ESRA AKIN-KIVANÇ
Ottoman art history written between the sixteenth and twentieth centuries unanimously describe Sheikh Hamdullah, son of Mustafa Dede, as the most prominent calligrapher of the sixteenth century and commend him with the epithet “The Second Yaqut” (yaqut = a precious ruby; the first yaqut being Jamal al-Din Yaqut al-Musta’simi, the preeminent calligrapher of the thirteenth century).1 These texts state that Sheikh Hamdullah was born in the city of Amasya and died in Istanbul. They do not, however, provide specific dates for his birth or death. Rather, in line with the common practice of premodern Ottoman art-historical writing, they estimate the artist’s age by aligning major episodes in his life (such as his relocation in Istanbul) with the historical events of the period (for example, Bayezid II’s ascension to the throne). The dates suggested for Sheikh Hamdullah’s birth range between 1426 and 1436. The date of death carved on his headstone at the Karacaahmed Cemetery in Istanbul, the year 927 (1520–21), is a later addition inscribed at an unknown date and thus is not reliable.2 Deducing from the artist’s signature on his presumably last dated work, some premodern authors have argued that he must have died at the age of eighty-eight. Others, however, suggest that Sheikh Hamdullah had reached “the blessed age of” one hundred and ten.3 Assuming that he lived for eighty-eight or one hundred and ten years, and that his birth occurred either in 1426 or 1436, his death can be placed between 1514 and 1536, or between 1524 and 1546 (figure 11.2).
FIGURE 11.2 Album of calligraphy, page showing ahadith (traditions of the Prophet Muhammad) inscribed in naskh and muhaqqaq scripts by Sheikh Hamdullah.
Artist: Shaikh Hamdullah ibn Mustafa Dede (d. 1520)
Date: c. 1500
Place of origin: Attributed to Istanbul, Turkey
Credit: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Edwin Binney 3rd and Edward Ablat Gifts, 1982. 1982.120.3.
The earliest known art-historical text that provides an account of Sheikh Hamdullah’s life and career is Mustafa Âli’s Menakıb-ı Hunerveran (Epic Deeds of Artists).4 With a completion date of 1587, Menakıb comes more than seven decades after the calligrapher’s death if, indeed, Sheikh Hamdullah died in the year 1514. Even if we accept the latest proposed date for his demise (1546), it is striking that the first written biography of such an eminent calligrapher did not appear until four decades after his death. Belated though it may be, Mustafa Âli’s account of Sheikh Hamdullah describes, in both content and structure, the artist’s preeminence in indisputably clear and direct terms. In the lineage of artists (silsile) that Mustafa Âli provides, Sheikh Hamdullah’s account is placed at the beginning of the line of “Seven Masters of Rum” (the masters born and who practiced in Ottoman lands), which, he, in turn, places immediately following the narratives of the “Seven Masters” of Persian calligraphy. The implications of this deliberate positioning are twofold. First, this hierarchic arrangement serves Mustafa Âli’s broader agenda of asserting Ottoman artists as equals in skill and accomplishment with the much-admired and rivaled Persian masters. And second, it firmly establishes Sheikh Hamdullah as the pioneer among the so-called Seven Masters of Rum. Mustafa Âli’s account reads as follows:
Now, the abovementioned Sheikh Hamdullah came to Rum during the reign of Sultan Bayezid Khan, son of Sultan Mehmed Khan, and received an appointment of fifty aspers per day. He was the intimate confidant of the late Sultan Bayezid Khan and an acclaimed companion, envied by [the Sultan’s] viziers. He passed away in the time of Sultan Selim Khan [II], the conqueror of Egypt, and the veneration that was accorded to him amongst the calligraphers of Rum was [never] extended to [any] others. And they said of him:
COUPLET
Ever since the calligraphy of Hamdi, son of sheikh, appeared,
The writings of Yaqut have surely vanished from the world.5
A standard entry in the Menakıb, this passage records the artist’s place of origin and his salary and comments on Sheikh Hamdullah’s relationships with his patrons and rivals. The introduction to the couplet, which praises the artist as superior even to the “peerless” Yaqut al-Musta’simi, indicates that the verse was not Mustafa Âli’s own composition but had been passed down to him orally. This particular couplet is cited in every written source about Sheikh Hamdullah composed after the Menakıb.
