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The Tomb of Ghāzī Evrenos bey at Yenitsa and its Inscription

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 December 2009

Vasilis Demetriades
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Yenitsa, in Ottoman Turkish Yenije-i Vardar or Vardar Yenijesi, is a small town some 50 km. west of Thessaloniki. Situated at the foot of Mount Païkon, near the lake of the same name (which was drained several years ago), it was in the Ottoman period an important Turkish military and cultural centre, particularly as being the base of the ghāzīs, the ‘warriors for the Faith’, who had followed the great march-lord (uj-begi) Evrenos on his campaigns in Thrace and Macedonia. Very early, perhaps as early as 1372, Evrenos had come to Central Macedonia with his followers and settled in this place, where already there was probably a Byzantine castle. There soon grew up a township, from which Evrenos and his sons and grandsons set out on repeated raids in all directions, devastating the countryside and preparing the way for the definitive occupation of Macedonia, and later of Albania, by the ‘central’ apparatus under the command of the sultan. It is probable that the several occupations of various towns in this area, such as Veria (Turkish: Karaferye) and Thessaloniki, were the achievement of these raiders. Yenije soon had a con-siderable Turkish population, so that in 1430, after the final occupation of Thessaloniki, Murad II was able to order the deportation from there to the newly-conquered city of a thousand Turkish families without reducing Yenije's prosperity.

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Articles
Information
Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , Volume 39 , Issue 2 , June 1976 , pp. 328 - 332
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Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London 1976

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References

1 For the history of the town during the Ottoman period, see Kiel, M., ‘Yenioe Vardar (Vardar Yenicesi—Giannitsa), a forgotten Turkish cultural centre of Maoedonia of the 15th and 16th century’, Byzantina Neerlandica, III, 1972, 300–29Google Scholar, and further: Demetriades, V., I Kentriki kai Dytiki Makedonia kata ton Evliya Čelebi, Thessaloniki, 1973, 207–34Google Scholar; idem, ‘Ena firmani gia tin anegersi tis protis ekklisias ton Genitson’, Makedonika, IX, 1969, 324–35.Google Scholar

2 For Evrenos and his descendants see the articles by İ. Uzunçarşili, H. in İslâm ansiklopedisi, IV, 414–18Google Scholar, and by Mélikoff, I. in Encyclopaedia of Islam, second ed., II, 720–1Google Scholar; also Demetriades, , Makedonia, 68–9, 216–19.Google Scholar

3 The Turks, most probably Evrenos's followers, appeared as raiders in Macedonia for the first time during the spring of 1372, see Loenertz, E. J., Les recueils de lettres de Démétrius Cydonès, Città del Vaticano, 1947, 175Google Scholar, and also Vakalopoulos, A. E., Istoria tis Makedonias 1354–1833, Thessaloniki, 1969, 29.Google Scholar

4 Demetriades, , Makedonia, 22–4, 208–9Google Scholar, and, for the name Yenioe, 62–4.

5 Vakalopoulos, , op. cit., 29–30, 35–49Google Scholar; Demetriades, , Makedonia, 17–18.Google Scholar

6 Anagnostis, Ioannis, Diigisis peri tis teleftaias aloseos tis ThessalonikisGoogle Scholar, in Migne, PG, CLVI, col. 624; Tsaras, Giannis, Ioannou Anagnostou Diigisis…, Thessaloniki, 1958, 62.Google Scholar

7 According to Evliyā Čelebi, he built in Yenije a small mosque (masjid), a theological school (madrasa), a hospice (‘imāret), situated near his tomb, from which food was distributed to everyone in need, a bath, and a great caravanserai, where 500–600 persons could be accommodated and fed without charge (Seyāḥatnāme, VIII, 171–2Google Scholar; Demetriades, , Makedonia, 217–22).Google Scholar Besides the villages mentioned above, Evrenos had devoted to the maintenance of these pious foundations the revenues of a vast summer-pasture (yayla) on Mount Paīkon and of the nearby lake of Yenije (Seyāḥatnāme, VIII, 174Google Scholar; Demetriades, , Makedonia, 225–7).Google Scholar (I am preparing, from the surviving registers, a complete list of the villages and čiftliks belonging to the waqf.) The very suspect ‘berāt’ by which Murād I purportedly bestowed these properties on Evrenos has been examined most recently by Beldiceanu-Steinherr, I., in Recherches sur les actes des règnes des sultans Osman, Orkhan et Murad I, München, 1967, 228–36.Google Scholar

8 Vakalopoulos, , op. cit., 49–55.Google Scholar

9 For Sheykh Ilāhī, see Kiel, . op. cit., 308–10Google Scholar; Demetriades, , Makedonia, 127–8Google Scholar; for Naoussa in the Ottoman period, see Demetriades, , 245–8.Google Scholar

10 Kiel, , op. oit., 308–16Google Scholar; Demetriades, , Makedonia, 231–2.Google Scholar

11 Kiel is mistaken in stating (318–20) that the baths were built by Aḥmed Bey and that they have been demolished: they are still standing, hidden by the ruined building of a Greek school.

