On the Recensions of Uruj's 'History of the Ottomans'

Author(s): V. L. Mnage
Source: Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Vol. 30,
No. 2, Fiftieth Anniversary Volume (1967), pp. 314-322
Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of School of Oriental and African Studies
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/610995
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ON THE RECENSIONS OF
URUJ'S 'HISTORY OF THE OTTOMANS'
By V. L.

MINAGE

The so-called 'Anonymous Chronicles' of the Ottoman dynasty and the

closely related texts which pass under the name of Uruj present formidable
problems to an editor, for they are not ' histories ' in the classical sense, handed
down in copies made for scholars by professional copyists, but rather storybooks of the genre of the Battal-ndre and the Djnishmend-ndme,written for
the edification and entertainment of the ordinary man, so that many a
' copyist' was in effect a redactor or even an author, freely paraphrasing his
model, adding new stories or alternative versions of old ones, and occasionally
stitching together two recensions to make a new and fuller version.
The picture was further blurred by the fact that F. Giese, when he edited
the Anonymous Chronicles,' misapprehended the relationship of the texts
available to him. Most of the manuscripts which he used, and the others now
known to exist in Turkey,2 fall into two main recensions, which may be conveniently referred to, after the sigla given by Giese to the two Vienna manuscripts which represent them, as 'Type Wl' and 'Type W,'; the account in
the former reaches to the middle of the reign of Bdyezid II (1481-1512), that
1 Giese's introduction to his edition appeared first as 'Die Ailtestenosmanischen Geschichtsquellen ', Janus, I (Festschrift Lehmann-Haupt), 1921, 28-35, and then, much expanded and
with a full description of the MSS, as ' Einleitung zu meiner Textausgabe der altosmanischen
anonymen Chroniken ', Mitt. zur Osmanischen Geschichte,I, 1921, 49-75; there followed Die
altosmanischen anonymen Chroniken: Teil I, Text und Variantenverzeichnis,Breslau, 1922, and
Teil II, [Tbersetzung,Leipzig, 1925. The last, with some corrections to the text and valuable
notes communicated by J. H. Mordtmann, reaches only to Text, p. 125, the point at which the
MSS of Type W1 (see below) end.
2 Only one MS is listed in Istanbul Kiltilpaneleri tarih-cowrafyayazmalarn kataloglart, 2,
I,
1944, pp. 177-8, and that is a copy made for 'All Emirl of the Berlin MS (Giese's B) ; another,
wrongly identified as a Neshri, is described at p. 210. However MSS of this text are, as is only to
be expected, fairly common in Turkey; L. Forrer (' Handschriften osmanischer Historiker in
Istanbul', Der Islam, xxvI, 3, 1942, 173-220) lists seven, besides the 'All Emiri copy of B.
While in Turkey in 1958-9 I saw a few more. These MSS belong as follows to the three groups
into which Giese divided the MSS (all from European libraries) which were available to him:
(1) Type W1 : Istanbul University Library TY 3704 (Forrer, no. 10a); Siileymaniye, Bagdadlh
Vehbi 1233 (Forrer, no. 10b); Topkapi Sarayi, Sultan Reqad 700 (F. E. Karatay's catalogue,
no. 625) ; Belediye, Cevdet K 255 (fully described by Sadettin Buluq in Die Welt des Islams,
Sonderbd. (Festschrift Giese), 1941, 72-4); Type W2: Siileymaniye, Hiisrev 386 (Forrer,
no. 10d) ; Ankara, Tiirk Tarih Kurumu 41 (described by Ahmed Refiq, who thought it an Uruj,
in TTEM, xvI, 1926, no. 14 (91), 69-78) ; Konya, library of Bay Izzet Koyunoglu (published
by 1. H. Ertaylan as Begir Qelebi, Tevarih-i Al-i Osman, Istanbul, 1946, on which see A. Erzi in
Belleten, xIII, 1949, 181-5) ; to this group probably belongs also Aya Sofya 3018 (Forrer, no. 10g) ;
closely related are those which (like Giese's R) have continuations: Ankara, Tiirk Tarih Kurumu
85; Tiirk Tarih Kurumu 117 (dated 935/1529, and hence perhaps the oldest dated MS) ; Type
W,: Istanbul University Library TY 587 (Forrer, no. 10e) ; Stileymaniye, Haci Mahmud 4820,
ff. 83-99 (fragments only) ; Arkeoloji Miizesi 1331 (Forrer, no. 10h) ; Topkapi Sarayi, Revan
1100/1 (Karatay, no. 677 : a short continuation is appended to the W3 text) ; Topkapi Sarayl,
Revan 1101/2 (Karatay, no. 707; Forrer, no. 10f: has a short continuation). A hitherto
unrecorded type is presented by the Edirne MS briefly described on p. 322 below.