Writing nearly six decades after Mustafa Âli, calligrapher Nefeszade İbrahim (d. 1650), son of Mustafa Nefeszade (himself a calligrapher, who, like Sheikh Hamdullah, was born in Amasya), expanded upon Mustafa Âli’s account and provided in his Gülzar-ı Savab (Rose Garden of Proper Conduct) the most extensive narrative of the life and work of the celebrated calligrapher by an Ottoman author. The text exists in various manuscript copies housed today in the libraries and archives in Istanbul. Although a heavily edited version dating to 1728–29 written in the hand of the famous calligrapher and biographer Müstakimzade Süleyman (1717–1787)6 has been transcribed in an unpublished critical edition of the text in modern Turkish,7 this important primary source has never been subjected to critical analysis and has hitherto been unavailable to researchers in any language other than modern Turkish.
The English translation that follows uses the oldest extant version of Gulzar, copied in 1656, six years after the death of Nefeszade İbrahim. Housed in the Âli Emiri collection at the Millet Kütüphanesi in Istanbul, the manuscript is identified with the siglum AE 808 and titled Risale-i Hutut (Treatise of Calligraphies). Sheikh Hamdullah’s account is found on folios 24b–33b. The author’s original work is missing, so it is impossible to determine the variants between this copy and the holograph.
In addition to presenting Gülzar to readers of English, this essay introduces a new version of the text. Cited only in Âli Haydar Bayat’s annotated bibliography of written sources on calligraphy and never before examined, this copy is preserved in the Hacı Mahmud collection at the Süleymaniye Library in Istanbul.8 The last portion of a large mecmua, the text identified with the siglum HM 3916 contains thirteen sections and is titled Tafsil-i Ahval es’Sultanü’l-Hattatin Hazret-i Hamdullah el-Maʿruf bi-Ibnü’l-Şeyh (A Detailed Account of His Excellency Hamdullah, the Sultan of Calligraphers, Known as Son of the Sheikh). This text lacks a colophon indicating the name of the copyist and the date of composition. However, based on the oldest datable text in the mecmua, a copy of Silahtar İbrahim Pasha’s Nabi’ye Mektup (Letter to Nabi), it is possible to suggest the end of the eighteenth century as terminus post quem for the codex.9
The version of Gülzar introduced in this essay for the first time displays a number of variants, which make it plausible that it may have originated from a copy other—and possibly older—than the abovementioned AE 808, the oldest version known to us. These variants include omissions of some words, occasional shifting of the placement of words in a given sentence, differences in expressions, and a marginal note in the same hand as that of the main text that indicates the specific burial place of the calligrapher as being “in the middle cemetery, near Taşcılar in Üsküdar.”
An examination of these variants helps construct three scenarios about the lineage of Gülzar’s extant versions. The first and least likely possibility is that AE 808 and Tafsil-i Ahval both descend from a lost copy that predates 1656, the date of completion of AE 808. Variants between AE 808 and Tafsil-i Ahval indicate that the lost version was not the author’s holograph but a later copy, possibly of the holograph. The variants between AE 808 and Tafsil-i Ahval suggest a second and more plausible possibility—that Tafsil-i Ahval descends from a now-lost copy, which in turn originated from another lost copy, the antecedent of AE 808. Finally, the most likely possibility is that AE 808 and Tafsil-i Ahval descend from two separate and now lost versions that might have been copied from the author’s holograph. The strongest indication of a date for Tafsil-i Ahval earlier than that of AE 808 is the presence in it of a sentence that comments on Sheikh Hamdullah’s self-regard.10 The somewhat delicate content of this sentence, discussed below, suggests that it was part of an early, and still not fully edited and refined, version of Gülzar rather than a later addition. Its absence in all other versions of Gülzar (as well as in other texts that contain information about Sheikh Hamdullah) makes it likely that this omission was not an oversight but a deliberate choice by one of the later copyists who considered any indication of hubris as unbefitting of an exemplar calligrapher such as Sheikh Hamdullah is portrayed to be.
Whatever the relationships among various versions of the text might be, the discovery of Tafsil-i Ahval suggests the existence of a now-lost antecedent of Gülzar that is older than AE 808. A comparative analysis of the twenty-four extant versions of Gülzar is necessary to determine the validity of this supposition with certainty. If Tafsil-i Ahval does prove to be older than AE 808, however, this would shorten the unusually long sixty-nine-year period between 1587 (the completion date of the Menakıb) and 1656 (the completion date of AE 808), during which, to this date, we have had no trace of an Ottoman art-historical text.
