In this chapter we shall consider the mechanism of the poetic system which the Turks borrowed from the Persians, looking first at the verse-forms, then glancing briefly at the prosody and at some of the more usual of the rhetorical figures.
Here the Turks were borrowing what was itself a loan, as almost every detail connected with the structure of Persian verse had been adopted by the Persians from the Arabs. To this Persianised-Arab system the Ottomans added, about the close of the seventeenth century when the national spirit began to stir in literature, a new and very simple verse-form modelled on their own popular ballads; and the system, thus reinforced, remained in exclusive use down to the year 1879, when the great reformer Hámid Bey introduced into Turkish poetry certain Western verse-forms, with a result that has proved revolutionary.
Although no distinctive trace of it is left in full-fledged Ottoman poetry, it will be interesting and useful if we try in the first place to get some slight idea of what old Turkish poetry was like before Persian influence had swamped or wiped out every genuine native element. To help us here we have three books, all written in Central Asia, and all considerably earlier than the commencement of the fourteenth century when Ottoman, or rather West-Turkish, poetry begins.
The oldest of these is the Qudatqu Bilik or ‘The Auspicious Knowledge.’ This, which claims to be the first book ever written in the Turkish tongue, was finished in Kashghar in A. H. 462 (A. D. 1069–70). It is in the Uyghur dialect of Turkish, and is the work of a certain Yúsuf who was Kháss Hájib or Privy Councillor to Boqra Khan, the King of those regions. In purpose this old book is ethical; it discusseS, chiefly in the form of conversations between a fictitious King, his Vezir, and the Vezir’s son and brother, the moral and social questions which weighed most with the Turks of those far-off times. As to external form, it is written in what the Persians and Ottomans would call Mesneví verse, that is, in rhyming couplets. The lines are uniformly eleven-syllabled, and the metre, according to Veled Chelebi — a modern Ottoman scholar of whom more anon, — is approximate to that of the Sháh-Náme of the Persian poet Firdausf. This last point is, however, difficult to determine, as the true Turkish metres — in one of which the Qudatqu Bilik is written — are syllabic, not quantitative like the Persian, and are sometimes susceptible of being read in more ways than one.1
The second of the old books referred to is the Díwán-i Hikmet or ‘Philosophic Poems’ of Khoja Ahmed-i Yeseví. This is some fifty years2 later than the Qudatqu Bilik, and is in the Uzbek or Jaghatay dialect. Judging from a statement at the beginning of the first poem, the Díwán in our hands is the second volume of the author’s works; the first seems to have disappeared. The book which we have consists of a collection of short poems wholly on mystic subjects. These poems vary somewhat in form, the norm being a succession of four-lined stanzas, the first three lines of each of which rhyme together, but take a new rhyme with each stanza, while the fourth lines are either identical throughout or, if varied, keep up the same rhyme. This rhyme-arrangement — a monorhyme with a thrice-repeated internal sub-rhyme — seems to have been very popular with the Turks. It is not confined to stanzaic verse; sometimes it appears in the couplet, the sub-rhyme being in this case repeated in the middle and at the end of the first line and in the middle of the second, while the monorhyme occurs once, at the end of every second line. It so happens that this arrangement of rhyme in connection with both stanza and couplet is known in Persian too; when it is in connection with the stanza, the form of verse is called Murebba῞, when with the couplet, it is said to be Musemmat.1 Yeseví’s metres are all genuine Turkish; but although the principle on which they are founded — a principle in true harmony with the genius of the language — is quite other than that of the Persian, an effect very similar to that of the Persian metres is often produced through the number of syllables being in many cases the same, while the fall of the accent replaces in a measure the quantity of the feet.
The third of our triad of ancient books is a poem on the scriptural romance of Joseph and Zelíkhá written, probably in Bokhara, by one Ἅlí, and finished on the 30th. of Rejeb 630 (12th. May, 1233). This poem is composed in four-lined stanzas of the form just described, that is, the first three lines in each rhyme with one another, while the fourth lines rhyme, or rather, are supposed to rhyme, together throughout. What actually happens in these fourth lines is that each ends in the same word, in what, as we shall learn, the Persians and Ottomans call a Redíf, before which the true rhyme-word ought to come; in Ἅlí’s poem these penultimate words do as a rule (but not always) rhyme more or less perfectly. The metre, while certainly not quantitative, is not strictly syllabic, as the number of syllables to the line fluctuates between eleven and twelve; it is probable that accent played a considerable part here.1
From what has been said it will be seen that except in the matter of its prosody, which is based on an entirely different principle, native Turkish poetry, as represented by the three old books at which we have glanced, had much in common with Persian. Its chief verse-forms were in use among those of the more cultured system; and the lilt of its verse, though reached by another road, was not very different. That this should be so is natural enough considering that not only had the Turks and Persians been in contact for ages, but that for some time they had been brought yet closer by belief in a common faith. The way was therefore paved for the adoption of the Persian system by the Turks; and it was almost without an effort that the native system glided into the foreign. So far as West-Turkish poetry is concerned, the only struggle was between the two principles of prosody, the syllabic and the quantitative; for the first hundred years they were used together indiscriminately, till about the beginning of the fifteenth century the former disappeared, leaving the Persian in undisputed possession.
One consequence of the acceptance by the Ottomans of the Perso-Arab poetic system is that almost all the technical terms used in Turkish in connection with the art or science, the names of the verse-forms, metres, feet, rhetorical figures and so on, are Arabic. In that language these are all significant words, describing, most often figuratively, that structure or peculiarity to which they are applied; but the Turks, in whose language few of them have any self-evident meaning, employ them as purely technical terms, generally without regard to their original signification.
Like all else connected with Persian and Ottoman poetry, the outward form is regulated by hard and fast rules which admit of no relaxation. Thus there are eighteen distinct verse-forms, each more or less appropriated to a certain class of subject; these the poet is bound to employ, making his choice according to his matter; he is in no wise at liberty to invent new combinations, and, indeed, no writer of the Old School ever attempted such a thing. Similarly, there is a limited number of metres; but as almost all of these are susceptible of several modifications, the total number of available varieties is pretty considerable. Each of these metres is divided into a definite number of feet, which, in their turn, are subdivided into a determined number of long and short or, as the Orientals call them, heavy and light syllables, following one another in a particular order which may not be altered. Some of these metres are generally used with one verse-form, some with another.
Let us look first at the Verse-forms wbich, as we have seen, are eighteen in number.
It is chiefly in the arrangement of the rhyme that these verse-forms differ from one another, and so a few preliminary words on the nature of Ottoman rhyme will be appropriate here. As given by the Oriental rhetoricians, the rules in connection with this are very technical and extremely elaborate, but with only one exception they work out into practical identity with those that regulate rhyme in our own poetry.1 When it extends beyond a single couplet Ottoman poetry is always rhymed, blank verse being unknown.
In addition to the rhyme we have very frequently what is called a Redíf (which in Arabic means ‘Pillion-rider’); that is, one or more words, always the same, added to the end of every line that has the same rhyme, throughout an entire poem; which word or words, though counting in the scansion, are not regarded as the rhyme, the true rhyme in every case being found immediately before. The lines:
‘There shone such a truth about thee,
‘I did not dare to doubt thee,’
afford an English example; the word ‘thee’ being here aredíf, while ‘about’ and ‘doubt’ form the true rhyme. But while in English we very seldom find a Redíf consisting of more than one word, a Persian or Ottoman Redíf may consist of every word in the line except the first, there being of course always one word to form the rhyme. The Redíf does not form part of the original Arab system; it was grafted on to this by the Persians when adapting it to their own poetry. It is, however, probable that the Redíf was a feature of ancient Turkish poetry also, as it is of frequent occurrence in so early and so thoroughly Turkish a work as the Díwán-i Hikmet of Ahmed-i Yeseví, and runs right through Ἅlí’s Joseph and Zelíkhá. It used to be constantly employed by the Ottoman poets, but it has somewhat lost ground of late years, as it tends to hamper freedom of expression, and moreover is not a characteristic of French poetry.
The Perso-Arab poetic system has two distinct rhyme-schemes, the one an invention of the Persians, the other the original Arabian plan. We shall begin with the first, as it is already familiar to us in our own literature, and as only one verse-form derives from it.
The distinctive feature of the Persian scheme is that throughout an entire poem the two hemistichs of each couplet rhyme with one another and without reference to the rhyme of any other couplet whatever, care only being taken that the same rhyme-sound does not immediately follow or precede, in other words, that two couplets having the same rhyme are not placed in juxtaposition. This system is simple in the extreme, and corresponds exactly to that observed in Pope’s heroic couplets and countless other English poems.
I. Mesneví, or ‘Double-Rhyme,’ is the name given to a poem written in these rhyming couplets. Each of these couplets must be complete in itself; there must be nothing of what the French call ‘enjambement,’ that is, there must be no overflow of words into the couplet following. On account of the unlimited freedom in choice of rhyme which it affords, this verse-form is generally adopted for long poems, the Arabian or monorhyme system being preferred for shorter pieces. All the metrical romances, for instance, many of which extend to several thousand couplets, are Mesnevís. The rhyming chronicles and lengthy mystic, didactic and ethical poems are likewise composed in this form. It is the rule that a long Mesneví, forming a complete book in itself, should open with a canto to the praise of God; this should be followed by one in honour of the Prophet, whose Mi῞ráj or ‘Ascension’ is very often celebrated in another. The next canto is generally a panegyric on the great man (usually the reigning Sultan) to whom the work is dedicated. This again is most often followed by a division bearing some such heading as ‘The Reason of the Writing of the Book,’ in which the poet narrates the circumstances that induced him to begin his work, generally the solicitations of some friend. After all this, which forms as it were the prologue, comes the story itself, or whatever else may be the subject of the work, divided as a rule into a number of books or sections, which are subdivided into a series of cantos. Each of these cantos is headed by a rubric, very often in the Persian language, setting forth the matter treated. The work is properly brought to a close by an epilogue, in which the date of composition is frequently mentioned. It was not unusual in early times for a poet to write a series of five such Mesnevís; in this case the series was called a Khamsa or ‘Quintet.’ When the subject of the Mesneví is a romance the poet often introduces during the course of the story a number of the little odes known as ghazels, placing these in the mouths of his characters in critical moments or when their feelings are highly strung. Long Mesnevís, running into thousands of couplets, are characteristic of the First and Second Periods, the subjects being generally mystic or religious in the former of these, mystic-romantic in the latter. By the beginning of the Third Period these lengthy poems began to pass out of fashion, and comparatively few Mesnevís of any great length were written after its close. The form did not lose in popularity, but was employed for shorter poems, sometimes religious, sometimes didactic, but most frequently narrative or descriptive. Indeed, the Mesneví has at all times been the favourite verse-form for narrative poetry of every kind. Finally, its simplicity recommends it to the modern writers, with whom it is in much favour for short occasional poems.