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ON THE RECENSIONS OF URUJ'S 'HISTORY OF THE OTTOMANS'

315

in the latter to various points in the middle of the reign of Siileyman I (1520-66).
In both Types the narratives begin with the same matter-the genealogy of
the Ottoman house, the migration of Ertoghrul's father Siileymanshah into
Rfim, and the exploits of Ertoghrul and 'Osman-and run parallel right down
to the events of the year 891/1486, early in the reign of Bdyezid II, at which
point they diverge completely. Up to this point of divergence, the great
distinction between the two Types is that W1 contains a number of passages in
verse and prose (some of them quite long) which are not found in W3.3 After
the divergence Type W1 gives its own fairly discursive account of the events of
the years 891-6, and then ends; du'ds for the prosperity of Bayezid II 4
leave no doubt that this recension was composed during his reign, presumably
shortly after the latest date which it records. Type W3, after giving a briefer
account for these years, proceeds with a detailed relation of events to a much
later point, the various MSS ending with the years 950/1543, 956/1549,
959/1552, or 963/1556.5 This continuation in Type W3 is not, however, all of
a piece: its entry for the year 899 closes with words which suggest that an
earlier recension had ended at this point,6 and it passes over in silence the
events of 900-4 and 908-14.7 In editing these chronicles Giese worked on the
assumption that the fuller version of Type W1 was the original text and Type
W, an abridgement of it, to which a continuation had been appended; up to
the point of divergence, therefore, his edition is based on Type W .8
F. Babinger then published 9 the texts of two further manuscripts, one
in Oxford (hereafter 0) and the other in Cambridge (C), which are similar in
content to the Anonymous Chronicles but which begin with a long proem
(dibdje),written in distinctly archaic language, on the virtues of the Ottoman
of 0 (but not of C) there appears, as the
Ghazi-Sultans; and in the dTba-je
author's name, ' Uruj b. 'Adil al-Qazzaz katib al-Edrenewi '. 0 is defective at
the end, breaking off short at the beginning of an entry for the events of
3 These passages peculiar to Type W1 occur mostly in the earlier pages of the work but a few,
both in prose and in verse, are found throughout the 'Legendary history of Constantinople'
(which occupies pp. 74-111 of Giese's text) ; in the later part of the text (events of 858 onwards)
Type W1 contains no verse passages but does have a few prose passages (here very short) which
are lacking in Type W,.
4 Giese, 'Einleitung', 62, referring to Text, p. 87, 1. 23, p. 116, 1. 13, p. 116, 1. 28.
5 Ever since Hammer (GOR,I, xxxvii), the authorship of this text has been generally ascribed
to the miderris and qddiMubyieddin b. 'All Jemlil (d. 957/1550), but the evidence for this
identification is tenuous : it consists only of the coincidence that Muhyieddin is reported to have
written a history of the Ottomans in Turkish (described by Tashk6prtizdde, tr. Mejdi, 390, as
bir kitdb-i latif-an epithet hardly appropriate to the Anonymous Chronicles), and that some
MSS of the Anonymous end with the events of the year preceding Muhyieddin's death.
6 Ed. Giese, p. 127, 1. 2 : ... hijretVa sekiz yaizdoksan dokuztnda idi. Andan-sogra Sultan
BayezddIstanbulda qardr ediib devlet irtifi'inda idi ; the entry for no year before this point is so
rounded off.
7 It is to be presumed that the redactor of Type W, based his text on a recension reaching to
899, added an account of the events of 905-7 (perhaps a short ghazd-nmme),and then resumed
the regular annalistic account with 915, the earliest year for which a record was available to him.
8 Thereafter Giese
gives, side by side, the independent accounts of the two Types down to
the point where MS Wxends (pp. 118-25), and then the continuation of Type W3 (pp. 125-53).
9 F. Babinger, Die friihosmanischen Jahrbucherdes Urudsch, Hanover, 1925.