A study of Sheikh Hamdullah’s life and works through various texts that were composed after Gülzar, including art-historical treatises such as Suyolcuzade Mehmed Necib’s Devhatü’l-Küttab (The Lofty Tree of Scribes),11 Müstakimzade Süleyman’s Tuhfe-i-Hattatin (Choice Gift of Calligraphers),12 Kebecizade Mustafa Hilmi Efendi’s Mizan-ı Hat (Scale of Calligraphy), Habibullah Fazaili’s Atlas-ı Hat (Atlas of Calligraphy),13 as well as works of history such as Amasya Tarihi (History of Amasya)14 and Tezkire-i Rumat (Treatise on Archery, an account of Sheikh Hamdullah’s renown as archer; figure 11.3),15 reveal how authors from one generation to the next appropriated, altered, and renarrated the artist’s biography. A thorough understanding of the connections among these individual texts is of critical importance for students and scholars of Ottoman and Islamic art.
FIGURE 11.3 A muthanna (symmetrically mirrored composition) in naskh script by Sheikh Hamdullah, featuring part of Qurʾan, surah 61:13 (“Help from God and a speedy victory. So give glad tidings to the believers”).
Source: Ms. A 6489
Artist: Shaikh Hamdullah ibn Mustafa Dede (d. 1520)
Place of origin: Turkey
Credit: İstanbul University Rare Books Library.
According to primary sources, Sheikh Hamdullah came from an esteemed and devout family. His father, Mustafa Dede, as a revered member of the Suhrawardi dervish order, was known as “Sheikh Efendi,” which sobriquet was later assigned to his son Hamdullah.16 Sheikh Hamdullah’s mother, equally pious, is commended for never nursing her children without first taking ablution.17 Sultan Bayezid II (r. 1481–1512), who was acquainted with the calligrapher’s parents while serving as governor in Amasya, highly respected his father and sought the blessings of his mother. Thanks to the prominence of his parents, Hamdullah earned the amity of the future sultan when he resided in Amasya, and even instructed him in calligraphy.
Though they neglected descriptions of the calligrapher’s prolific artwork in terms other than dictated by the literary canons of eulogy (such as, “supreme,” “flawless,” and “novel”), authors of vernacular texts exerted tangible, if hitherto undetected, efforts in the construction of Sheikh Hamdullah’s persona. Intriguing discrepancies among the calligrapher’s biographies found in Gülzar and in later texts by various authors reveal that textual portraits of the legendary artist were scripted more than once, and with discretion.
One version of Sheikh Hamdullah’s biography narrated by authors after Nefeszade, for instance, states that Bayezid II invited the calligrapher to Istanbul after assuming the throne and privileged his former instructor by allocating to him a private workspace inside the Topkapı Palace and by rewarding him with villages in Üsküdar. According to the version that Nefeszade recounts in Gülzar, however, Sheikh Hamdullah migrated to the capital without the sultan’s knowledge: after Sheikh Hamdullah arrived in Istanbul, one day someone from the palace asked him to write a calligraphic specimen for him, which he then presented to the sultan, who, upon viewing it, recognized Hamdullah’s hand and ordered that he be found and brought to his presence. This seemingly subtle variance in the story, which communicates to the reader that the calligrapher had always been in the company of his patron, rather than being reunited with him as a result of a happy coincidence, attests to the later author’s desire to construct a narrative of an ideal patron-protégé relationship that would serve as a model for contemporary and future generations of rulers and artists. At the same time, the early version accounted in Gülzar suggests that the renowned calligrapher’s ascension in rank might not have taken place as straightforwardly as we have come to believe, although Sultan Bayezid’s reverence for him as a person and as an artist is evident in many aspects of his life and career.
In their attempt to render a portrait of a supremely flawless artist, not only did premodern authors alter the content, flow, and form of the narratives they inherited from their predecessors orally or in writing, but they also erased them when they deemed it convenient to do so. The elimination in later texts of a brief detail that appears in Gülzar as part of a conversation said to have taken place between Sheikh Hamdullah and Bayezid II points to the significance in art-historical writing of not only what is recorded but also what has been expunged.
