue oppressed the people, and in the end Hüftâdî Bey was killed in a popular uprising in 1038. Hüsameddin's full account has its own page, Hüftâdî Ahmed Bey.

Hüsameddin says that Turâbî won even this governor's favour "by satire and praise" (hicv ü senâ). The kıta carries both at once: its first couplets begin as if praising the bey, and the last couplet turns him into a giant who makes a fly cry out. After the governor's killing the notables of Amasya were sent to Istanbul to answer for it, while Turâbî was appointed judge of Çorum with the rank of mevleviyet. What earned him this privilege, Hüsameddin leaves unexplained. Turâbî died in Safer 1040 (September 1630), having been dismissed from office.

His Poetry

Hüsameddin's phrase "medh ü zemme kâdir", able both to praise and to censure, is confirmed by the single example of Turâbî's poetry left to us. Hüsameddin quotes this kıta, which was in the tezkire of Abdî Efendi, in the fourth volume while describing Hüftâdî Bey's arrival in Amasya:

Sanma boş mîr-livâ Heftâdî
Maşrık u mağribe yetmiş adı
Ana Yüzoğlu deyüb geçme sakın
Işret ü şöhrete vermiş dâdı
Öyle bir dîv-i mânend ki ol
Bir sinekten koparır feryâdı

The kıta is a play on words between the name "Heftâdî" (Persian for seventy) and the Turkish word "yetmiş" (seventy, but also "has reached"), and between the number and the sense of wildness in the nickname "Yüzoğlu" that the people had given the bey. It is given on its own page with the original text, English prose and commentary: Kıta 1, "Sanma boş mîr-livâ Heftâdî". The same poem is also mentioned, together with the other fragments surviving from the lost tezkire, in the article Abdî Efendi's tezkire.

Turâbî's other poems are lost. Hüsameddin's copy of the tezkire was lost in a fire, and he only says that Turâbî's "poetic works" were recorded there. The spelling of the pen name also varies in the sources: the head of the entry has "Turâbî", the passage quoting the kıta "Türâbî".

His Circle and Students

Other entries of Hüsameddin show that Turâbî stood at the centre of the literary circle of Amasya. According to a sentence quoted from Abdî Efendi's tezkire, Âbî Mehmed Çelebi had conversations and exchanged jests with Âzerî, Türâbî and Hevâyî, and this foursome was called "the four elements of letters". It is recorded that the secretary and poet Âhî İbrâhim Efendi, who died around 1026, held conversations and poetry contests with poets such as Kelâmî, Âzerî and Turâbî, and that the calligrapher and poet Rüşdü İbrâhim Efendi, who died in 1039, exchanged jests and verses "with the poets of his age such as Turâbî Mustafa Efendi". Among his students are counted İsmâil Efendi-Kâtibzâde (Kâtibî), secretary of the Amasya court, müderris and poet, and the secretary Sâdık Hasan Çelebi. In the fourth volume, listing the poets of the pen of the period 1017-1099, Hüsameddin also gives Türâbî's name immediately after Kelâmî's.

His sons Mehmed and Ömer Ağa followed not the path of learning but that of the ricâl, that is, state service.

Men of Amasya with the Same Pen Name

In the eighth volume Mustafa Efendi's entry falls between those of two namesakes. Turâbî Şuayb Efendi, who lived more than a century before him, served as a preacher in Istanbul in the reign of Bayezid II and died in 927 (1521); the Naqshbandi sheikh Turâbî Ali Efendi died two centuries later, in 1245 (1830). Nothing suggests that the three were related. Osman Kurtoğlu, in an article that surveys the poets who wrote under the name Türâbî, also mentions these three men of Amasya on the basis of Hüsameddin and notes that the Bektashi sheikh at Konica, Türâbî Abdullah Baba of Amasya, was a different person.

Chronology

993 (1585): The "Turâbî Çelebi" named together with Kelâmî and Sükûtî in Şâmî Mustafa Bey's gathering is very probably he.

1017 (1608): He receives the bounty of Kuyucu Murad Paşa and becomes müderris of the Hüseyin Ağa Madrasa.

Rebiülahir 1038 (November-December 1628): Hüftâdî Ahmed Bey arrives as sanjak-bey of Amasya; Turâbî's kıta is addressed to this bey.

1038 (1628-29): Hüftâdî Bey is killed in a popular uprising; Turâbî becomes judge of Çorum with the rank of mevleviyet.

Safer 1040 (September 1630): He dies, having been dismissed from office.

Bibliography

Primary sources

Academic studies

Online sources