As we have seen, the Qudatqu Bilik, the oldest Turkish book known, is written throughout in rhyming couplets; hence it is probable that Mesneví verse formed part of the original Turkish material and is therefore, so far as Ottoman poetry is concerned, rather a survival from the native system than a loan from outside.
Turning now to the Arabian system; we find that the distinctive characteristic here is the monorhyme; that is, that a single rhyme runs throughout the entire poem, no matter how long this be. In poems written on this principle the first lines of the several couplets generally remain ur rhymed, while all the second lines rhyme together; in some cases, however, the first line of the opening couplet — i. e. the first line of the poem — rhymes with its own second line and consequently with that of each succeeding couplet. There are seventeen verse-forms constructed upon this plan, which was much more popular than the Persian, almost all the shorter pieces, and these form by far the larger portion of Ottoman poetry, having been written in accordance with it up to the rise of the Modern School. Let us now look at these seventeen verse-forms.
The unit upon which the Arabian scheme is built is the Misra῞ (or Misrá῞), which we may translate as ‘Hemistich.’ This is a single line of verse written in one of the established metres, which, if placed beside another line in the same metre. would form a distich or couplet.
II. When a Misra῞ does not form one of the members of a couplet, but is a unit complete in itself, having no connection with any other versified writing, it is called a Misra῞-i Άzáde or ‘Independent Hemistich.’
III. The Beyt, usually translated as ‘Couplet’ or ‘Distich,’ consists of two misra῞s in the same metre, which misra῞s may or may not rhyme together.
The Beyt, whether rhymed or unrhymed, may be either one out of several couplets which together form a poem, or it may, like the Independent Hemistich, be a separate unit.
When the two hemistichs rhyme, the Beyt is said to be Musarra῞ or ‘Rhymed.’ This term is further applied — as descriptive of the rhyme-scheme — to any poem consisting of a succession of such couplets; so that in a piece of verse rhymed in Musarra῞ fashion all the hemistichs will rhyme together.
When a Rhymed Beyt forms the opening couplet of a poem in monorhyme (especially of a ghazel or qasída) it is called a Matla῞, a word which literally means the ‘Orient’ or ‘Rising-point’ of a heavenly body. Such is the correct use of the term Matla῞; but the word is often loosely applied to an Independent Beyt when the two lines rhyme together.
An Independent Beyt the two lines of which do not rhyme together is called a Ferd, or, more usually, a Mufred, both of which words mean ‘Unit.’ But these terms likewise are often loosely employed, being frequently used to designate any Independent Beyt whether unrhymed or rhymed.
IV. The Ghazel: This, which is the most typically Oriental of all the verse-forms alike in the careful elaboration of its detail and in its characteristic want of homogeneity, is, or at least was till within recent years, the first favorite of the Ottoman poets. It is a short poem of not fewer than four and not more than fifteen couplets. Such at any rate is the theoretical limit, but Ghazels containing a much larger number of couplets may occasionally be met with; this, however, is exceptional, from five to ten being the average number. The first couplet of a Ghazel is, as we have seen, called the Matla῞ and is invariably musarra῞, the two hemistichs always rhyming together. All the succeeding couplets are non-musarra῞; that is, all their second lines rhyme together and with the Matla῞, while their first lines do not rhyme at all. If we employ the alphabetical notation usually adopted when dealing with rhyme-sequences, we get the following for a Ghazel of six couplets: A.A: B.A: C.A: D.A: E.A: F.A. The last couplet of a Ghazel has the special name of Maqta῞ or ‘Point of Section;’ and in this the poet introduces his name, thus as it were affixing his signature to the little work. This custom of introducing the name towards the end of a poem is not peculiar to the Ghazel, but is common to all the verse-forms of more than two couplets deriving from the Arabian rhyme-system. Occasionally, but not often, a poet takes one of the lines, it may be the first or it may be the second, of the Matla῞, and repeats it as the rhyming-line of the Maqta῞ that is, as the last line of the Ghazel. This operation, which is called Redd-i Matla῞ or ‘Return of the Matla῞,’ has sometimes a very pleasing effect, when the line repeated is pretty or striking and falls naturally and aptly into its place in either couplet. The second couplet of a Ghazel, that immediately following the Matla῞, is technically called the Husn-i Matla῞ or ‘Beauty of the Matla῞,’ and it was a practice among the old poets to endeavour to make it more beautiful or more ingenious than the Matla῞ itself. Just as the couplet immediately below the Matla῞ is called the Husn-i Matla῞, that immediately above the Maqta῞ is called the Husn-i Maqta῞; and just as the poet was supposed to give the former a peculiar excellence, he was held to make the latter likewise a verse of more than usual merit. Thus the poet would choose the best of the five couplets that would remain after appropriating the Matla῞, Husn-i Matla῞ and Maqta῞ of a Ghazel of eight distichs, and would place it immediately above the Maqta῞, thus making it into the Husn-i Maqta῞. Of course the judgment of the poet would not always be that of others, so the critics call what they take to be the best couplet of a Ghazel, whatever its position in the poem, the Sháh-Beyt (or Sheh-Beyt), that is, ‘Couplet-Royal,’ or sometimes, the Beyt-ul-Ghazel (or Beyt-i Ghazel), that is ‘Couplet of the Ghazel.’ In point of style the poem should be faultless; all imperfect rhymes, uncouth words and questionable expressions must be carefully avoided, and the same rhyme-word ought not to be repeated. It is the most elegant and highly finished of all the old poetic forms, and it is in it that the Ottoman poets have the best opportunity for displaying their exquisite skill as stylists. Hence perhaps the extraordinary popularity of the form; the number of Ghazels in the language is probably greater than that of all the other poems put together. Love in all its manifold phases — the charms of the beloved, the rapture caused by her presence, the anguish born of her absence or her harshness, — this forms the true and proper subject of the Ghazel. What the sonnet was to the Italians the Ghazel was to the Persians and Turks, the literary form dedicated to the praise of Love. But notwithstanding this we shall find that it was usual with the poets to refer in their Ghazels to many other things, sometimes widely enough removed from the master passion. But while the Ghazel may thus be made to treat of anything, from the mission of the Prophet to the introduction of coffee,1 there is a certain narrow circle of subjects which seem to have been regarded as the special and appropriate themes of this form of poetry. Prominent among these are the pleasures of wine, the delights of springtide, and the vicissitudes of fortune, with of course the woes and joys of love in the foremost place of all. It may be that a single Ghazel will touch on one and all of these things, devoting a couplet or two to each; for it is a marked feature of the form that the several couplets stand in no direct relationship to one another, so that they might be arranged in any order without affecting the general sense of the poem. All the same, although there may be no definable connection between the individual couplets, these ought never to be out of harmony with one another, and a single tone of mind should run through a whole poem. One writer has likened the Ghazel to a brilliant coruscating with glorious colours and displaying many facets, but yet a single whole. Such indeed is what ought to be, but in practice we find that in a vast number of Ghazels, especially when the work of mediocre writers, there is no more unity of thought or feeling between the several couplets than there is between the paragraphs in the columns of a newspaper. It follows of necessity that each couplet must be complete in itself, must contain a complete idea completely expressed. The two lines often present a kind of parallelism, similar to what is found so largely in Hebrew poetry, the second repeating, interpreting, or responding to the first. The couplets of a Ghazel have frequently been compared to pearls on a thread: the thread, they say, will make them one necklace, but the value of the necklace must lie in the beauty of each pearl, not in the thread. While this discursiveness characterises Ghazels as a class, it is far from being universal; sometimes a writer treats a given subject, or at least works a single vein of thought, throughout an entire poem; but even then, the couplets, being each an independent entity, lead up to nothing, and might be set down in any order without detriment to the whole. Ghazels devoted to a single subject occur more frequently in the Fourth Period than in earlier times; and nowadays unity of tone and sentiment, as well as avoidance of irrelevant digressions, is aimed at by the writers of these little poems. For although the Ghazel no longer maintains its old pre-eminence, it is far from having fallen into desuetude, and almost every poet of the New School has given us some examples of his skill in dealing with this old-time favourite. Fuzúlí, Báqi and Nedím are the most famous of the Ottoman Ghazel-writers; of these, the first two belong to the Second, the third to the Fourth Period.