According to Gülzar, after bringing the calligrapher to the palace, one day the sultan “inquire[d] about the might of Yaqut al-Mustaʿsimi’s knowledge and the strength of his hand in calligraphy and in penmanship.” As AE 808 states, “The late sheikh had the presumption that he might be an equal of, or even better than, Musta’simi.” Upon hearing Sheikh Hamdullah’s response and pretensions, the decorous sultan, who must not have been pleased, commented, “You have not seen Mustaʿsimi’s written work that he inscribed with great care,” and he handed the calligrapher works by Yaqut, encouraging him to create an even finer style. It is likely that Nefeszade included the remark about Hamdullah’s “presumption that he might be an equal of, or even better than, Mustaʿsimi” to illustrate the stages of a calligrapher’s path to perfection in skill and in character. The omission of this sentence from the narratives of later authors and copyists (whose content strongly suggests editorial preference) might have been prompted by their taking Nefeszade’s remarks at face value, thus interpreting the calligrapher’s conceit as unseemly; tradition made it quite clear that propriety was an indispensible virtue of a good calligrapher. Alternatively, later authors and copyists might have been concerned that the subtle point Nefeszade tried to make might be misunderstood. Or, if Nefeszade was indeed recounting a truthful aspect of Sheikh Hamdullah’s temperament, at least during his early- and mid-career, they might have displayed prudence in selecting the individual colors of the ideal artist’s portrait that they had set out to paint.
As more primary texts become available in transcription and translation, their critical analyses not as autonomous texts but as literally dialogic intertexts will help reveal the workings and reworkings of their creative process.18 Biographies of artists are luminous manifestations of Bakhtin’s statement, “any text is the absorption and transformation of another.”19 An important and immediate task that awaits researchers of Ottoman art is to identify the “inside” as well as the “outside” of primary texts, along with their contextual and linguistic matrices within which they function by means of “inversion, conversion, expansion, and juxtaposition.”20
TRANSLATION
Following these, [there was] the pole of scribes, the rose-garden of the meadow of good conduct and the peacock of the spring of disciples, angel-natured, abode of return, Sheikh Hamdullah son of Mustafa Dede—May the mercy of God the Most High and Noble be upon him! [He] emerged in the city of Amasya. On the path of beginning and development, he studied from the calligraphic samples (meşq) of Hayreddin Maraşi—May God illuminate his resting place. After that, he collected the calligraphic works of the late [ʿAbdullah] Sayrafi,21 which he excellently adopted and emulated in his own writing. Afterward, garnering the perfect aspects of the writings of the cynosure of scribes, Cemaleddin Yaqut [al-Musta’simi], and practicing and examining them with scrutiny as well, [he] seized all the secrets of the art of writing, and reached perfection.
At that time, His Excellency Sultan Bayezid [II] Khan—May God’s mercy and forgiveness be upon him—was a governor. Offering him affection and displaying loyalty, the late sheikh used to send to [Bayezid] at times supplications (evrad) and litanies (ezkar) and at other times variegated calligraphic specimens [in his own hand]. His Excellency Sultan Bayezid Khan—May God’s mercy and forgiveness be upon him—showed him affection in kind.
It was known to [Sultan Bayezid] that the late Mustafa Dede, the the late sheikh’s honorable father, was an enlightened pir22 and an exalted man of unprecedented [rank] within the Suhrawardi dervish order. In his days of youth, as he was wandering in the city of Amasya with the desire of getting married, the father of the sheikh, the late Mustafa Dede, met a man from among those to whom God’s secrets had been revealed. That person gave him advice saying, “O Dede! The one you will marry is the daughter of a poor woman in the so-and-so neighborhood, and no one else. Marry her at once, without hesitation!” Complying with that noble man’s advice, the late Mustafa Dede married the orphan of that poor woman. When he met that noble man again, [Mustafa Dede] inquired about his wisdom. Raising his hand, that exalted man recited prayers and responded, “Because you heeded my entreaty and married the orphan of that righteous and destitute woman, may God the Glorified [give] you a worthy child whose knowledge will be perfect, whose virtues will be famous in every city and known at all times, and whose renown will last until the Day of Judgment. And [may] his name [be] Hamdullah!” [With these words] he pointed out [Hamdullah’s fate] with prayers. With God’s grace, the exact same [fate] unfolded and in [the year] 886 (1481–82), the late sheikh attained distinction in the city of Amasya, and his writing also earned [him] acclaim.