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316

v. L. MANAGE

873/1468-9, while C, which is complete, ends with the events of 899/1493-4

(and with words closely echoing those which in Type W3 seem to indicate the
close of a recension).10 From a reference in 0 to Khalil Pasha (the Grand
Vizier executed in 857/1453) as 'the vizier of our time' 11 Babinger deduced
that Uruj was working in the reign of Mehemmed II, and claimed that he was
thus presenting the oldest Ottoman historical text in prose, the source for the
Anonymous Chronicles: these could now, he said, be seen to be nothing but
shortened, revised, or extended texts of Uruj.12
In his review of Babinger's edition,'3 G. Bergstraisser,comparing the content
of the two Uruj texts with that of the two main types of the Anonymous
Chronicles, demonstrated that the absence in Type W3 of the verse and prose
passages found in Type W, was not (as Giese had assumed) due to their having
been dropped by the redactor of Type W3,,for they were absent also in Uruj :
they had been interpolated by the redactor of Type W, into an earlierrecension,
whose text-at least as regards its content--is preserved more faithfully in the
Uruj texts and in the correspondingpassages of Type W3 of the Anonymous
Chronicles.
Two further manuscripts, in Paris, reaching to the year 908/1502-3, were
first noticed by Giese,'4 who referredto them as extended texts of Uruj. In an
exhaustive analysis Sadettin Bulug compared their contents with those of the
Uruj MSS 0 and C and of the two main types of the Anonymous Chronicles."5
The absence of any author's name in these MSS (hereafter P and Pa), together
with the appearance in the introduction (of P only) of the words 'from the
year 687 up to [this] year 900 ', led Bulug to conclude that P and Pa derive
from a compilation made in that year, to which an anonymous redactor had
added the continuation for 900-8; 16 Uruj himself, he believed, was the author
of a much older version, made perhaps as early as the first years of the reign of
Mehemmed II.17
A fifth manuscript became known in 1952 with the publication of the
catalogue of the Manisa Public Library.'8 Though this text (M) is slightly
defective at the beginning and the end, most of the dTbajeon the Ghdzi-Sultans
10 Ed.
Babinger, 139: ... hijretilV sekiz yfiz doksan dokuzinda idi. Andan Sultdn Bcyezid
devlet i sa'ddetle Qostantiniyyedeqardr edlb her gun devlet i sa'ddet artmakda idi (cf. p. 315, n. 6,
above; the resemblance is still closer in the Arabic script, where irtifl'inda and artmakdahave
nearly the same outline).
11 Ed. Babinger, p. 20, 1. 4: zamanfmfzda vezir, a phrase lacking at the corresponding point
in C (= p. 92, 1. 18) and in the Anonymous Chronicles (ed. Giese, p. 20, 1. 22).
12 Ed. Babinger, introduction, viii-ix.
1s In OrientalischeLiteraturzeitung,xxIx, 1926, cols. 433-8.
14 F. Giese, Die altosmanische Chronik de8 'A8iipadazdde, Leipzig, 1929, introduction, 14
and 26.
15 Sadettin Bulug, Untersuchungen iber die alto8manischeanonyme Chronik der Bibliothique
Nationale zu Paris, suppl. turc 1047, anc. fonds turc 99, Breslau, 1938 (hereafter Untersuchungen).
16
17 Untersuchungen,54-5.
Untersuchungen,11, 19.
18 Ismet Parmaksizoglu, Manisa Genel
KaitLphanesi: tarih-cografyayazmalars, I, Istanbul,
1952, p. 9, no. 12. By the courtesy of the authorities of the Bibliothbque Nationale and of the
Turkish Libraries Directorate I have microfilms of P, Pa, and M.