V. The Qasída — which word in Arabic means ‘Purpose-Poem’ — is in form similar to the ghazel, but is much longer. Theoretically it contains not less than thirty and not more than ninety-nine couplets. It is the original Arabian form, that in which the famous Mu῞allaqát and other ancient Arabic poems are written. In Persian and Turkish literature it is the special form affected by the court poetry, its proper subject being the eulogy of some great personage, a Sultan or Vezir or Sheykh of Islam. The Ottoman Qasída consists of two parts: the Nesíb, which we may translate as the ‘Exordium,’ and the Maqsad or Maqsúd, literally the ‘Purpose,’ which we may render as the ‘Panegyric.’ The first of these is often extremely beautiful; its subject, which is definite, admitting of none of the discursiveness of the ghazel, may depend upon the occasion on which the poem is written and presented to the patron to whom it is dedicated. Thus if it be during Ramazán, the Muslim Lent, or at the Bayram Festival, the theme of the Exordium will likely be a poetical account of the fast or of the feast; or if it be on the occasion of the completion of a new palace or the laying out of a garden, it will be a brilliant description of the same; or again it may be simply a highly coloured picture of the season of the year, spring, summer, autumn or winter, in which the poem chances to be composed. But anything may be taken as subject; sometimes it is the great man’s horse, or his sword, or his signet; sometimes it is a flower, as the rose, the hyacinth or the tulip; occasionally, as in the case of a celebrated Qasída of Nef῞í, the Exordium is purely moral or philosophic. The Panegyric, which follows the Exordium, has seldom any essential connection with it, and great dexterity is often shown by the poet in the way he dovetails the one into the other; a remote resemblance, a momentary association of ideas, will serve him as a hinge, and while he seems yet to be singing the delights of spring, we find he has begun the glorification of his patron.1 The Panegyric itself proceeds with all the pomp and splendour of language which the poet can command; and, when the work of a master, the succession of long lines, with their stately measure and gorgeous imagery, has something of the magnificence of an imperial pageant. But too often the Panegyric is little more than a string of turgid and bombastic epithets, the resonance and grandiloquence of which fail to conceal the banality and insincerity beneath. The name of the patron is usually introduced near the beginning of the Panegyric, while towards the end, in a couplet, which is technically styled the Táj or ‘Crown,’ the writer mentions his own name,and begins a prayer for the prosperity of the great man, which closes the poem. Many writers introduce a ghazel into their Qasídas, sometimes near the beginning, sometimes near the end; this ghazel is often ostensibly addressed to some unnamed beauty and has no intimate connection with the Qasída itself beyond having the same rhyme, being in the same metre, and occasionally deriving its imagery from the same dominant subject. It is allowable in a Qasída to repeat the same rhyme-word with the same meaning, provided that at least seven couplets intervene, but it is always better to dispense when possible with this license. In poems of this class there are usually two or three matla῞s or rhyming couplets besides the opening distich; these are introduced here and there in the course of the poem to break the long sequence of non-musarra῞ verses, and sometimes by way of beginning as it were a new paragraph.1 In the Díwáns, or volumes containing the collected works of a poet, there is usually a rubric prefixed to each Qasída setting forth its subject and mentioning the name of the great man in whose honour it is composed; these rubrics are usually in Persian. The best couplet of a Qasída is technically called the Beyt-ul-Qasíd or ‘Couplet of the Qasída.’ The Qasída, which found its most brilliant exponent in Nef῞í of Erzerum, a gifted poet of the Third Period, has in great measure passed out of fashion since the rise of the Modern School. Not only is that flattery of the great which is its ultimate aim at variance with the better taste now prevailing, but the poets of to-day rightly regard it as a waste of time and ingenuity to get together some fifty or sixty rhyming words and work these up to form the rhymes of as many couplets, as the result must almost always be a mere tour de force, often woefully strained and sadly deficient in every element of true poetry. Thus Báqí, who is one of the finest poets of the Second Period, has what he calls his Hyacinth Qasída to the honour and glory of his learned teacher Qaramání-záde Mehemmed Efendi, in which he makes the word Sunbul, that is ‘Hyacinth,’ end forty-nine lines, being preceded by as many words all rhyming together, only one of which is repeated in the whole course of the poem. The extreme difficulty of an achievement such as this, to end nearly fifty couplets with a word like ‘hyacinth,’ prefixing to the same in each case a different rhyme-word, and yet not only to preserve sense and avoid the evidence of labour, but also to impart to the work the charm of poetry, must be apparent to all. In most languages the feat would be simply impossible; but the wealth of rhymes in Turkish, together with the great freedom in arranging the sequence of words allowed to, or at least taken by, the old poets, render it somewhat less hopeless in their case than it would be with us. Some writers, as it would appear from mere bravado, go out of their way to choose a difficult word for the redíf of a Qasída; thus the poet Sunbul-záde Vehbí has a work of this class in which he makes the term Sukhan ‘Word’ end a hundred and twenty-eight lines, preceded of course by nearly as many different words all of which rhyme together. Efforts such as this are of necessity foredoomed to be literary failures; but even when less ambitious, there are comparatively few writers whose Qasídas are at once so correct and so poetical that we can justly describe them as completely successful; and the leaders of the Modern School have done well in discouraging any further waste of time and talent in so unprofitable a field.
VI. The Qit῞a, literally ‘Section,’ is identical in form with the ghazel except that the first couplet is non-musarra῞ instead of being rhymed. Thus if the first couplet of a ghazel be removed, the remainder will be a Qit῞a so far as the form is concerned. The poem, however, while it may treat of almost any subject, must confine itself to that subject; the theme may not be changed, as in the ghazel, with every couplet. A Qit῞a may be of any length from two couplets upwards. In the longer Qit῞as it is usual for the poet to introduce his name somewhere towards the close, but not in the last couplet. This form is much used for the Táríkhs or ‘Chronograms,’ of which more hereafter; but in these, if the poet mentions his name, he generally does so in the last distich.
The Nazm: This is simply a Qit῞a with a rhymed in place of an unrhymed distich for the opening couplet, and is therefore exactly the same as the ghazel in form. It differs from the latter solely in the nature of its subjects, and in the manner in which these are treated. The word Nazm means ‘Verse’ in general, and this is its usual application; but as a technical term it is the name of the verse-form just described.
VII. The Mustezád, literally ‘Complemented,’ is formed by adding to each misra῞ or hemistich in a piece of verse a short line called the Ziyáde or ‘Complement,’ which may be either read or omitted, the poem making equally good sense in either case. When the piece of verse so treated is a ghazel, it is usual to make each Ziyáde rhyme with the misra῞ to which it is affixed. Sometimes, however, the matla῞ and the second misra῞s of the succeeding Ziyáde-couplets have an independent rhyme of their own, leaving only the first misra῞s of the Ziyáde-couplets to rhyme with the first misracs of the couplets of the ghazel. There is only one metre in which it is allowable to write a Mustezád.1 When really well done, the Mustezád has a pleasing effect, but the management of the Ziyáde calls for a good deal of skill on the part of the poet. The success of the poem depends upon the happiness with which these short complementary lines are worked in; for while they must not materially affect the sense of the poem, they should heighten the effect of the whole by a series of graceful and significant touches. When they fail of this, they are apt to degenerate into mere padding.
VIII. The Rubá῞í (in the plural Rubá῞íyát) or ‘Quatrain’ is, as its name indicates, a short poem of four lines, the first, second and fourth of which rhyme together, the third remaining blank. This arrangement of the rhymes has a very singular and pleasing effect, as the rhyme of the first two lines, which seemed to be lost on the appearance of the third, returns like an echo in the fourth and closes the little poem in a manner at once grateful to the ear and satisfying to the æsthetic sense. Occasionally the third line also is rhymed, but then the result is less happy as the effect just mentioned is absent.2 There is a series of twenty-four metres, all derived from the Hezej, peculiar to the Rubá῞í; in one of these it must be written, and they may not be used for any other form of poetry. The Rubá῞í may deal with any subject, but it should do so in a forceful or epigrammatic fashion. It is as a rule little more than a pregnant hint; the poet seems, as it were, suddenly to see some point in a new and unexpected light, this he suggests in four nervous lines, making no comment, drawing no conclusion, the reader being left to follow up for himself the train of thought when he has recovered from the slight shock of surprise which the perusal of a good Rubá῞í should at first produce. Each Rubá῞í is a unit complete in itself, and has no connection with any other. In his masterly adaptation of a selection of the Rubá῞í of the Persian poet ῞Omar-i Khayyám, the late Edward Fitzgerald has so manipulated and arranged the Quatrains chosen as to make them read as though there were a certain orderly connection between them, as though they followed one another in a naturally developing sequence, in fact, as though they were stanzas in one long poem — an idea never conceived, or at any rate never acted upon, either by Khayyám or by any other Eastern poet.1 Rubá῞ís when collected are always arranged, exactly as ghazels are, according to a certain alphabetical system which we shall learn by and by; the sense of the several poems (for, as we have seen, each Rubá῞í is a separate little poem) has nothing whatever to do with the arrangement. Ἅzmí-záde Háletí, who flourished early in the Third Period, is said to have been the most successful Rubá῞í-writer among the Ottomans. The Rubá῞í is sometimes, but not often, called Du-Beyt or ‘Double-Couplet,’ and occasionally Teráne, a word which means, among other things, ‘Melody’ or ‘Harmony.’ This form is so short that the poet rarely mentions his name in it.
There is a native Turkish form which in the arrangement of the rhyme is identical with the Rubá῞í, but which is composed in quite different metres. In East-Turkish literature this form is cultivated and called the Tuyugh or Tuyuq. It has never found its way into Ottoman literary poetry, but it lives in the Ottoman folk-verses known as Mani.
The verse-forms deriving from the mono rhyme-scheme that still remain to be described are all stanzaic. It does not follow that these forms, though based on the monorhyme, are of Arabian origin; some at least are most likely Persian, while one (XI) is practically identical with a very early, and probably original, Turkish form. The first two are really but variations of a single model.
IX. The Terjí῞-Bend (literally ‘Return-Tie’) is a poem consisting of a succession of stanzas (called Terjí῞-Kháne or House of the Return’) in the same metre, but each with a different rhyme. The stanzas are monorhyming and may be rhymed either exactly in the ghazel style, or in the manner called musarra῞ when the rhyme is repeated at the end of every hemistich; but whichever system is adopted in the first stanza must be adhered to throughout the poem. The number of couplets is the same in each stanza, and is never less than five and rarely more than ten. To each stanza is added, as it were, a refrain, an unvarying rhymed couplet, which has the same metre as the rest of the poem, and mayor may not rhyme with the opening stanza. This rhyming couplet is called the Wásita or ‘Link,’ or else the Bend or ‘Tie.’ Some writers, however, apply the term Bend to the Terjí῞-Kháne and Wásita taken together.
X. The Terkíb-Bend (literally, ‘Composite Tie’) is exactly the same as the preceding except that the Wásita closing the several stanzas (in this case called Terkíb-Kháne) varies on each occasion.
The Terjí῞-Bend and Terkíb-Bend are much used for elegies; they are also employed for mystic, philosophic, and contemplative poetry in general. Towards the close of the last stanza, but not in the Wásita, the poet mentions his name. The Terjí῞-Bend is reckoned the more difficult form of the two, in as much as the several stanzas have to be so worked up that the recurring Wásita falls naturally and appropriately into its place at the end of each. In the Terkíb-Bend, where the Wásita varies with every stanza, the poet has of course a much freer hand.
We now reach a second group of stanzaic verse-forms, each member of which has a special name descriptive of the number of lines in the stanza. We shall begin with the shortest and simplest.
