Kınalızade Ali (Qınālızāde ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn ʿAlī) Efendi (916–79/1510–72), an Ottoman scholar and judge, was the author of Ahlak-ı Alai ( Akhlāq-i ʿAlāʾī, “ʿAlāʾī Ethics”), a popular treatise on Ottoman political and social morality. Born to a high-ranking judge in Isparta, in central Anatolia, Kınalızade studied in Istanbul for a career in the Ottoman legal establishment. After receiving his icazet ( icāzet, licence to teach) in 945/1538, he took several teaching positions in Istanbul, Edirne, Bursa, and Kütahya (948–66/1541–58), followed by the prestigious…

Hudayi (Khudāyī, also erroneously Hüdāyī, Hüdāʾī) Mustafa (Muṣṭafā) Bey, given the byname Okçuzade (Oqçızāde), was an Ottoman janissary and poet born to a janissary on an unknown date in Istanbul. The meagre information we have about his life comes from a rhymed petition that he wrote to Sultan Süleyman (Süleymān) I (r. 926–74/1520–66) after having been demoted from his position of scribe, seeking a post in Istanbul, his home town. His professional career, like his father’s, was in the Ottoman military. He was enlisted as a janissary for more than twenty years, reaching the rank of yaya-ba…

Andelibi (ʿAndelībī, Kastamonulu, fl. tenth/sixteenth century) was an Ottoman divan (dīvān, high culture) poet, originally from Kastamonu (in north-central Anatolia). His real name was Hasan (Ḥasan), and he lived under the aegis of Sultan Mehmed (Meḥmed) II (r. 848–50/1444–6 and 855–86/1451–81). Sources from his era provide the only evidence about his life and work, and his biographical information is mostly recorded in şuara tezkireleri (şuʿarā tedhkireleri, poets’ biographies). Andelibi worked as a religious official in Istanbul, where he achieved fame as a Qu…

Bihişti Ahmed (Bihiştī Aḥmed, b. 877/1473, fl. 918/1512) was an Ottoman poet and historian active during the reign of Bayezid (Bāyezīd) II (r. 886–918/1481–1512). He is the author of the earliest known hamse ( khamse, “quintet”) in Ottoman Turkish, as well as of an Ottoman dynastic history. Bihişti was the son of Karışdıran Süleyman Bey (Ḳarışdırān Süleymān Beg), the district governor of Vize, in eastern Thrace, during the reign of Murad (Murād) II (r. 824–48/1421–44 and 850–5/1446–51) and, according to Bihişti, the first man to surmount the…

Mehmed Mecdi (Meḥmed Mecdī, d. 999/1591), an Ottoman prose writer, poet, and biographer, was born into an ulema (ʿulamāʾ) family in Edirne, and his father’s name was Abdullah (ʿAbdullāh). Due to his ulema origins, Mecdi was commonly referred to with the honorific Çelebi. He became an assistant to one of the leading scholars of the period, Kaf Ahmed (Qāf Aḥmed) Çelebi (d. 961/1554), and quickly rose to prominence among his fellows. Interested in literature, Mecdi wrote poetry and critiques of the Arabic and Persian works he rea…