Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XVI.djvu/77

 65 said by the Chinese to have received and trans- lated the Chinese classics and histories, and they are known also to have adopted to some extent the Buddhist doctrines and literature. The second era of Turkish culture dates from the conquest by Turkish tribes of the countries of Mohammedan Asia, beginning with the lat- ter half of the 10th century. Overrunning first the N. E. provinces of Iran, and finding there the new Persian literature beginning its career, their wild chiefs became its admirers, patrons, and imitators, and the Turkish mind and lan- guage received that strong Persian impress which they have ever since borne. The east- ern Turkish literature, or that produced beyond the Caspian, is usually called the Jagataian, from the name given to the country E. of the Oxus in the partition of the Mongol empire. It is much less abundant, and also much less known, than the literature of the western branch. Its most flourishing period was from the time of Tamerlane (1400) to that of Baber (died 1530). Its most admired author is Mir Ali Shir, the vizier of Sultan Hussein, and a munificent patron of Persian authors, particu- larly of the poet Jami; his most interesting work, perhaps, is his collection of biographies of earlier Jagataian poets, with specimens of their productions. The memoirs of his own life and times by Sultan Baber, the conqueror of Hindostan and founder of the Mongol dy- nasty, cover a period of nearly 40 years, and are written with entire simplicity and natural- ness. The astronomical works prepared at Samarcand, under the patronage and direction of Ulugh Beg (died 1449), grandson of Tamer- lane, deserve honorable notice. The literature of the western or Osmanli Turks, to which alone we usually apply the name of Turkish literature, is exceedingly rich, but it is upon the whole of inferior interest, because it con- tains so little that is original and distinctively national in style and spirit. It is mainly an imitation, more or less successful, of Persian models, but in part also of Arabic. As the language of the Osmanlis is full of Persian words, compounds, phrases, and even forms of construction, so is their history, their philoso- phy, their poetry, a reworking of Persian ma- terial, an echo of Persian taste. The history of the Osmanli literature begins with that of Osmanli nationality ; even before the power of the dynasty was established by the capture of Constantinople, works had been produced which the nation has never let perish, and has hardly excelled; prominent among the great names of this era are those of Sheikhi, the ro- mantic poet, and also the ablest physician of his time, of Solyman Tchelebi, and of Nesimi the free-thinker. But the most flourishing pe- riod in the whole history of the literature was the 16th century, chiefly during the reigns of Solyman the Magnificent and his son Selim II. Meshihi, renowned as an elegiast, and Kemal Pasha Zadeh, a man of universal learning and an admired author in many different depart- ments, especially in history and in Moslem ju- risprudence, wrote early in the century. Both these branches are of great importance and prominence in the Turkish literature. The latter, of inferior interest to us, but of the highest consequence to the Turks themselves, in its double aspect, religious and legal, and indispensable to those who would fully under- stand the internal life of the nation, is illus- trated by an unbroken series of great writers. In history, besides general and independent authors, such as Mohammed Effendi, Betchevi, and Hadji Khalfa, the line of official histo- riographers and annalists of the realm, com- mencing with Saad ed-Din, deserve especial notice. Among his successors were Nahna, Reshid, Izzi, and Vasif. Notwithstanding the turgid and affected style of the official histori- ans, they are most valuable authorities for the history of the Ottoman empire, in its internal and its external relations. Saad ed-Din wrote under Solyman, and has been excelled by none who came after him in dignity and philosophic spirit ; he brought the story of the rise and growth of the Turkish power down to 1526. Of the same period is Lami'i, one of the most highly esteemed of Turkish authors, and in some departments quite unsurpassed; his works are both in prose and verse, and include many translations from the Persian. Fasli, distinguished by depth of thought and tender- ness of sentiment, lived till 1563. But the chief ornament of the century is Baki, the acknowl- edged prince of Turkish lyric poets, and ranked by the orientals with the Persian Hafiz and the Arab Motanebbi in the trio of unrivalled mas- ters of song. He died at a great age in 1600. A new period of literary activity and excel- lence, although decidedly inferior to that al- ready referred to, followed in the lYth century, under the patronage of the great vizier Koprili, in the reign of Mohammed IV. Most worthy of note here are Nebi, the most admired poet of the century, Nefi, the first of Turkish satir- ists, Naima the historian, and Hadji Khalfa, the historian, geographer, biographer, and en- cyclopaedist, a man of immense learning and industry, whose history of Arabic, Persian, and Turkish literature, in Arabic, is a chief authority upon its subject, for both the East and the West. In the 18th century, the dis- tinguished vizier Raghib Pasha is eminent both as an author and as a patron of learning ; but among the innumerable writers, in every depart- ment, of the last century or two, there are few who deserve to be particularly noticed ; we may mention merely Said Rufet Effendi, Aini Effendi, and Pertev Effendi as the most esteemed poets. The Turks have done little for the grammatical and lexicographical illustration of their own language, but a great deal for that of the Arabic and Persian. The press was in- troduced into Constantinople early in the 18th century, by Ibrahim Effendi, and, both there and elsewhere, has been actively engaged in publishing the most important works in Ara-