XI. The Murebba῞ or ‘Foursome’ is a poem consisting of a succession of four-line stanzas called Bend or ‘Tie.’ The fourth line of the first stanza mayor may not rhyme with the other three which must all rhyme together. But whatever be the rhyme of the fourth line of the first stanza, that rhyme must be repeated in the fourth line of every succeeding stanza, while the first three lines of each of these must take a new rhyme. Sometimes the fourth line of the first stanza is repeated as the fourth line of each one following, and is thus made into a sort of refrain; in this case the poem is known as a Murebba῞-i Mutekerrir or ‘Repeating Foursome.’ Sometimes these fourth lines, while rhyming together, vary with each stanza, then the poem is called a Murebba῞-i Muzdevij or ‘Pairing Foursome.’
As has been already said, the rhyme-arrangement of the Murebba῞ is practically identical with one of the most popular and most characteristic of the original Turkish rhyme-schemes, that on which most of Ahmed-i Yeseví’s poems and the whole of Ἅlí’s Joseph and Zelíkhá are written.
The Terbí῞: Sometimes a writer builds a Murebba῞ on a poem, usually a ghazel, of some other author. He does this by prefixing two lines of his own to each couplet of the poem he has taken as the basis of his work. These two lines, which are called the Zamíme or ‘Addition,’ must be in the same metre as the poem worked on. In the first of the four-line stanzas thus formed both lines of the Zamiíme must rhyme with the matla῞ of the ghazel taken as basis, which of course forms the last two lines of the verse; but in each of the succeeding stanzas the lines of the Zamíme must rhyme with the first or non-rhyming line of the mufred to which they are prefixed. The result is of course a perfect Murebba῞-i Muzdevij. The difficulty in the Terbí῞ (and in the similar Takhmís and Tesdís) is to make the Zamíme blend naturally and gracefully with the lines to which it is prefixed; it should so harmonise with these both in feeling and in language that the whole poem appear to be the work of one and the same writer. When this is not achieved, the stanzas have a patchy look, and the result is failure.
XII. The Mukhammes or ‘Fivesome’: This is exactly the same as the Murebba῞ except that here each stanza consists of five instead of four lines. It also may be either Mutekerrir or Muzdevij, according as the last line of the first stanza is repeated or varied in those that follow. Sometimes, however, the lines are divided by the rhyme into groups of three and two instead of four and one. In this case the first three lines of each stanza take a different rhyme, while the last two keep the same rhyme throughout. Here again the poem may be either Mutekerrir or Muzdevij. In the Mukhammes, though it is usual, it is not essential that the fifth line, or the fourth and fifth lines, of the opening stanza rhyme with the four, or three, that precede.
The Takhmís: This is to the Mukhammes what the Terbí῞ is to the Murebba῞, namely, a Mukhammes built upon an earlier poem. It is formed in precisely the same way as the Terbic except that three instead of two new lines are prefixed to each couplet of the poem chosen for basis, which here again is generally a ghazel. There is another and somewhat simpler variety of the Takhmís in which the poet constructs his Mukhammes, not upon a whole ghazel, but upon a single hemistich or upon a single couplet. In this case, if his basis be a line, he prefixes to it four, and if it be a couplet, three rhyming hemistichs of his own, which for the first stanza usually rhyme with the basis, but in each of those succeeding take a new rhyme. Such a Takhmís must necessarily be Mutekerrir. There is no necessary limit to the number of stanzas in a Takhmís of this class, whereas in a poem built on a ghazel the number of stanzas must of course be that of the couplets in the basis. The effect produced by a good Takhmís is far more pleasing than that to be obtained from an equally well constructed Terbí῞, and as a consequence the former stands in much higher favour. Thus while Terbí῞s are comparatively rare, examples of the Takhmís abound in Ottoman literature, especially during the later Periods.
XIII. The Museddes or ‘Sixsome’: In this form, which is similar to the two preceding, each stanza consists of six lines or, in other words, of three couplets. The four lines of the first and second couplets of each stanza rhyme together, but in each stanza they take a new rhyme. The third couplet of the first stanza mayor may not rhyme with the two that precede, and it mayor may not be repeated as the third couplet of each following stanza, and the Museddes is Mutekerrir or Muzdevij, accordingly. As with the Murebba῞ and the Mukhammes, here also when the poem is Muzdevij the final rhyme must be retained throughout. This is one point in which poems of this second stanzaic group differ from the Terkíb-Bend where the several Wásitas have each a separate and independent rhyme. Occasionally, though rarely, the two lines of the third couplets do not rhyme together; when this is the case each line rhymes with its correspondent in the other stanzas, that is, the fifth lines of all the stanzas rhyme together, and so do the sixth lines, though they do not rhyme with each other.
The Tesdís: This is similar to the Terbí῞ and the Takhmís, and is a Museddes built upon some previous work, usually a couplet, as in the second form of the second variety of the Takhmís. The same rules as to rhyme and metre hold for the Tesdís as for the Terbí῞ and Takhmís.
Similar to the Murebba῞, the Mukhammes and the Museddes are:
XIV. The Musebba῞ or ‘Sevensome,’
XV. The Musemmen or ‘Eightsome,’
XVI. The Mutessa῞ or ‘Ninesome,’ and
XVII. The Mu῞ashsher or ‘Tensome,’
in which the stanzas consist of seven, eight, nine and ten lines respectively, and all of which are of very rare occurrence.
The subjects of poems of this second stanzaic group are generally those treated in the ghazel, but such poems are not so discursive as that favourite form, they keep as a rule more strictly to the matter in hand. The poet mentions his name in the last stanza.
With this group closes the series of Ottoman verse-forms derived from the Arabian rhyme-system, and there now remains to be described only that one form which is of purely Turkish origin.
In Turkish popular poetry, that which is the peculiar possession of the uneducated classes, and is the outcome of the native genius uninfluenced by Persian or French models, the feet are, in accordance with the true Turkish system, syllabic, not metric, and the rhyme is frequently very imperfect, sometimes merely assonant.
The generic name for the Turkish popular ballad is Turki, that is ‘Turkish (-song),’ — itself an eloquent witness to the national character thereof. These Turkis, which are sung all over the country, especially in the humbler circles of society, are of various forms which differ slightly from one another. One of the most popular of these is a succession of four-line stanzas, the first three lines of each of which rhyme with one another, while all the fourth lines, which may be the same throughout or may vary with each stanza, rhyme together. Some of the oldest known Turkish poems, such as Ἅlí’s Joseph and Zelíkhá and many of the pieces in Ahmed-i Yeseví’s Díwán-i Hikmet,1 are, as we have seen, written in this form, which strengthens our belief that in the Turki we have a survival of the ancient pre-Persian poetry of the Turkish peoples. It is this variety of the Turki which about the end of the Third Period, when the native genius began to assert itself, was dressed up as a new literary form and christened
XVIII. The Sharqí, that is, ‘Eastern.’ In the Sharqí the syllabic feet of the turki are replaced by metric feet of the orthodox description, the faulty rhymes are done away with, while the ungrammatical or provincial expressions are banished. In short, the poem becomes a perfectly correct composition written in accordance with the prevailing Persian rules of literary art. But the memory of its humble origin is preserved in the simple nature of the feeling that characterises it and of the language in which that feeling is expressed. The ingenious conceits and rhetorical exuberances that are held to increase the merit of a ghazel or a qasída would be reckoned out of place in a Sharqí; similarly, the Persian idioms and constructions which are sought after in the other verse-forms are avoided here, and their place is taken by a more homely phraseology. The tone of the Sharqí is nearly always gay, and the meaning clear and straightforward. The subject is almost invariably love, simple human Jove, very often it is an invitation to the beloved to come out for a stroll to the Sweet Waters of Europe or some other favourite promenade. Another reasoh of the greater simplicity of the Sharqís is that they were meant to be sung. The ghazels were no doubt occasionally sung, but they were primarily intended to be read. But the Sharqí is the literary development of the turki which is essentially a song; it is therefore a song written in conformity with the canons of poetic art, and as such it is intended to be heard, not to be read and re-read like the other forms, and consequently it must be simple. Another feature of its parent, the turki, retained by the Sharqí is its comparative freedom in certain minor points regarding form, thus the recurring line which closes the several stanzas, and which js called the Naqarát or ‘Chorus,’ is very often used also as the second line of the first stanza, which thus becomes irregular. Again, the Naqarát may vary with each stanza, as in the murebba῞-i muzdevij. In the terminology of music the name Miyán or ‘Middle’ is given to that portion of the music of the song to which the third stanza of a Sharqí is sung; this music is taken to be the most touching and impressive passage of the whole composition, and the poet is supposed to make his third stanza which bears the special name of Miyán-Kháne or ‘Middle-House,’ likewise the most tender and affecting of the poem. The poets Nedím and Wásif are perhaps the most famous of the Sharqí-writers.
Monorhyming poetry has occasionally a secondary rhyme; when this is the case, each couplet has, besides the final rhyme common to the whole poem, a special rhyme of its own which is usually repeated three times, namely, in the middle and at the end of the first hemistich and in the middle of the second, an arrangement which has the effect of cutting up the distich into four divisions. When poetry is rhymed in this manner it is said to be Musemmat. Musemmat rhyme, which is simply the Murebba῞ arrangement adapted to the couplet, seems to have been peculiarly pleasing to the Turkish ear, and most likely formed part of the original native system. As already said, we find it in the ancient pre-Ottoman poetry produced in Central Asia; and it forms the most striking characteristic of the first rude efforts in lyric verse made by the Western Turks.
The eighteen varieties which have been described constitute the series of verse-forms used in Ottoman poetry down to the time when the Modern School revolutionised the entire literary system; but there still remain for consideration a few names which indicate not the form of a poem, but the nature of its contents. Leaving aside such terms as Medhíye or ‘Eulogy,’ Hijv or ‘Satire,’ Mersíye or ‘Elegy’ and Hezelíyát or ‘Facetiæ,’ which denote varieties common to all literatures cmd call for no explanation, we shall confine ourselves to those which are more peculiarly Oriental.
