Ahmed Pasha of Bursa

Ahmed Pasha of Bursa (c. 1426 – 1496/97) was the leading divan poet of fifteenth-century Ottoman Turkey — "sultan of poets" to his contemporaries — and at the same time a high officer of the ulema state: müderris, qadi, kazasker, tutor to Mehmed II and holder of the vizier's rank. ^{1 2} He is not the grand vizier Hersekzade Ahmed Pasha, nor the later Bursa mufti Ahmad Pasha ibn Khidr Beg; he was the son of Veliyyüddin Efendi, kazasker of Murad II. ² Where he was born is genuinely unsettled: Latifi and Gelibolulu Âlî give Bursa, while Sehi, Beliğ and Âşık Çelebi — citing the poet's own cousin and heir, Nazır Çelebi — give Edirne, and the TDV entry concludes Edirne is the likelier. ^{1 2} Fuad Köprülü reasoned that he was born shortly before or after 830/1426. ¹

Educated at Edirne, in Arabic and Persian among the learning of the day, Ahmed Pasha began as müderris of the Muradiye Madrasa at Bursa, and in 855/1451 he was appointed qadi of Edirne in place of Molla Hüsrev. ^{1 2} His own teacher had been the poet Melîhî, whom he later presented to Mehmed II and brought into the palace. ² Under Mehmed he rose fast: kazasker, then the sultan's companion (musahib) and tutor (hoca), then the rank of vizier; at the conquest of Constantinople the sultan kept him close and used him to raise the army's morale, and Sehi records that in camp his meticulous, hair-splitting care earned him the nickname "the sipahis' mufti". ²

The favour bred envy, and on the strength of gossip — the tezkires variously say he had addressed a word to one of the sultan's servants, or cast an eye on a favourite, or was framed by intriguers — Mehmed's anger fell on him: Âşık Çelebi says the sultan first meant to kill him and settled for imprisonment in the kapıcılar odası, while Latîfî places the prison at Yedikule. ^{1 2} From prison he sent the sultan his celebrated qasida on the refrain "kerem" — generosity — thirty-five couplets that won him his life and pardon, though the literary historian Ali Nihad Tarlan doubted the story and thought the poem had another occasion. ¹ He never returned to the palace: he was sent to Bursa on thirty akçe a day as trustee of the Orhaniye, Muradiye and Emir Sultan madrasa endowments, then served as sancakbeyi of Sultanönü (Eskişehir), Tire and Ankara. ^{1 2}

After Mehmed's death in 1481, Bayezid II restored his standing and appointed him sancakbeyi of Bursa, the city he had lived in and would die in — hence "Bursalı". ^{1 2} The TDV entry dates his death only to 902 AH, 1496–97; the Turkish article's heading gives 1497 against its own text's 1496, the Persian article gives 1496, and Wikidata preserves both. ^{2 1 3 4} He was buried in the türbe he had built beside the madrasa he founded near the Muradiye Mosque. ¹ His Divan, which he arranged at Bayezid II's command, opens with a 120-couplet münacat and a na't to the Prophet ﷺ and contains 352 ghazels beside qasidas — among them the famous "kerem", "benefşe" and "âb" poems — Arabic and Persian verse, and even a Greek couplet. ² Later poets from Ahî and Lâmiî to Necati and Bâkî wrote nazires to him, and the tezkire tradition, followed by Ziya Paşa and Muallim Naci, judged him the greatest poet raised between Şeyhi and Necati. ²