Poet, panegyric, and patron: a Bahariye Kaside by Tacizade Caʿfer Çelebi for Sultan Bayezit II

Abstract

Scholarly attention to Central Asia's history and cultural heritage remain little known even among specialists in Islamic studies, but it is true also for the sixteenth century, the immediate aftermath of the Timurid period; study of literary patronage in the first half of the sixteenth century, for instance, in the several courts of Chinggisid rulers that emerged in the context of the decentralized "Shibanid" or "Abu-Khayrid" Uzbek polity in Mawarannahr, is limited to a handful of articles, and not surprisingly, relatively more attention has been devoted to literary production in Persian than to Chaghatay Turkic literature-even though this era is of central importance in the development of Chaghatay as a literary language. This chapters move between ancient and contemporary literature, exploring Sultan Selim's interest in dream interpretation, translating newly uncovered poetry and exploring the works of Orhan Pamuk. Linguistic complexities of the Turkish language and dialects are analyzed, new translations of sixteenth-century decrees offer insight into Ottoman justice and power.