In the aforementioned year, at the time when Sultan Bayezid Khan—May God’s mercy and forgiveness be upon him—set out from his governorate [in Amasya] for the throne of the Exalted Place [that is, the capital], and after he returned to Istanbul when the sultanate of the empire passed down to him, the late sheikh too left his home and arrived in Istanbul. [There] he settled in the house on the dead end across from the Kadıasker Hammam near Eski Odalar, where Cemaleddin Amasi and ʿAbdullah Amasi were residing. [One day] a person from the Royal Gate [that is, the Topkapı Palace] arrived and had the late sheikh write a brief note (ruq’a), which he [then] presented to the sultan. Upon seeing the writing of the late [sheikh], His Excellency Sultan Bayezid Khan, possessor of knowledge, thought of bringing him as well, and declared, “Find the scribe of this writing!” And bringing him [to his side], he greatly enjoyed [the sheikh’s] conversations and appointed him scribe and instructor at his Imperial Palace. Out of great affection for the late sheikh, he allocated a space in his esteemed private quarters where [the calligrapher] could inscribe the Qurʾan in solitude, and where [the sultan] could converse with him intimately.
One day, that Abode of Majesty Sultan Bayezid Khan—May God’s mercy and forgiveness be upon him—honored [the sheikh] with a visit, [and] inquired about the might of Yaqut al-Musta’simi’s knowledge and the strength of his hand in calligraphy and in penmanship. The late sheikh had the presumption that he might be an equal of, or even better than, Musta’simi. Stating, “You have not seen Musta’simi’s written work that he inscribed with great care,” Sultan Bayezid Khan handed [the sheikh] seven known and famous pages [inscribed] in black that were preserved in his Imperial Treasury. When the sultan uttered, “It would have been delightful and heart-pleasing had there been created a special style (tarz-ı hass) finer than and superior to this style of Yaqut,” the late sheikh took the said pages and spent forty days in isolation, studying and practicing with them, advancing thus [his] hand at the station of the field of [inscribing] pages and sheets without resting for many days. After galloping [as such], the steed of the superior ornament [that is, skill] of his hand reached such a station that it was evident that in style (şive) and elegance, [his writing] had become finer than and superior to that of Yaqut, also with regard to [monetary] worth and value. As a matter of fact, this verse has been said about him:
Ever since the calligraphy of Hamdi, son of sheikh, appeared,
The writings of Yaqut have surely vanished from the world.
May God’s mercy be upon his soul and [may He] increase His blessings!
This verse too has been said about him:
The sheikh, possessor of a style of superior prowess,
Reflection of the countenance of the essence of pure ruby (yaqut).
The late sheikh was such a master of exalted fame and [so] laudable that the fact that in various naskh and in the Six Scripts he [had a] prolific pen and a praiseworthy style is well known throughout the world.23 Being unique in an entire century with superior calligraphy is [an achievement] that only he was able to attain. Furthermore, he possessed [knowledge in] all sciences (‘ulum), [in] the sciences of the Arabic [language], and was learned in any and every [matter]. On the path of sheikhs, he was a follower of Suhrawardi. He was highly talented in hawk and falcon hunting, as well as in swimming. He was proficient in sewing garments and in the art (‘ilm) of pulling bows and shooting arrows. And in his age, the art of discus throwing24 was also his specialty.
When [he lived] in the city of Amasya, he had also become famous in archery. After he arrived in the city of Istanbul, he placed the first shooting range that still exists at Yıldız in Okmeydanı, and practiced and trained at the said square. When [the sheikh’s activities] reached the blessed [and] noble ears of His Excellency Sultan Bayezid Khan—May God’s mercy and forgiveness be upon him—thanks to the late sheikh’s good fortune,25 [the sultan] endowed the said square to the archers. [The presence there] of the late sheikh’s aforementioned archery range made possible this endowment.
Additionally, [the sheikh] had such superior talent in tailoring that one day he sewed a kaftan out of white cloth for His Excellency Sultan Bayezid Khan, and stitched it in such a way that it was immaculately seamless, and presented it to the sultan. It was immensely praised and likened to the chemise of the Angel Ridwan.26
And in swimming, too, he was so advanced that, as the story goes, one day as His Excellency Sultan Bayezid Khan was at worship [as he did] in summer days at the pavilion on the banks of Rumili, the late sheikh saw him from the shores of Üsküdar. Undressing and holding his wallet in his mouth, [the sheikh] crossed the tide[s] without getting it wet. Responsibility [for the truthfulness of the story] belongs to the [original] narrator.
He wrote forty-seven Noble Qurʾans, one Noble Mashariq,27 one Noble Masabih,28 and an[other] Noble Mashariq, which he inscribed on gazelle skin. Other than these, he penned Noble Enam,29 Noble Kehf,30 supplications (evrad) and litanies (ezkar) numbering one thousand, numerous scrolls, as well as countless calligraphic specimens and books so conscientiously that for students of calligraphy they are each a heart-pleasing [work] like an ornamental verse (qıt’a) from the meadow of Heaven or an apostle that comes to [one’s] aide.
