Birds in The Karamanlı Nizâmî Divān

Abstract

There are sources that feed the imagination of Divan literature poets. One of the
elements that have an important place in these resources is birds. In addition to the fact that
the poets of Divan literature use birds as the source of legendary and mythological
narratives, look at the source of the poem based on the physical appearance, sound, content
and nutrition of birds existing in humans. In particular, the concepts of lover, beloved,
competitor and memduh, which are in the character world of divan poetry, are used as
simile, metaphor, etc. It has been used in relation to the birds within the framework of the
rhetoric based on the marriage relationship.
This study aims to examine the handling and functioning of birds in Turkish
poems in the Dîvân of Karamanlı Nizâmî, one of the 15th century poets. The concept of
bird is used as a genus noun in Divan, as well as a proper noun. The concept of bird as a
species name in Dîvân takes place in 8 poems. 11 birds, which are among the special bird
species in the Nizami Divan, were identified as Bahri, Nightingale, Çil Bird, Doğan, Pigeon,
Hüma, Hoopoe, Crow, Parrot, Peacock and Bat. The poet's use of birds in his poems, based
on his observations in nature, will be tried to be processed through the poems, rather than
the mythological and legendary based birds among the special bird species