Foremost among such is the Táríkh or ‘Chronogram.’ This is a word or set of words the numerical values of the letters1 forming which give on addition the year of the Hijre, or Muhammedan era, wherein occurred the event to which such word or set of words refers. Of course a Chronogram need not be in verse, but it generally is. In this case it is usually comprised in the last line of a short poem in the qitCa form which narrates the event the date of which the Chronogram embodies. When every letter in this final hemistich is included in the addition, and when this gives the exact sum required, the Chronogram is called a Táríkh-i Támm or ‘Perfect Chronogram.’ When only the dotted letters are to be reckoned, the Táríkh is said to be Jevherdár or Jevherín, that is, ‘Gemmed;’ when only the undotted letters, it is said to be Muhmel, that is, ‘Unmarked.’ Sometimes the sum of the letters in the last line is either more or less than is required; recourse has then to be had to a device technically called Ta῞míye or ‘Enigmatizing,’ which consists in suggesting to the reader by a cleverly contrived hint the sum which must be deducted from or added to the total yielded by the chronogrammatic line.2 Offering, as it does, a wide field for the exercise of ingenuity, the Chronogram was naturally a great favourite with the Turkish poets. It has been cultivated more or less at all times, but it reached its highest point of popularity about the beginning of the nineteenth century when flourished the greatest of all the Ottoman chronogrammatists, Surúrí, who possessed an extraordinary talent for improvising Chronograms — an almost impossible feat, one would have thought.
The composition of what are called Nazíras has likewise been at all times a very favourite exercise with the Turkish poets. The name Nazíra or ‘Parallel’ is given to a poem written in emulation of one by another writer. The Nazíra must be in the same metre and have the same rhyme and the same redíf (if there be one) as the poem emulated; it should moreover be conceived in a similiar spirit. The fascination of Nazíra-writing lay in the endeavour to outdo one’s fellow-craftsman on his own chosen ground. Thus a poet might select as redíf for a ghazel or qasída some word or phrase which had never been so used before, and which was particularly hard to fit in neatly and correctly. This he would work in at the end of his verses with all the skill at his command; and when the poem was published, it would be recognised by his brother-artists as a challenge to which their literary zeal and their threatened reputation alike would constrain them to respond. But ‘Parallels’ were not written only to the verses of contemporaries or immediate predecessors; the poets often composed them to the works of men long dead whose style they admired and whose verses they were fain to rival. The term Nazíra is used only in connection with poems written on the monorhyme system. When one poet sought to ‘parallel’ a long mesneví of another, his work was called a Jewáb or ‘Response’ to that of the latter. Thus the Subhat-ul-Ebkár or ‘Communion of Virgins’ by the Ottoman poet Ἅtá῾í. is said to be a Jewáb or ‘Response’ to the Subhet-ul-Ebrár or ‘Rosary of the Just’ by the Persian Jámí. This same term, Jewáb, is applied to a Khamsa or ‘Quintet,’ that is, a series of five mesnevís, when this is written to ‘parallel’ an earlier series.
There are two classes of verse composition, the Lughaz or ‘Riddle’ and the Mu῞ammá or ‘Enigma,’ which, though they can hardly lay claim to being poetry, were largely cultivated by many poets and often form a special chapter in the Diwans or collections of a poet's works. The first of these, the Lughaz or ‘Riddle,’ is simply a versified conundrum in which from a more or less fantastic description the name of the object which is the answer may be guessed. But the Mu῞amma or ‘Enigma’ or ‘Logogriph’ is an extra-ordinarily subtle and ingenious variety of conceit such as the Eastern mind revels in. The answer, which is almost always supplied — so hard is the puzzle, — is usually a proper name, and is arrived at by the manipulation, in accordance with certain conventions, of some of the words and letters contained in the two lines of which the ‘Enigma’ generally consists.1
Hymns, when addressed to God, are called Munáját; when addressed to the Prophet, they are styled Na῞t. There are usually some of each class among the collected works of a poet.
The Mesnevis alone have individual titles. In the case of romances these are as a rule formed of the names of the hero and heroine, as ‘Khusrev and Shírín;’ in the case of didactic poems they are often purely fanciful, as Nefhat-ul-Ezhár ‘The Waft of the Flowers;’ sometimes the title may be indicative of the subject of the work, as Sáqí-Náme ‘The Book of the Cupbearer,’ which is the name of many poems dealing with the pleasures of wine whether literal or allegoric.
Qasidas are often distinguished by a title taken from the subject of the exordium, or from the word that forms the redíf, or, where there is no redíf, from the last letter of the rhyming words. Thus a Qasída-i Beháríya or ‘Spring Qasída,’ is one the exordium of which describes the spring season, a Gul Qasídasi or ‘Rose Qasída’ is one where the word gul or '‘rose’ forms the redíf, and a Qasída-i Rá῾íye or ‘R Qasída’ is one in which the rhyme-words end in the letter R.
Libás-i husnina göz dikdi ῞álem:
Niqáb-i zulfini ref῞ etdi dídem.
‘On the vestment of her beauty did the world fix its gaze;
‘My eye set aside the veil of her curls (i. e. I saw her face through them).’
To get at the solution here we see the ‘eye’ must ‘set aside’ or replace the ‘curl.’ Now the word for ‘eye’ in the verse is(díde), but there is another word with the same meaning, namely
(῞ayn), and this word is also the name of the letter
; again, according to a convention that holds in Enigmas the word ‘curl’ may be used (because of the form of a curl) to represent the letter
. So we have somewhere to replace a
(libás) ‘vestment,’ we get
(Ἅbbás), which is the name we wish.
The term Díwán is applied to the volume which contains the collected works of a poet, excepting long mesnevís which usually form separate and independent books. In a Díwán all the pieces in the same verse-form are grouped together, the several groups forming as it were so many chapters or sections. Within certain limits the order or sequence of these groups or chapters is fixed; the qasídas always come before the ghazels, these before the rubá῞ís, and these before the independent distichs and hemistichs, which last generally close the volume. The position of the chronograms and other qit῞as and of pieces in the stanzaic forms is not so rigidly determined, but these usually come between the qasídas and the ghazels. The position of any short mesnevís that may be included is likewise unsettled. The enigmas, when there are any, form a subdivision of the chapter of independent distichs.
The ghazels alone are arranged among themselves in a fixed order, the poems of the other classes following one another in their several chapters at hap-hazard and without method. The ghazels are arranged in alphabetical order; not however according to the first letter of the poem, but according to the last letter of the rhyming lines, which is of course the same throughout the poem. Thus all the ghazels in which the rhyming lines end in the first letter of the alphabet are brought together and made into the first subdivision of the chapter; similarly those in which the rhyming lines end in the second letter of the alphabet are collected and formed into the second subdivision, and so on through the whole alphabet.
When the rubá῞ís are so numerous as to form a volume by themselves (as occasionally happens), they are arranged, in this same alphabetical order.
Although the practice is now falling somewhat into desuetude, it used to be the almost universal custom for every Turk when he became a writer of any sort, were it only a clerk in a Government office, to assume or to have given to him what is called a Makhlas, that is a pen-name or pseudonym, by which, unless he were a member of the Imperial family, he was ever afterwards commonly known. Thus such names as Fuzúlí, Nef῞í., Háletí and Ghálib are all the Makhlases of the several poets, not their personal names by which no one ever thinks of or mentions them. The Makhlas is always a significant word; it is almost invariably Arabic, very rarely Persian, never Turkish. The practice of using a Makhlas came into force among the Ottomans about the time of the invasion of Timur early in the fifteenth century.
There are a few other class-names descriptive of the character or subject of a poem; but these are of comparatively rare occurrence and will be better dealt with in the course of the History.
Comparatively few poets wrote to any considerable extent in mesneví-verse; the mono rhyming forms (among which is included the sharqí) were for several reasons much more popular. For the sake of convenience we shall speak of those monorhyming forms collectively as Lyric Forms, of the work composed in them as Lyric Poetry, and of the poets who produced such work as Lyric Poets,
It is of course the Perso-Arabian prosodial system that prevails in Ottoman poetry. But this system is essentially unsuitable; for while the Perso-Arabian prosody is quantitative, there are, strictly speaking, no long vowels in the Turkish language.1
Ancient Turkish poetry, as exemplified in the Qudatqu Bilik, the Díwán-i Hikmet of Ahmed-i Yeseví and the Joseph and Zelíkhá of Ἅlí, is constructed upon a very simple system which is in perfect harmony with the genius of the language. This system, which has all along prevailed in the popular songs and ballads, that is, in the true, spontaneous poetry of the Turkish people, is called Parmaq-Hisábi2 or ‘Finger Counting,’ and is not quantitative, like the Perso-Arabian, but is syllabic, the lines consisting of a given number of syllables, generally from seven to fifteen, with a cæsura after every third or fourth, while the cadence is determined by the fall of the accent. But this method, though so well suited to the language out of which it has grown, has never been systematised, the metres of which it contains the germs have never been developed, indeed, even the existing cadenced arrangements of syllables remain unclassified and unnamed.
In the earliest West-Turkish literary verse, that written between the years 700 (1300–1) and 800 (1397–8), this system is generally, though not universally, employed. The poets of those days took considerable license; their metres, it is true, were always Persian, but while they made the feet as a rule syllabic, they would frequently, merely to suit their own convenience, treat them as quantitative. This blending of the Turkish and Persian systems is characteristic of that period; for it is noteworthy that there is scarcely a trace of the Turkish method of scansion in the poetry produced after the invasion of Timur at the beginning of the fifteenth century. That calamitous event forms a landmark in the development of West-Turkish poetry, that which is on the hither side being far less Turkish and more Persian than that which is on the farther.
The native Turkish metres fared even worse than the native Turkish system of scansion. But these metres were so like the Persian both in the number of their syllables and in their cadence that their supercession by, or rather their absorption into, the latter was inevitable as soon as the Turks began to look to Persia for guidance. Thus the metre of the Qudatqu Bilik is very like the Persian Mutaqarib of the Sháh-Náme; while the special eleven-syllable metre of the Tuyugh or East-Turkish quatrain is practically identical with the second form of the Remel described a little farther on. Things being so, it is but natural that while traces of the native system of scansion linger on for a century in West-Turkish poetry, there should be no equally obvious vestiges of the ancient metres.