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ON THE RECENSIONS OF URUJ'S 'HISTORY OF THE OTTOMANS'

317

(as found in MSS 0 and C) survives, together with the mention (as in O) of the
author's name. Where P in the introduction has '900', M reads '906';
M's last pages bring the account down to the events of 907/1501-2. As H.
Inalcik has pointed out,19 the scope of this manuscript, undoubtedly the work
of Uruj himself, undermines Babinger's claim that Uruj had composed his
work under Mehemmed II.
A revealing light is thrown on the chronological sequence of the various
texts by the analysis of their differing versions for the tale of the 'Dream of
Ertoghrul' and other tales related to it.
(1) All texts of the Anonymous Chronicles relate the story in very similar
terms. The gist of this (the most familiar) account is as follows (ed. Giese,
p. 6, 1. 14-p. 7, 1. 9).
' It is related that A{one night when Ertoghrul was still alive he dreamed a
strange dream. In the morning he pondered the dream and went [from
Ankara] to Konya, where there was an interpreter of dreams named 'Abdul'aziz
to whom he told his dream. Some have said that the interpreter was a holy
sheyLhnamed Edeball [his virtues, etc.]. Ertoghrul told him, " I saw a moon
rise from your bosom and enter mine. Then a tree sprang from my navel;
there were mountains in its shade, and from them streams flowed to water the
land ". The sheykhsaid, " You will have a son named 'Osman, who will fight
many ghazds.} B Your descendants will be padishahs; your son will marry
my daughter, and their line will be pddislAhs ". Some time later 'Osman was
born. When he grew up he married that sheykh'sdaughter, and she bore him

a son,Orkhan.'

The redactor of this account evidently knew of two versions of the story:
in the one, the dream is interpreted by a certain 'Abdul'aziz, who lived at
Konya; but the redactor prefers and mainly follows another version in which
the interpreter is a sheykh named Edeball (who also, it is implied, lived at
Konya). The daughter is not named, but the similar account given by
'Ashiqpashazddesuggests that in the original ' Edeball version' her name was
Malkhun (and that Edebali lived near S6uiit).2o
(2) The original ''Abdul'aziz version' is found in MS Aya Sofya 2705, a
mejmii'a containing 11 short works. The eighth (ff. 68v-76r) is a brief
Tevdrikh-iAl-i 'Osmain,consisting mainly of a list of dates (the latest being 960)
for the events of Ottoman history, but beginning with an unusual and discursive
19 'The rise of Ottoman historiography', in B. Lewis and P. M. Holt (ed.), Historians
of the
Middle East, London, 1962, 152-67 (at p. 152).
20
'ABhiqpashaz~de'saccount (? 4) is very close in verbal detail to that of the Anonymous
Chronicles, but has some important differences : the dreamer is not Ertoghrul but 'OsmAn,there
is no mention at all of 'Abdul'aziz, the girl is named (as Malkhun), and Edeball is evidently
living not at Konya but somewhere near S6giit. In making these modifications to the story,
'Apz. was perhaps influenced by what he had been told in his youth by ' Edeball oglI Mahmiid
Pasha' (end of ? 4). All the same it is strange that he does not name Edeball until nearly the
end of the story (ed. Giese, p. 10, 1. 13) : up to that point the interpreter of the dream has been
merely 'a certain sheykh'.