As the story goes, one day, His Excellency Sultan Bayezid Khan—May God’s mercy and forgiveness be upon him—had gathered the grand ulema, who were compilers and editors [of books], and [he] invited the late sheikh, as well. {The books arranged} by them [that is, the ulema] were present and placed over {the said sultan’s} chest.31 [The sultan] had pointed the late sheikh to a seat above everyone else, and introduced him to the ulema. Realizing with wisdom that [this arrangement] caused grief in these [ulema], [the sultan] brought out the Qurʾan that the late sheikh had inscribed, and had each and every one present peruse it. After perfect commending [of the sheikh’s inscription], when [the sultan] asked them, “Did any king of old times possess such an esteemed calligrapher and scribe of prosperous pen?” they fully approved of His Excellency Bayezid Khan[ʼs opinion]. Placing the elegant books of the aforementioned ulema on top of one another over the chest, His Excellency Bayezid Khan addressed the said ulema [and asked], “Shall we place the mentioned Qurʾan under these books, or is it appropriate to place it over them?” They responded saying, “How can it be permissible to place a book or anything else above the Exalted Qurʾan, about the lofty glory of which it has been ordered: ‘Which none shall touch / But those who are clean: / A Revelation from the Lord / Of the Worlds.’?”32 And His Excellency—May God’s mercy and forgiveness be upon him—Sultan Bayezid Khan declared this about the late sheikh, with persuasion and wit: “This person’s esteemed [deeds] are plenty, and there is no individual who has given such life to the inscription of the Holy [and] Exalted Qurʾan. How could we seat this person below you?” It is narrated that, upon [hearing these words], [the ulema] were ashamed, and knowing what a considerate [person] Sultan Bayezid Khan was, they conciliated their pride in their knowledge,33 and asked for God’s pardon and forgiveness.
And some say that [the sheikh] was the envy of all the viziers and [at the same time] their prosperous confidant and scribe. And these words that he pronounces in most of his signatures are evidence of his perfect attachment [to the Ottoman house]: “O you who shows mercy with proper justice! See how, why, and with what did this scribe of the sultan, son of Sultan [Mehmed II], Sultan Bayezid Khan,34 inscribe when his hand trembled and his hair grew gray when his age reached eighty some years!” This is how he asked for forgiveness and signed [his work] until the end [of his life]. What they mean by “some” is [years ranging] from three to nine. As a matter of fact, the story of Joseph—Peace be upon him—in the Noble Qurʾan relates “…some years,” but there is dispute over the actual [number] of years [meant by] “some.”35 And it should be known that based on the meaning [of the word “some”] provided here, when the late sheikh’s noble age was eighty-eight, his blessed noble head began to tremble immensely, but God the Glorious spared his blessed noble hands from shaking. In his old age, he wrote just as beautifully as he did in his young age. This miracle is a testament to his perfect qualities. And at times, signing the words, “Hamdullah, tried by various misfortunes” [that is, spiritual trials], he complained of the times, and described himself as [the perpetrator of] various sins. And at other times, he identified [himself with the words,] “Written by Hamdullah, little in stature and hefty in sin.” At times, withdrawing from writing and entering a state of ecstasy, he departed from his home and household for days, worshipped at Aqbaba and Alemdağı, fully withdrawing from this world’s affairs at the tomb of Mustafa Çelebi, son of Sarı Qadı Sultan, who was the son of [Hamdullah’s] own sheikh. His Excellency the Saint Sultan Bayezid used to send out men [after him] to bring [the sheikh] back. And [a copy of] the lineage of sheikhs [composed by] the said Mustafa Çelebi that the late sheikh inscribed in thuluth script is still extant. Between the lines [of the text] are noble ahadith written in [the sheikh’s] hand.
And some say that in addition to his appointment [at the Palace], the late sheikh owned a couple of villages (qarye) in the district of Üsküdar, and one village was assigned to the seal pressers (mührezenler). For that reason [that is, the rewards that the sultan bestowed upon the sheikh], it has been said that the real scribe of the inscriptions was not the sheikh, but perhaps His Excellency the Saint Sultan Bayezid Khan, who time and again held the former’s ink-pot, arranged his cushion [behind him] in support, and recited prayers.