In the prosodial system elaborated by the Arabs and adopted by the Persians a vowel is long either naturally or by position. It is long naturally when accompanied by one of the letters of prolongation, it is long by position when followed by two consonants. When this prosody came to be systematically applied to the Turkish language, while there was no trouble as to the vowels that were long by position, the poets found themselves confronted with a difficulty in connection with the vowels that were accounted long naturally; for there are no long vowels in Turkish words, the presence in such of any of those letters which in Arabic or Persian mark prolongation being merely a guide to the pronunciation. They therefore determined that while the vowels in such Arabic and Persian words as were used in Turkish should continue to bear the same value as in their proper language, these vowels which in purely Turkish words are accompanied by what in Arabic or Persian would be reckoned a letter of prolongation, while remaining normally and properly short, might by a license be regarded as long when the exigencies of metre so required. This license, which is technically called Imále or ‘Inclination,’ was very largely used by the old poets; but unless employed for some special purpose, such as to give additional emphasis to a word, its presence is as a rule a defect from an artistic point of view, as it not only imparts a lumbering movement to the lines, but a feeling of discomfort is evoked on encountering words thus as it were racked on a Procrustean bed.
The Perso-Arabian prosodial system, in accordance with which is composed all Ottoman literary poetry of the Old School, is exceedingly elaborate and intricate. The whole subject is technical in the highest degree, and any attempt to explain the principles upon which it is built and the laws by which it is regulated would be out of place in this History. Such a study would moreover be of no practical utility for our purpose here which will be better served by learning what actually are the metres most commonly used by the Ottoman poets.
In the Arabian prosody as modified by the Persians and accepted by the Turks there are some dozen or more distinct metres,1 each of which, besides its normal or standard form, comprises a number of variations. Each of these metres has a special name, and each of the variations has a compound name which is held to describe by more or less remote analogy the nature of its departure from the normal form.
The following are the most usual in Ottoman poetry: —
I. The normal form of the metre called Hezej; it is: —2
This is much used in lyric poetry, especially for ghazels and qasídas.
The following are all variations of the Hezej: —
This measure is much used for mesnevís. Composed in it we have amongst others Sheykhí’s Khusrev u Shírín, Zátí’s Shem῞u Perwáne, Mesíhí’s Shehr-engií, Άhí’s Khusrev u Shírín, Hamdí’s Leylí u Mejnún, Kemál-Pasha-záde’s Yúsufu Zelíkhá, Lámi῞í’s Vise u Rámín and Yahya Bey’s Yúsuf u Zelíkhá.
The above is chiefly used for lyric forms.
This is another favourite for mesnevis; the two finest in the language, Fuzúlí’s Leylí u Mejnún and Sheykh Ghálib’s Husn u Ἅshq, are both written in it; so is Nábí’s Khayrábád.
This is a lyric measure.
II. Two forms only of the Rejez metre are used; the standard: —
and this variation: —
Both are lyric.
III. Of the Remel metre four forms, all variations, are in use.
This, which is a very favourite lyric measure, finds a fairly close English parallel in the fifteen syllable trochaic measure rendered familiar by Tennyson’s ‘Locksley Hall.’
Locksley Hall that in the distance overlooks the sandy flats.
This form is used both for mesnevls and lyrics. It is the measure in which the great Persian poet Mevláná Jelál-ud-Dín wrote his famous Mesneví-i Ma῞nevi, which book, as we shall see in another chapter, gave the keynote for the earliest Turkish poetry; and so this was the measure in which the first poets composed their mesnevis, the Rebáb-Náme of Sultán Veled, the Gharíb-Náme of ῞Άshiq Pasha, the Mevlid of Suleymán Chelebi and the Iskender-Náme of Ahmedí being all in this variation of the Remel.
This is a lyric measure.
The following measure has four forms which may be used together indiscriminately: —
This is chiefly used for mesnevís; in it are composed Yahya Bey’s Genjíne-i Ráz, Kháqání’s Hilye-i Sheríf, Ἅtá῾í’s Suhbet-ul-Ebkár, Nábí’s Khayríya, and Fázil Bey’s Khúbán-Náme, Zenán-Náme and Defter-i Ἅshq.
IV. Practically only one form of the metre Serí῞ is used; it is a variation: —
Yahya Bey’s Gulshen-i Enwár and Ἅtá῾í’s Nefhat-ul-Ezhar are written in this.
V. More popular is the following variation of the metre Khafíf; this like the fourth variety of the Remel has four forms which are used together indiscriminately: —
In this we have Hamdí’s Yúsuf u Zelíkhá, Fazí’s Gul u Bulbul, Yahya Bey’s Sháh u Gedá, Ἅtá῾í’s Heft-Kh án and ῞Izzet Molla’s Gulshen-i Ἅshq.
VI. Three variations of the metre called Muzári῞ are often met with: —
and
and
These are all lyric measures.
VII. Of the Mujtes metre one variation is in pretty frequent use; it too is lyric: —
VIII. One variation of the Mutaqárib-metre-is-frequent:-—
This is chiefly used for mesnevís; in it are written Yahya Bey’s Kitáb-i Usúl, the Sáqí-Námes of Háletí, of Ἅtá῾í and of the Sheykh of Islam Yahya Efendi, also the Zafer-Náme of Sábit and the Mihnet-Keshán of ῞lzzet Molla.
In one or other of the measures represented by the foregoing eighteen schemes is written almost the whole of the literary poetry of Turkey, the only notable exception being the rubá῞ís or quatrains, which have a series of measures peculiar to themselves. There are twenty-four of these rubá῞í-measures, all modifications of a variation of the Hezej metre; and the four lines of a single rubá῞í may be in any four of these.
It is manifestly impossible to exactly reproduce the Oriental measures in an English translation; the frequent successions of long syllables alone would forbid this. But a sufficiently close approximation may be obtained by preserving identity in the number of syllables and arranging the accents so that the cadence of the original is suggested; thus the English fifteen syllable trochaic measure already mentioned supplies a very fair representative of the most popular of the Remel forms.
The ῞Ilm-i Belághat, the Perso-Arabian Art of Rhetoric, was till the last quarter of the nineteenth century the only rhetorical system known to the Ottomans.
This Eastern Art of Rhetoric is divided into three great branches: (1) the ῞Ilm-i Ma῞ání or ‘Science of Significations,’ which deals with the arrangement of periods and the appropriate employment of phrases: (2) the ῞Ilm_i Beyán or ‘Art of Exposition,’ which treats of the various ways in which a thought or idea may be expressed: (3) the ῞Ilm-i Bedí῞ or ‘Art of Verbal Embellishment’ or, as we may render it, the ‘Art of Euphuism,’ which explains the nature and use of the rhetorical figures that form the decorative element in literary work.
With the first of these three branches, the ῞Ilm-i Ma῞ání, we are not here concerned. The second, the ῞Ilm-i Beyán, which has four subdivisions, deals with a series of figures founded on resemblance or contiguity, such as the simile, metaphor, synecdoche and metonymy, which, though differently classed, are essentially the same as with ourselves, and therefore require no description.1 It is the third branch, the ῞Ilm-i Bedí῞, the ‘Art of Euphuism,’ which renders it necessary for us to give some attention to Eastern rhetoric, for here we have a number of highly characteristic figures, many of which have no counterpart in our own manuals.
In the Art called Bedí῞ or ‘Euphuism’ there is then a large number of Figures (technically called San῞at), each of which is in most cases minutely subdivided. Most of these figures are common to poetry and prose; but some are peculiar to poetry, while others again are peculiar to prose. The last of these sections we shall leave out of sight as not being pertinent to our present subject, and confine our attention to the more important or more characteristic figures of the other two.
Some of these are either so familiar to us already, or bear names so self-explanatory, that they call for no description. Such are the Tazádd or ‘Antithesis;’ the Mubálagha or ‘Hyperbole;’1 the Telmíh or ‘Allusion;’2 the Rujú῞ or ‘Epanorthosis;’ the Iqtibás or ‘Quotation’ (from the Koran or Hadís); and the Tazmín or ‘Quotation’ (from another poet).1 But with most of the figures the case is otherwise; and the more popular of these we shall now briefly consider.
Among the greatest favourites in the group of figures that depend upon the sense of the words, and not upon their position in the verse or upon their form, are the following: —
Husn-i Ta῞líl or ‘Ætiology:’ this figure, the name of which literally translated means ‘Eloquent Assignment of Cause,’ consists in the assignment of some graceful but fictitious reason for some fact or occurrence, as in this couplet: —
‘Within the garth the Rose hath hid behind the verdant leaves,
‘Shame-faced, her glory humbled by the lustre of your cheek.’2
Here the poet attributes the rose’s being red and its growing behind some leaves to the discomfited flower’s blushes and its desire to conceal itself on baving been outdone in beauty by tbe cheek of the lady he addresses. This figure, which, when prettily conceived and expressed, is extremely graceful, is of very frequent occurrence.
Ἰhám (sometimes called Tevríye) or ‘Amphibology:’ this is a kind of pun, and consists in the employment of a word or phrase having more than one appropriate meaning whereby the reader is often left in doubt as to the real signification of the passage. As a rule the more unusual meaning is that really intended; and if this should give offence, the poet can always protest that he employed the word in its ordinary sense. The very numerous instances in which a poet plays upon the meaning of his own name are examples of the Ἰhám.
Closely allied to the foregoing is the Ἰhámham-i Tenásub or ‘Amphibological Congruity.’ Here while one of the significations of the amphibological word is obviously intended, the other, though dearly not meant, has some congruity with the subject in hand, as in this distich of ῞Alí Hayder Bey: —
‘Proud of its rosebud, the branch of the rose
‘Tosses, and flouts rúzgár (i. e. Fortune; the wind).’1
Here the word rúzgár is evidently used in its sense of ‘fickle Fortune’ or ‘the world’ in general, which the rose-branch, proud of its loveliness, is said to look on with disdain; yet the other meaning of rúzgár, namely ‘wind,’ is congruous when speaking of a twig tossing in the breeze. Both forms of Amphibology are very often met with; it is of course hardly ever possible to suggest them in translation.
Tejáhul-i ῞Άrif, literally, ‘Feigned Ignorance:’ this figure consists in affecting ignorance of what one knows in order to heighten the effect of one'’s statement, as in this opening couplet from one of Nef῞í’s qasídas: —
‘Say, is this Adrianople-town or is it Eden-bower?
‘Say, is yon the Royal Pavilion or a Paradisal tower?’2
The poet knows perfectly well that the place he is praising is Adrianople and not Paradise, but he affects doubt in order to heighten the eiTect of his eulogy.