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318

V. L. MANAGE

story of the origin of the Ottomans.21 The relevant part (ff. 69v-71v) runs
as follows.
'Though Ertoghrul had many concubines (jYriye), he had no children, and
was continually praying to God to send him a son. He married a pious lady,
and one night dreamed a dream. In the morning he rode [from " S6giitcek "]
to Konya, and told his dream to a vizier of Sultan 'Alaeddin named 'Abdul'aziz,
who was a great astrologer. He said, " In my dream a spring (pinar) flowed
from my hearth (ojak) and covered the world like a sea ". 'Abdul'aziz consulted
his astrolabe and his books and said, " God will give you a son, whose descendants will rule the world ". Ertoghrul praised God and returned home. A son
was born to him and named 'Osman. 'Osman succeeded his father after his
death; he was an even mightier warrior, with over a thousand followers.
marched under the son of the Emperor of
C {The Byzantines (Rum
'Alaeddin. 'Osman divided his warriors into three
Constantinople to attack t.'ifesi)
groups, made a night attack from three sides, and defeated them. He took
much booty, and sent half of it to 'Alaeddin. 'Alaeddin was astonished at
'Osman's prowess, and sent 'Abdul'aziz to him with gifts of armour from the
treasury, fifty files of camels, fifty files of [mules],22and the White Standard of
the Prophet which he had received from the Sultan of Egypt. } D 'Abdul'aziz
had a beautiful daughter: she too was sent, and also a standard and a drum.
'Osman went out to meet 'Abdul'aziz and entertained him. Next morning
E F
{'Osman made the gLhusland went out riding with his followers. When
they were about to turn back a cloud of dust was seen. From it emerged an
armed infidel beg,who called, " Which of you is 'Osman ? " ' [The begis named
Mikhal. The Prophet, appearing to him in a dream, had given him the name
'Abdullah and told him to seek out and join his servant 'Osman, who had the
Prophet's White Standard; Mikhal'sdescendants would make conquests as far
as Hungary. Mikhal came up and made the profession of faith before
'
'Osman.] H I Some days later 'Abdul'aziz returned to 'Alaeddin and told him
what had happened. 'Alaeddin sent to 'Osman the sword of the Caliph 'Osman
which the Sultan of Egypt had sent him.} G After 'Osman had married
'Abdul'aziz'sdaughterRabi'a, she bore him a son, Orkhan.'
Although the Aya Sofya MS is splendidly written, it offers a poor text:
the name Rdbi'a should presumably have appeared at an earlier point (just
after D), and the mention of the ghusl (after F) shows that a reference to the
marriage and its consummation has been omitted. Nevertheless the outline of
the story is clear. It has little in common with the 'Edeball version' : the
21 The first
part of this story, as told in the Aya Sofya MS, is summarized by Miikrimin Halil
in Isldm ansiklopedisi, art. ' Ertugrul G zi ', Iv, 332a, where he notes that MS Aya Sofya 2705/8
is an abridgement, with a continuation added, of the text preserved in MS Dresden Or. 111, an
anonymous history of the Ottomans reaching to the year 908. The story is reproduced in its
essentials by 'Ali (Kunh al-akhbir, v, 24), who says that he found it 'in an old book composed
under Biyezid II '--presumably the work contained in the Dresden MS.
22 The word katsr, missing in this MS, is to be supplied from the parallel passage in Uruj
(p. 8, 1. 2 [0] = p. 83, 1. 14 [C]), described below as account (3).

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ONTHERECENSIONS
OFURUJ'S
'HISTORY
OFTHEOTTOMANS'

319

dream is different, the interpreter is an astrologer-vizier and not a sheykh,and

whereas the sheyh's daughter is not named in the Anonymous Chronicles the
vizier's daughter is here named Rtbi'a.
(3) The account given in the Uruj MSS 0 and C is a combination of these two
versions (ed. Babinger,p. 7,1. 6-p. 10,1. 20 [MS O] - p. 82, 1. 21-p. 86, 1. 2 [MS C]).
'After Ertoghrul died, 'Osman succeeded him.' [Now follows, almost
verbatim as in the Aya Sofya MS, the story of 'Osman'sdefeat of the Byzantine
army and of 'Alaeddin's sending the presents (C-D), but with no mention yet
of 'Abdul'aziz or of the girl. The story continues :] ' 'Alaeddin sent the gifts by
a wise vizier named 'Abdul'aziz. 'Osman went out to meet him and entertained
him. Next day 'Abdul'aziz displayed the gifts and said, " The dream which
your father Ertoghrul dreamed and which Sheykh Edebali interpreted was
this... ".' [Now follows, but without the passing mention of 'Abdul'aziz,
section A-B of the version given in the Anonymous Chronicles; but after B
Edebali continues] ' "...and I shall have a daughter named Rdbi'a, who will
marry your son 'Osman; their descendants will be padishahs ". When
'Abdul'aziz brought the gifts from 'Alaeddin, there came also Sheykh Edeball
and his daughter, who was married to 'Osman. Next morning 'Osman made
the ghusl and went out riding... '. [Here follows the story of Mikhil, as in the
Aya Sofya text F-G, but with the addition, at H: 'Edeball and 'Abdul'aziz
rejoiced that they had lived to see that day'. The birth of Orkhanto 'Osman
and Rabi'a is recorded, after a digression, at p. 11, 11.24 ff. = p. 86, 11.22 ff.]
The redactor of this account has taken as its basis the ' 'Abdul'aziz version'
of the Aya Sofya MS (2), dropping its own dream story and interpolating into
it (at E) the dream story of the 'Edeball version' given in the Anonymous
Chronicles (1). The two versions are successfully woven together, so that the
story develops logically, except that we are invited to recall a dream of which
we have as yet heard nothing. The crucial modification is that the name
Rabi'a is transferred from 'Abdul'aziz's daughter (who in this account has
disappeared) to the daughter of Edeball.
This account, it is clear, can have arisen only from the conflation of the
two independent versions; so that on this criterion the redaction represented
by the Uruj MSS 0 and C represents a development from (and could not have
served as the source of) the text of the Anonymous Chronicles.
(4) MS M presents difficulties. That the redactor (presumably Uruj himself)
has, as he states explicitly, supplemented his model with passages borrowedfrom
'Ashiqpashazade23 causes some confusion, and more arises from the accident that
the first leaves of the MS are out of order and some of them are lost.24
23 At ff. 12r-13r, M presents almost verbatim the passage referring to 'Dervish Ahmed
'Ashiqi', which was quoted from MSS P and Pa by F. Giese (ed. of 'Apz., introduction, 26, and