Now, nobody doubts or questions [the fact that] the sheikh’s accomplishment of perfect erudition and his peerlessness in calligraphy and in beautiful penmanship has been an exclusive blessing of the lofty patronage and prayers of goodness of His Excellency Sultan Bayezid Khan. In accordance with the honorable verse, {“While that which is for the good of humankind remains on the earth,”}36 he lived one hundred and ten years; and in keeping with [that] elegant noble verse, God the Glorious the Most High increased his life span on the face of the earth. Some say that the late sheikh reached the last years of His Excellency Sultan Selim Khan, conqueror of Egypt—May God’s mercy and forgiveness be upon him—but the true account is that it [that is, his death] must have occurred in the noble times of Sultan Suleiman Khan Ghazi—May God’s mercy and forgiveness be upon him.
Monla Şemseddin Pir and Dervish Çelebi, a disciple of Abdullah Amasi, recount that at that time, His Excellency the sheikh had reached quite an old age and used to write wearing two or three pairs of eyeglasses [at the same time]. In fact, one day, His Excellency Sultan Suleiman Khan—May God’s mercy and forgiveness be upon him—wished to have a Noble mushaf copied [for himself]. He invited His Excellency the sheikh and had him brought to his felicitous presence. Observing that [the sheikh] had become quite pir, (that is, old) [the sultan] received his blessings and sent him [back] to his home. Then when he ordered that “There is no writing equal to that of this saint. Yet, what we need [now] is writing that is of pure strength and of no fault,” Celalzade Muhiyeddin Amasi, who had quite a hand [like] steel, was brought over and charged with the copying of a Noble mushaf [for the sultan].
The research and writing process of this study has been facilitated by a research grant from the University of South Florida, The College of The Arts. I am grateful to Dr. Hani Khafipour for his kind invitation to contribute to this anthology. I owe special thanks to Professor Howard Crane and Dr. Müge Galın for providing feedback on my essay, as well as to Professor Robert Dankoff, who kindly answered my questions on the translation of the text.
1. Yaqut al-Musta’simi is known for having perfected Ibn Muqla’s calligraphic system by replacing the straight-cut nib of the reed pen with an obliquely cut one, thereby creating a new, extremely delicate style. This invention earned al-Musta’simi the epithet of “cynosure of calligraphers.” For an account of al-Musta’simi by Mustafa Âli of Gallipoli, see Esra Akın-Kıvanc, ed. and trans., Mustafa Âli’s Epic Deeds of Artists: A Critical Edition of the Earliest Ottoman Text About the Calligraphers and Painters of the Islamic World (Leiden: Brill, 2006), introduction and 188–89. For another account of the calligrapher by the Persian author Qadi Ahmad, see Vladimir Minorsky, ed., Calligraphers and Painters: A Treatise by Qadi Ahmad, Son of Mir-Munshi (circa A. H. 1015 / A. D.(1606) (Washington, DC: Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian Institution, 1959), 57–58.
2. For a detailed discussion of the inscription as well as for old and contemporary photographs of the tombstone with and without the inscription, see Muhittin Serin, Hattat Şeyh Hamdullah (1992; repr., Istanbul: Kubbealtı Neşriyatı, 2007), 38–39.
3. Serin, Hattat Seyh Hamdullah, 38–39.
4. Akın-Kıvanç, Mustafa Âli’s Epic Deeds of Artists.
5. Akın-Kıvanç, Mustafa Âli’s Epic Deeds of Artists, 199, 202.
6. Müstakimzade Süleyman Sadeddin Efendi, Tuhfe-i Hattatin, ed. İbnülemin Mahmud Kemal İnal (Istanbul: Devlet Matbaası, 1928), 1717–87), renowned historian of the eighteenth century and author of nearly one hundred and fifty works. For a detailed biography, see İbnülemin Mahmud Kemal İnal’s İnal’s introduction to Müstakimzade Süleyman Sadeddin Efendi, Tuhfe-i Hattatin (Istanbul: Devlet Matbaası, 1928), and Mehmed Süreyya, Sicill-i Osmani (Istanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yurt Yayınları, 1996), 1552.
7. Fehime Demir, “Türk Hat Sanatı İçin Kaynak Gülzâr-ı Savab (İncelemeli Metin Çevirisi)” (master’s thesis, Marmara Üniversitesi, İstanbul, 2004).
8. Âli Haydar Bayat, Açıklamalı Hüsn-i Hat Bibliyografyası Yazmalar-Kitaplar-Makaleler Kitaplarda Hatla İlgili Bölümler-Dış Ülkelerdeki Yayınlar (İstanbul: İslam Tarih, Sanat ve Kültür Araştırma Merkezi, 2002).