Irsál-i Mesel, literally, ‘Proverbial Commission:’ this consists in quoting and applying a proverb in a single distich; by its means the poet is able to enforce his statement by the citation of some well-known adage. The practice of quoting proverbs, which was always more or less popular, was carried to great lengths by the poets of the Third and Fourth Periods.
The figures comprised in the following group depend on the position of the words or phrases in the verse.
Leff u Neshr, literally, ‘Fold and Spread:’ this consists in naming two or more subjects and subsequently naming their respective attributes, as in this couplet of Nedím: —
‘They’ve distilled the rose’s
broidered daintily its
‘One is made thyone is made the
for thee.’1
We have this figure in English, thus in Shakspere’s ‘Venus and Adonis:’ —
‘An 
that is stopped, or 
stayed,
more hotly, 
with more rage.1
Sometimes the order of the attributes is reversed, in which case the figure is said to be ‘Irregular.’
Ἅks or ‘Antistrophe:’ this consists in the reciprocal conversion of the same words in different clauses, as in this couplet from Sheykh Ghálib’s allegory ‘Beauty and Love:’ —
Etdi rukh-i husni nesteren-zár
Rukhsáre-i ῞ashq ve ῞ashq-i rukhsár‘The face of Love and the love of (his) face
’Made Beauty’s cheek a bower of eglantine.’2
Here in the rukhsáre-i ῞ashq (face of love) and ῞ashq-i rukhsár (love of face) the words are mutually reversed.
Tard u Ἅks or ‘Epanodos:’ this consists in forming the second line of a distich from the reversed halves of the first line, as in this couplet: —
‘The season of youth is the time to acquire knowledge,
‘The time to acquire knowledge is the season of youth.’1
In the foregoing example the conversion is complete and the figure is called ‘Perfect;’ when it is less complete, the figure is ‘Imperfect.’ We have the figure in English, as in this couplet of Milton: —
‘O more exceeding love, or law more just;
‘Just law indeed, but more exceeding love.’
Redd-ul-Ἅjzi ῞ale-s-Sadr or ‘Epanadiplosis:’ this consists in repeating in the second hemistich of a couplet a word or phrase that occurs in the first. It has several varieties according to the position of the repeated word, its ‘Perfect’ form being when the first word of the first line is made the last word of the second.
I῞áde or ‘Epanastrophe:’ in this figure the last word of one couplet is made the first of the next. When a poem is formed upon this plan it is said to be Mu῞ád.2
the homonymous words have exactly the same form and sound, as in this couplet: —
Ider iráqa-i dem hasretiñ-la cheshmánim;
Terahhum it, nije dem dir esír-i hijrán im.‘Through yearning for thee my eyes pour forth blood;
‘Have pity! how long a time am I the thrall of separation!’1
Here the Arabic word dem, ‘blood;’ and the Persian word dem, ‘time,’ have exactly the same form and sound.
The Jinás is said to be Mefrúq or ‘Disjoined’ when the two terms are not written alike, as in this example: —
Rukhsáriñi, ey dilber, áyíneye beñzetdim;
Veh! veh! ne khatá etdim! ayi neye beñzetdim?‘O fair one, I likened thy face to the mirror;
‘Alack! alack! what a mistake I have made! to what have I likened the moon?’2
Here the word áyíneye ‘to the mirror’ is matched by the two words ayi neye ‘the moon to what.’ By ‘the moon’ the face of the beauty is meant.
The Jinás is Merfú or ‘Repaired’ when one of the terms is completed only by adding to it a portion of another word, as in this couplet by Safá Bey: —
Yoq-ken guneshiñ eshi semáde
Bir esh gurinurdi shemse máde‘Though the sun has no mate in the sky,
‘There appeared a mate to the sun in the water.’3
Here to match the single word semáde ‘in the sky’ the last syllable of shemse ‘to the sun’ has to be taken along with the word máde ‘in the water.’ The mate of the sun in the water is of course the reflection. This variety of Homonymy has always been very popular, even from the earliest times. The following English example will make the principle quite clear: —
Wandering far, they went astray,
When fell on the hills the sun’s last ray.
The Jinás is said to be Láhiq or ‘Contiguous’ when the two words have the same letters except one letter in each of the two; this irregular letter may be initial, medial or final. In this example it is the initial letter that is irregular:
Sebáti yoq bu ῞álemiñ, aña kim i῞timád ider
Ferah gelir, terah gider, terah gelir, ferah gider.‘Inconstant ever is the world, and he who doth thereon repose
‘Now gladly .comes, now sadly goes, now sadly comes, now gladly goes.’1
The ‘gladly’ and ‘sadly’ of the translation, which represent the ferah and terah of the original, suggest the Jinás.
The Jinás is Náqis or ‘Defective’ when one of the terms has an extra letter, initial, medial or final.2
The Jinás is Muharref or ‘Altered’ when the letters of the terms are all alike, but the vowel points differ, as in the couplet: —
Shehriñ ichinde shuhreti artar jemáliniñ
Evsáf-i verd-i ῞árizi vird-i zebán olur.‘The fame of her beauty increaseth in the city,
‘The praise of her rose-cheek is the theme of (every) tongue.’3
Here the letters in the words vrd ‘rose’ and vrd ‘theme’ are alike, it is only the vowel points (usually unmarked in Eastern writings) that differ.
The Jinás is said to be Khattí or ‘Scriptory’ when the form of the two words is the same, but the dots differ.1
Qalb or ‘Anagram:’ this is reckoned among the varieties of the Jinás. When the transposition of the letters is total, as in the English words ‘live’ and ‘evil,’ the Anagram is said to be ‘Perfect.’ This verse contains an example: —
Öñine ebr-i siyáhi chekerek,
Etdi pinhán kelef-i bedri felek.‘Drawing a dark cloud before it,
‘The sky concealed the freckles (i. e. the spots) of the moon.’2
When the transposition of the letters is only partial, the Anagram is said to be Ba῞z or ‘Partial.’3
Qalb-i Musteví or ‘Palindrome:’ in this, which is an extended anagram, a complete line, sometimes a complete distich, is the same when read backward or forward.4
In the Jinás-i Muzdevij or ‘Coupled Homonymy’ part of an antecedent word subsequently forms a whole word, as in this couplet of Sám!: —
Qachan kim nukte-senj olub achar ol máh-i gulfem fem
Rumúz-i ῞ilm-ul-esmádan urmaz dakhi Adem dem.‘When that rosy Moon opens her mouth in subtle sayings
‘Adam no longer brags about the mysteries of thc Science of Names.’5
There is another variety of this figure in the following distich of the same poet: —
Shf῞a-vesh ákhir olur qámeti álámda lám
Chiqaran waz῞-i teberra ile dushnámda nám‘At last will the form of him become a lám1 through woes who like the Shí῞a2
‘Maketh his name by introducing denunciation in abuse.’3
Mushákele: this figure consists in using a word twice consecutively, once in a natural, and once in a figurative sense.
Ishtiqáq or ‘Paronymy:’ this consists in bringing together words derived from a common root, as in this couplet of Fu῾ád Pasha: —
Hukúmet hikmet ile mushtetek dir,
Vezír olan hakím olmaq gerek dir.‘Authority and wisdom should go together;
‘He who is vezir, he should be wise.’4
Here the words hukúmet ‘authority,’ hikmet ‘wisdom,’ and hakím ‘wise,’ are all derived from the Arabic root H K M.
Shibh-i Ishtiqáq or ‘Quasi-Paronymy:’ in this the words, though apparently of common derivation, are in reality not so, as in the line: —
Qalir-mi básira khálí khayál-i khálindan?
‘Will the eye bide void of the image of her mole?’5
Here the Arabic words khálí ‘void’ and khayál ‘image’ and the Persian word khál ‘mole,’ though they resemble one another, are all three quite distinct in origin.
The next group contains figures dependent on the letters composing the words.
Hazf: this consists in using only words formed entirely of undotted letters; a poem composed of such words is said to be Mahzúf. Menqút: this is the reverse of the preceding, and consists in using only words formed entirely of dotted letters. Raqtá: this consists in arranging words so that the letters are dotted and undotted alternately. Khayfá: this consists in using alternately words composed wholly of dotted and wholly of undotted letters. Muqatta῞: this consists in using words none of the letters of which join. Muwassal: this consists in using words all of the letters in which join. The late Ziyá Pasha has two Mahzúfqasídas, both of which are printed in his great anthology called the Kharábát or ‘Tavern;’ but I have not met any Turkish examples of the other varieties though they are mentioned in books on rhetoric and illustrated by trivial Persian verses.
A number of points connected with the manipulation and arrangement of rhyme are likewise reckoned among the rhetorical figures Of these the most important are: —
Irsád or ‘Preparation:’ this consists in hinting or suggesting to the reader or hearer of a poem in monorhyme — once he knows the rhyme-sound — what will be the rhymeword before he reaches the end of the distich, as in this couplet from a ghazel of Ἅsim Efendi the famous translator into Turkish of the great Arabic and Persian dictionaries named respectively the Qámús and the Burhán-i Qáti῞:
Nije bir khidmet-i makhlúq ile makhzúl olalim? —
Sá῞il-i Haqq olalim, ná῞il-i mes῾úl olalim.‘Wherefore should we be cast off serving the creature? —
‘Let us pray of God, let us attain our prayer!’1
Here the reader having learned from the word makhzúl in the first line that the rhyme-sound is úl (the olalim is a redíf), is prepared on encountering the word sá῾il at the beginning of the second to meet its passive form me῾súl as the rhyme-word.
Iltizám or ‘Supererogation,’ also called Luzúm-i má lá Yelzem or ‘Making Necessary the Unnecessary,’ and I῞nát: this consists in using a given letter or sound in addition to what the rules of rhyme demand. One variety has been described in the note on page 75.
Zú-l-Qáfíyeteyn or ‘Double-Rhyme:’ here each rhyming line of the poem has two distinct rhymes. When these are contiguous the Double-Rhyme is said to be Mutaqarrin or ‘Adjacent,’ as in this couplet of Nábi: —
Efzúní-i
dir,
Ser-máye-idir.
‘Increase of life is in scantness of trouble,
‘The fund of salvation is in the lightness of (one’s) load.’1
Here the rhyme-words kem-ázárliqda and sebuk-bárliqda (the dir is a redíf) are immediately preceded by the rhyming words hayát and neját.