Die verschiedenen Textrezensionen des 'A.iqpaiazdde...

Kl., 4), 5), and by S. Bulug (Untersuchungen, 47).

(Abh. Pr. Ak. Wiss.,

1936, Phil.-hist.

24 Comparison with O and P shows that the correct order of the first leaves of M is:
[1 leaf lost] 1-7 [lacuna] 10-13 [lacuna] 8-9 [lacuna] 14-24. The stories summarized here begin
on 10r and end on 9v.

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320

V. L. MeNAGE

The story begins, after a lacuna, with 'Osman's defeat of the Byzantine
army and 'Alaeddin's sending of the presents-not only the arms, the camels,
the mules, and the Standard of the Prophet, but also the sword of the Caliph
'Osman; there is no mention of 'Abdul'aziz (who in version 3 had, on two
occasions, brought the gifts). There follows the story of the dream in the
'Edeball version': it is no longer encapsulated in the 'Abdul'aziz story, as in
MSS O and C, but told as an independent incident; yet there appears in it
(as in MSS O and C) the name ' Rabi'a ' as that of Edeball's daughter, yet to
be born. [The redactor now introduces, from 'Ashiqpashazade,a short passage
on Edebali and his family, and describes how 'Ashiqpashazdde'sauthority had
been Yakhshi Faqih. He relates how 'Alaeddin left Ertoghrul to continue the
siege of Kara-hisar and defeated a Tatar army, and digresses to give the early
history of the state of Karaman. By a rather clumsy transition, he returns to
the Ottomans.] 'That was in the time of 'Osmdn Ghazi, and Ertoghrul too
was alive then. After the death of Sultan Ghiyaseddin (of Konya) Ertoghrul
could have conquered Karaman, but he preferredto wage the ghaza. One day
he recalled the dream which Edeball had interpreted and remembered how
God had granted his daughter to 'Osman. He summoned Rabi'a from Konya.
She came, escorted by all the nobles of Karaman, and was married to 'Osmin.
Next morning... '. [Now follows the story of Mikhal, from F but only as far
as H; here, whereas in MSS O and C both 'Abdul'aziz and Edeball rejoice,
this account has:] ''Osmdn's father-in-law Sheykh Edebali 'azhz had come
(i.e. from Konya) too, and all rejoiced to have seen that day.' The text continues: 'One day Ertoghrul died and 'Osman succeeded him', and 'Osmdn's
virtues are recounted. The mention of the birth of Orkhn has presumably
been lost with the next following leaf.
The redactor of this account has decided to dispense altogether with
'Abdul'aziz, and from this decision arise all the variants in the story. 'Abdul'aziz
is no longer available to recount to 'Osmin the story of Ertoghrul's dream, but
he is not needed, for Ertoghrul here survives to the time of the marriage and
arranges it himself. Since there is no 'Abdul'aziz to return to Konya and bring
the Caliph's sword (and indeed no 'Alaeddin still alive to send it), the sword is
sent earlier with the other gifts, in the one consignment.
This version is logically an improvement on (3) in that the redactor has
removed the anomaly of referringback to a dream that has not been mentioned.
That it is posterior to (3) is evident from the survival from the ' 'Abdul'aziz
version' of the name Rabi'a and the stories of the defeat of the Byzantines,
the sending of the presents, and the conversion of Mikhl (an echo of
'Abdul'aziz's name seems to linger in the phrase
Edebali 'azlz). Another
S.eykh to win a resounding
anomaly has, however, arisen: 'Osmdn is permitted
victory and to receive from 'Aleddin the insignia of authority in the lifetime
of his father, whereas in (3) Ertoghrul had died before these events.
(5) This anomaly has been removed in MSS P and Pa, where the redactor
has excised the whole episode of the defeat of the Byzantines and the sending