12 Kiel identifies the Great Mosque with that built by Evrenos's grandson Aḥmed (323–9). This cannot be correct. Evliyā records (VIII, 175–6) that ‘The tomb of Sheykh Ilāhī is in the mosque (mesjid) of Aḥmed Bey, situated on an eminence’, and later (176) that he is buried ‘where the medrese and the tekke stand’. The ruins of the madrasa were visible until a few years ago, situated near a small mosque on a hill at the north-western end of the town, so that it is this mosque, known in later times from its proximity to the barracks as the ‘Army Mosque’ (‘Asker Jāmi'i), which must be the mosque of Aḥmed Bey. The large mosque at the eastern entrance to the town must be that built (in 915/1509–10, according to Evliyā) by a later descendant, Iskender Bey: Evliyā mentions first (VIII, 170) the ‘Iskender Jāmi'i’, as being the largest in the town, and says that it is in the market (čārshū)—and the ruins of the market are still to be seen close by this large mosque.

13 See Voutierides, P., ‘Neai ellinikai poleis—Genitsa’, Panathinaia, XXV, 1912–1913, 210.Google Scholar Emīn Bey, Evrenos's descendant in the thirty-third generation, then owned large estates in the vicinity.

14 Seyāḥatnāme, VIII, 175Google Scholar; Greek translation (based on the Istanbul MSS rather than the printed text) in Demetriades, , Makedonia, 228–9.Google Scholar

15 The inscription was read with the help of my former tutor at SOAS, Professor V. L. Ménage, to whom I am most grateful for his suggestions.

16 n.q.l. is clear, although intaqala is the normal verb in such a context.

17 An Ottoman register (cited in Vakiflar Dergisi, II, 1942, 342) refers to Evrenos as ‘sa'īd al-ḥayāt wa shahīd al-mamāt’. The use of the term shahīd does not necessarily imply death in battle or by some sudden disaster: see Wittek, P., Das Fürstentum Mentesche, Istanbul, 1934, 145–6Google Scholar, referring to Mordtmann, J. H.'s notes in Der Islam, XII, 1922, 223 and 225.Google Scholar

18 i.e. the ‘corner’ of the Stone, Black and the maqām IbrāhīmGoogle Scholar, see (e.g.) Encyclopaedia of Islam, art. ‘Ṭawāf’ (Fr. Buhl).

19 Evrenos's father was known as ‘Prangi’ ‘Īsā, after the name of the village where he was buried; the alternative name of the locality has been read as ‘Sircik’ (by Barkan, Ö. L., in VD, II, 1942, p. 342, no. 185)Google Scholar and ‘Kircik’ (by Uzunçarşili, İ. H., in Oamanli tarihi, I, second ed., 1961, p. 562, n. 5).Google Scholar Prangi is situated near the right bank of the river Evros (T: Meriç), some six km. east of Didymotikhon, and gave its name to a much-freqnented ferry-point over the river (Orhonlu, Cengiz, ‘Gemicilik’, Türkiyat Mecmuasi, XV, 1969, at pp. 160 and 169).Google Scholar

20 From ilā … apparently an anacolouthon: one expects al-muḥtāj ilā … preceding the name of the deceased; but compare the equally loose wording in two funerary inscriptions published by Âyânoğlu, F. İsmail in ‘Fatih devri rieali mezar taşlari ve kitâbeleri’ (VD, IV, 1958, 193–208): p. 195, no. 4 and p. 199, no. 17.Google Scholar

21 It is reported to have been used in the berāt, dated 793/1390, of Ghāzī ‘Alī Bey, a son of Köse Mikhāl, see İslâm ansiklopedisi, art. ‘Mihal-oğullari’ (by M. T. Gökbilgin), at cols. 285b, 289b.

22 Evliyā's mention of a ‘chronogram’ (in the context, netīje-i tārīkh budur, he must mean more than merely ‘date’) is puzzling. He must simply have made an error in writing up his notes (especially as a.d. 1417 would be a surprisingly early date for a true chronogram on an Ottoman monument).