An Unknown Poet and His Work: Dîvân-ı Ayânî

Abstract

Ayânî, who lived in the 16th century, did not find as much fame as the poets of his time, but wrote nazirs to their poems, is the subject of this article. The only work of the poet that we have is Dîvân-ı Ayânî. In this article, Ayânî is introduced to the scholarly world. In the first part of the article, which consists of two parts, information about the poets with the pseudonym Ayânî who lived in the 16th century in biographical sources is given, and the data about the poets with the pseudonym Ayânî in the collections are evaluated. In the second part, the dîvân is analysed in terms of form and content. The copy of the dîvân was analysed and its orthographic features were explained with examples. With this analysis, it has been revealed that Ayânî is a poet who should be emphasised with his tahmis and tesdis written to 16th century poets Bâkî, Muhibbî, Emrî and Vahdetî, as well as his verses and nazirs. According to our findings, Dîvân-ı Ayânî is currently the only source for the poet named Resîdî, who is not mentioned in biographical sources.