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OF URUJ'S'HISTORYOF THE OTTOMANS'

ON THE RECENSIONS
of the gifts.

The story now consists merely of the ' Edebali version'

321
of the

dream story (with the girl named Rabi'a), Ertoghrul's summoning of Rabi'a from
Konya, the marriage, and the conversion of Mikhal.
The sequence of the various accounts is therefore:

(1)

(2)

''Abdul'aziz version' ('Abdul'aziz'Edeball version' (Edebali-?Malkhun)

of the Anonymous Chronicles;
Rabi'a) of the Aya Sofya MS;
(3) the version, conflated from these ('Abdul'aziz, Edebali-Rabi'a), of MSS 0
and C;
(4) the revised version (Edebali-Rabi'a) of MS M;
(5) the shortened version (Edebali-Rabi'a) of MSS P and Pa.
That the redaction of MSS P and Pa (5) should prove to be posterior to
that of MS M (4), and that of the latter posterior to MSS 0 and C (3) is no
surprise: other features of their texts point straight to the same conclusion.
But the proof that (3), the 'Uruj ' story of MSS 0 and C, derives from the
version common to all recensions of the Anonymous Chroniclestends to reverse
the view generally held 25 on the connexion between these two groups of texts.
There are, it is true, two other features common to the Uruj MSS 0 and C
which indicate that they are posterior to the common ancestor of the existing
texts of the Anonymous Chronicles: some of their extra passages end with
words which suggest that they are interpolations; 26 and in their purely
annalistic sections they contain none of the (patently earlier) constructions in
-eldenberiiwhich here and there in both Types of the Anonymous Chronicles
have

from the chronological

incorporated by an early redactor.27
survived

list(s)

with

'retrospective'

dating

On the other hand there remains the fact that these two Uruj MSS contain
two principal features which seem to be anterior to any text of the Anonymous
Chronicles hitherto published or described: their regular, and apparently
reliable, mention of the names of the viziers and the beylerbeys during the
reigns of Mur5d II and Mehemmed II; 28 and the archaic dibdje on the
Ghazi-Sultanswith which they open.
This last, however, is no longer to be regarded as a diagnostic characteristic
of an 'Uruj ', for the same dibaje, without an author's name, introduces the
25 Miikrimin Halil, however, in an aside in Isldm ansiklopedisi,
Iv, 331, spoke of Uruj as
having used the Anonymous Chronicles as the basis for his own work.
26
e.g. Urudsch, p. 14, 11. 16-19 [0] = p. 88, 11.23-5 [C] (lacking at Anon., p. 13, 1. 16);
p. 41, 11.12-15 [0] = p. 108, 11.20-1 [C] (lacking at Anon., p. 52, 1. 13).
27 For these chronological lists see Historians of the Middle East (cited in n. 19 above), 157-9
(H. Inalclk) and 170-2 (V. L. M6nage), and further V. L. M6nage, Neshri's history of the Ottomans... , London, 1964, 14-16.
28 The first is at Urudsch,
p. 45, 1. 19 [0] = p. 112, 1. 1 [C] (sub anno 824), lacking at the
corresponding point in Anon., p. 55, 1. 13; the last is at p. 127, 1. 10 [C] (sub anno 876), lacking
at Anon., p. 113, 1. 22.