9. For Silahtar İbrahim Paşa, see İbrahim Hakkı Uzunçarşılı, Osmanlı Tarihi IV/1, 405–406. (Ankara: Turk Tarihi Kurum, 1956). For Nabi (1642–1712), see Süreyya, Sicill-i Osmanî, vol. 4, 1219.
10. The sentence reads, “The late sheikh had the presumption that he might be an equal of, or even better than, Musta’simi.”
11. Suyolcuzade Mehmed Necib, Devha-tül-Küttab, ed. Kilisli Muallim Rıfat (İstanbul: Güzel Sanatlar Akademisi Neşriyatından 16, 1942).
12. Müstakimzade Süleyman Sadeddin Efendi, Tuhfe-i Hattatin.
13. Habibullah Fazaili, Atlas-ı Khatt (Isfahan: Kitabfurushi Shahriyar, 1971–72).
14. Abdi-Zade Hüseyin Hüsameddin, Amasya Tarihi, ed. Âli Yılmaz and Mehmet Akkuş (Ankara: Amasya Belediyesi Kültür Yayınları, 1986).
15. Ankara Dil ve Tarih Coğrafya Fakültesi Library, Yazmalar ms. 44891.
16. A Sufi order that traces its origin back to Abu’l Najib Suhrawardi (1097–1168), disciple of Ahmad Ghazali (d. 1126). For more on the order, see Encyclopedia of Islam online.
17. Kemal Edip Ünsel, “Tezkire-i Rumat” (Atıcılar Tezkiresi), Tarih Vesikaları 3, no. 15 (1949): 171—82.
18. Graham Allen, Intertextuality (New York: Routledge, 2000, 2001), 29, 109.
19. Allen, Intertextuality, 37.
20. Allen, Intertextuality, 115.
21. For an account of the life and works of ʿAbdullah Sayrafi, see, Akın-Kıvanç, Mustafa Âli’s Epic Deeds of Artists, 108, 121, 128, 190–91, 193, 194, 283.
23. For discussions of these scripts, see Akın-Kıvanç, Mustafa Âli’s Epic Deeds of Artists, 159–287.
24. In some versions of the text, the word is remil, the art of sand writing, or geomancy.
25. Sebeb-i bahtlari ile. In other versions, sebeb-i muhabbetleri ile (out of his affection for [the sheikh]).
26. According to traditions, Ridwan is the angel who guards the gates of heaven.
29. The title of the sixth chapter of the Qurʾan. Also a collection of the frequently read Qurʾanic chapters and verses.
30. The name of the eighteenth chapter of the Qurʾan.
31. Passages taken from other versions of the text are placed within curly brackets {}. My own additions to the text for sake of clarity are indicated within normal brackets [].
33. Alternatively, “they surrendered to [the sultan’s] assurance in his [own] knowledge” (gurur-ı ilmlerine insaf edup).
34. Reading this sentences as, “See how, why, and with what did this scribe of the sultan, son of Sultan Bayezid Khan,…” some Turkish scholars proposed that Sheikh Hamdullah addressed himself as “the son of the Sultan.” Although absence of punctuation may have led to this misreading, it is clear from the context that the word “son” identifies Bayezid as a sultan of sultan, meaning his father Mehmed II. Additionally, given Sheikh Hamdullah’s age, such a sobriquet seems implausible.
35. The word is biz’a. In Qurʾan 12:42, Yusuf Âli translates biz’a sinin as “a few (more) years.” “And of the two / To that one whom he considered / About to be saved, he said, / ‘Mention me to thy Lord,’ / But Satan made him forget / To mention him to his lord: / And [Joseph] lingered in prison / A few [more] years.”
36. Qurʾan, second to last part of 13:17. The blank space that the copyist of AE 808 left, possibly to write in a different color of ink, was never filled in. The verse is found in other versions of Gülzar.
Akın-Kıvanç, Esra. “Mustafa Âli’s Epic Deeds of Artists and New Approaches to Written Sources of Ottoman Art.” Journal of the Ottoman and Turkish Studies Association 2 (2015): 225–58.
Allen, Graham. Intertextuality. New York: Routledge, 2000, 2001.
Çıpa, Erdem, and Emine Fetvacı, eds. Writing History at the Ottoman Court Editing the Past, Fashioning the Feature. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2013.
Piterberg, Gabriel. An Ottoman Tragedy History and Historiography at Play. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003.
T. C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı. Hat ve Tezhip Sanatı. Ankara: T. C. Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Yayınları, 2009.