When one or more words intervene between the two rhyming words the Double-Rhyme is said to be Mahjúb or ‘Screened,’ as in this couplet also by Nábí: —
esír-i dest-i
digil-mi dir?
zebún-i penche-i
digil-mi dir?
‘Is not the world thrall in the hand of Will?
‘Is not man powerless in the grasp of (the Divine) Might?’2
Here several words intervene between the rhyme-words ῞álem — meshíyet and ádem — qudret.
Zú-l-Qawáfí or ‘Polyrhyme:’ here each rhyming line of the poem has more than two rhymes as in this couplet again by Nábí: —
Pá-der-gil-i
Píchídé-i‘Discoursing of Thee are the reed-pens stuck fast in the clay of agitation;
‘Imagining Thee, do the treatises writhe on the bed.’1
Here there are three pairs of rhymes, telásh and firásh, maqálin-la and khayálin-la, khámeler and námeler. The Polyrhyme also can be ‘Screened,’ as well as ‘Adjacent’ as in the foregoing example.
Tersí῞ literally ‘Bejewelling:’ this is a yet further elaboration of rhyme in which each word in the first hemistich bas a corresponding word of the same rhyme and measure in the second, the only exceptions being parts of the verb substantive and particles, which are repeated. Poetry thus rhymed is said to be Murassa῞ or ‘Bejewelled.’ These lines offer an example: —
‘Autumnless may the spring of thy garden remain!
‘May He whose aid we pray bear off the peace of thy foe!’2
The two lines that follow show how this trick would work out in English: —
Thine be cheery gladness, yea, and déar delight!
Mine be wealy sadness, aye, and drear despite!
There are further a few miscellaneous figures, the most noteworthy of which are the following.
Berá῞at-i Istihlál ‘Eloquent Presagement:’ this consists in foreshadowing at the opening of a long poem, such as a romantic mesneví, the subject of the poem and the manner of its treatment. This figure is very common in prose works also.
Telmí῞: this consists in writing a poem partly in Turkish and partly in Arabic or Persian, the lines or half-lines being alternately in the one language and the other. Poetry composed in this macaronic fashion is said to be Mulemma῞ or ‘Pied.’
When poetry can be scanned in more than one metre it is said to be Mutelevvin or ‘Polychromatic.’
Acrostic verse is called Muveshshah.
The foregoing list of figures, though very far from complete, is sufficient for our purpose, and will moreover give some idea of the extremely elaborate character of the Oriental Art of Rhetoric. But now, so far as Turkey is concerned, this old Eastern art is a thing of the past. Its knell was sounded when in 1299 (1881–2) Ekrem Bey published his Ta῞lím-i Edebíyát or ‘Lessons in Composition.’ In that admirable work where for the first time the canons of Western literary taste were systematically placed before the Turkish student, the entire rhetorical system is revolutionised. The old divisions of Ma῞ání, Beyán and Bedí῞ are abolished, and nine tenths of the figures we have been considering are swept away as incompatible with earnestness and sincerity in modern times. But as up till then the old system held undisputed sway, the attention we have bestowed on it is justified.
1 The Qudatqu Bilik has been published along with a German translation and an interesting and valuable Introduction by Professor Vámbéry: Uigurische Sprachmonumente und das Kudatku Bilik, von Hermann Vámbéry, Innsbruck, 1870.
2 Veled Chelebi says it was written in A. H. 500 (A. D. 1106–7), but perhaps the true date is somewhat later. Khoja Ahmed-i Yeseví, i. e. Khoja Ahmed of Yesi (in Turkistán), was the most famous of the early Turkish Sheykhs. According to a Persian work entitled Khazínet-ul-Asfiyá or ‘The Treasury of the Pure,’ by One Ghulám Muhammed, Khoja Ahmed died in his native town of Yesi in A. H. 562 (A. D. 1166–7).
1 Some call it Musejjac.
1 A description of Ἅlí’s poem, with a number of extracts, is given by Th. Houtsma in the 34th. Vol. (that for 1889) of the Journal of the German Oriental Society.
1 The exception referred to occurs in what is technically called Mu’esses Rhyme. Here the rhyme-letter (technically named the Reví) is preceded by a short vowel (technically named the Tevjíh), which again is preceded by a consonant (technically named the Dakhíl), which in its turn is preceded by a long vowel (technically named the Te’sís). Now while in such rhyme the Reví, the Tevjíh and the Te’sís must be the same, the Dakhíl need not be the same; thus the words Jázib, Kátib, Tálib are all good rhymes in Persian and Turkish. Such rhymes would be paralleled in English by ‘baker,’ ‘hater,’ ‘paler,’ words which we should regard as merely assonant, not as really rhyming. When the Dakhíl also is made the same, as in the words Jazíb and Kázib, Kátib and Rátib, Tálib and Ghálib, the resultant rhyme is reckoned by the Easterns as a rhetorical embellishment, and classed as a variety of the figure called Iltizám or ‘Supererogation.’ With this exception the principle of Perso-Turkish rhyme is virtually the same as that of English.
1 Belíghí, a janissary poet of the time of Murád III, has a Ghazel on this subject.
1 The couplet in which the transition is made bears the technical name of Guríz i. e. ‘Flight,’ or Guríz-gáh i. e. ‘Place of the Flight’ some writers, however, apply the term Guríz-gáh to the whole Nesíb or ‘Exordium.’
1 A Qasída containing such couplets is technically called Zát-ul-Matálí῞ or ‘Possessor of Matlacs;’ and the couplets themselves are respectively styled the First Matla῞ Second Matla῞, Third Matla῞, and so on.
1 This is a variation of the fundamental metre called Hezej; the misra῞ to which the Ziyáde is added must scan: 
and the Ziyáde: 
2 When the third line rhymes with the others the poem is called a Rubá‘í-i Musarra῞ or ‘Rhymed Quatrain.’
1 By far the best of the English translations of ῞Omar-i Khayyám is that by Mr. John PaYne, (VillOn Society, 1898.)
1 In many of Yeseví’s poems the first stanza is irregularly rhymed, the second line often rhyming with the fourth instead of with the first and third, which two occasionally do not even rhyme together. All these variations reappear in the Ottoman Turki.
1 Every letter in the: Ottoman alphabet has a numerical value.
2 An example may help to make this clearer. Belgrade was won back from the Austrians by Mehemmed Pasha in the year of the Hijre 1152 (A. D.1739). Rághib Pasha commemorated this victory in the following chronogram:
‘Driving out the paynim host, I have told the chronogram thereof:
‘Mehemmed Pasha hath taken the fortress of Belgrade.’
‘Here the sum of the letters in the second (the chronogrammatic) line is 2003, which is 851 in excess of what is required. Now the sum of the letters in the words‘the paynim host’ is 851; this, ,we are told, has been ‘driven out,’ so. we understand that we must ‘drive out’ or subtract the sum 851 from 2003, on doing which we get 1152, the year of the victory.
1 This ‘Enigma’ on the name Ἅbbás by the poet Hashmet will serve as an example of the class: —
1 The presence of 
in a Turkish word does not indicate, as it would in an Arabic or Persian word, a long vowel; these letters are introduced merely as guides to the pronunciation; and thus in early books written while the orthography was quite unfixed we find spellings like 
which may stand for either 
which may stand for either 
or 
The letters 
were subsequently introduced into these and other words in order to avoid confusion, not to indicate long vowels. So it is incorrect in transliterating to mark such vowels as long; thus 
‘pretty’ ought to be transliterated guzel, not gῡzel or gúzel, which is not only inaccurate, but is misleading, as the accent falls not on the first, but on the second syllable.
2 Or, in more high-flown language, Hisáb-ul-Benán.
1 The authorities differ as to the exact theoretical number; but practically only eight are in use among the Turks.
2 In every case the scheme shown is that of a single hemistich.
(1) The Teshbíh or ‘Comparison’ (including both our Simile and Metaphor).
(2) The Isti῞áre or ‘Trope,’ that is the employment of a word in other than its proper sense, thus in this line of Sheykí, the words ‘day’ and ‘night,’ which stand respectively for ‘face’ and ‘hair’ are isti῞áres or ‘tropes.’
(3) The Mejáz-i Mursel or ‘Synecdoche.’
(4) The Kináye or ‘Metonymy.’
In the last two cases the translations are merely approximate, as several classes of the Mejáz-i Mursel would be reckoned by Western rhetoricians as varieties of the Kináye or ‘Metonymy,’ and vice versa. Each of these four subdivisions of the Beyán is further divided into numerous classes. The modem Ottoman rhetoricians restrict the Kináye to ‘Inuendo,’ which in old times was one of its classes.
‘She veiled the day with the night,’
1 The four subdivisions of the ῞Ilm_i Beyán are:
1 The Mubálagha or ‘Hyperbole’ is divided into three classes:
(1) Teblígh, when the exaggeration is possible both to reason and experience.
(2) Ighráq, when the exaggeration is possible to reason but not to experience.
(3) Ghuluvv, when the exaggeration is possible neither to reason nor to experience.
2 i. e. allusions to incidents in history, romance, etc., with which the cultured reader is supposed to be familiar.
1 In the Tazmín the poet quotes the first line of a couplet by another poet, but substitutes a line of his own for the second.
2 The best-known example in Turkish is the beautiful ghazel of Fuzúlí which begins: —
‘O Thou whose perfect Being is the Source of the secrets of wisdom!
‘Those things whose Source is Thine Essence are the vehicles for the manifestation of Thine Attributes.’
2 As in the words 
and 
and 
and 
1 As in the words 
and 
3 As in the words 
ihmál and 
ihmál; 
máder and 
máder; 
jání and 
nájí.
4 In this couplet of Nazmí each line is palindromic: —
‘Her blandishments are ruby (i. e. intoxicating like ruby wine), the pain caused by her ruby (red lip) is anguish;
‘It (her ruby lip) is houri-like, the cure for that soul (i. e. the lover’s).’
The allusion in the second line is to the story in the Koran according to which God taught Adam the Names of all things, and then enquired them of the angels, who, being unable to tell them, were bidden hear them from Adam and then bow down in adoration before him. This they all did except Iblís who, being puffed up with pride, refused to obey the Divine command, whereupon he was driven from the presence of God, and became Satan.
1 i. e. become bent like the letter lám 
.
2 A Shf῞a is an adherent of the heretical sect that prevails in Persia, one of the customs of which is to denounce the first three Khalífas.