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322

ON THE RECENSIONS OF URUJ'S 'HISTORY OF THE OTTOMANS'

text preserved in the Edirne MS Badi Ahmed Ef. 480/2091,29 which, in spite
of the presence of the dibdje, contains none of the other principal features
associated with Uruj's work as represented by MSS 0 and C.30 On the contrary,
as far as the year 891 (the 'point of divergence' of Types W1 and W3 of the
Anonymous Chronicles) its text is, in content and scope, very close to that of
Type W3, being differentiated from it only by patently archaic features-still
more of the unassimilated constructions in -eldenberii,and a more elaborate
account of the last years and death of Murad II. The final solution to the
problem of this whole group of chronicles may well be found in this text and
others related to it.31
This much, however, seems to be already clear: the dibdjeof MSS 0 and C
(and M) survives from an earlier 'anonymous' text, its absence in the Anonymous Chronicles representing an omission, and the appearance in it (in MSS
O and M) of the name ' Uruj, son of 'Adil ' representing an interpolation. This
Uruj, there is no doubt, flourished in the reign of Bayezid II; he seems to
have made two main recensions of his work: the one, made in or soon after
900/1494-5, is represented by MSS 0 and C; the second, a revision with
interpolations from 'Ashiqpashazddeand a continuation to 908/1502-3, was
begun in 906/1500-1. The text of the latter, surviving only partially in the
defective MS M, is probably nearly all preserved in MSS P and Pa.
29 The MS consists of 102 fols., 14 x 10 cm. The main work in it, headed
Tevarikh-i Al-i
'Osmdn, consists of 89 fols. with 13 lines to the page, written in a small neat naskh, fully vocalized.
It is preceded by eight unnumbered fols., bound in later, of fragments (poems by Firdqi, Nejiti,
Mesilhi, and others) ; it is followed by a short work entitled K. Rdsat al-insin, written in the
same hand as the Tevrikh, and consisting of medical precepts and prescriptions. Nowhere in
the MS does a date of copying appear.
The Tevari begins with a dibdje which agrees almost verbatim with that of the Cambridge
MS Qf Uruj and, like C, contains no author's name. After the 5min (Urudsch, p. 4, 1. 16 [0],
cf. p. 80, 1. 14 [C]), the text begins, slightly differently from 0 and C but almost exactly as Type
W3 of the Anon. (ed. Giese, p. 4, 1. 5), with the words: IHikiyetdegetirmishlerdur kim 'Osman
Ghazi.... The historical account is brought down to 896/1491.
30 Thus there is no reference to Elvan
Nelebi's mendqib and no digression on Mikhil or on
Umur Beg of Aydin; there is no regular mention of the viziers and the beylerbeys; Khalil
Pasha is not called 'the vizier of our time '; there are no verses; and the dream of Ertoghrul
is interpreted by Edeball, with only a passing mention, as in Anon., of 'Abdul'aziz.
31 The recension represented by the Edirne MS appears also in the fragments of a text
bound in as the fifth and last section of the British Museum MS Add. 7870 (Rieu, CTM, 251b) ;
the last page has survived, to show that the text ended, exactly as the Edirne MS, with the words
Bayram namazint shehr-i Qos.tantiniyyedekilub barishiklik olub elki giri! gitmekde (the reference
being to the conclusion of peace with Egypt at the end of 896/1491, cf. Anon., p. 125, 1. 26) ;
there follows the date of copying, 1 Rajab 950/30 September 1543. The dib je, if there was one,
is lost, as are the pages recording the death of Murid II.
Also apparently belonging to this recension is MS E 50/643 of the Miize Kitapligi of Bursa,
described by Muharrem Ergin in TDED, Iv, 1-2, 1950, 112-13. It begins (without a dibaje) as
Type W3 of Anon. (p. 4, 1. 5 : Hikiyetde geturmishlerdfir.. .) and ends with the description of a
fire in Bursa in 896 (cf. Anon., p. 125, 11.24-5), the penultimate event mentioned in the Edirne
MS and the British Museum fragment.

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