192

THE TAESCHNER COLLECTION (Or. 12.399, cont., 12.400)

such as ‘me^hur’) in red by a later owner; a piece of paper with a list in red nk'a, possibly by the same owner, of the poets whose names are found in the collection is included in the manuscript. Bound in worn-out, soft brown leather with the remnant of a blind tooled inset in Oriental fashion on the front cover; glazed cream to brownish paper, tattered and tom (and afterwards mended) in places, of which the margins are decorated with stencilled vegetal patterns in slightly darker shades of pale brown to green, partly with additional contours in black ink (see plate); ff. 1 and 10, part of one sheet in the first quire, are of different, light brown, paper and probably taken from a different MS; 87 folios; 196x130 mm; original written space 105x65 mm; the original text contains nine lines, the first eight of which are written diagonally in two columns; without catchwords; elegant ta'lik (original text); headings in red; without a date and the name of a copyist (a comer of a page, 87a, with the name of one of the contributors has been tom off); two owners’ seals, one of which contains the legend ‘el-fakir Hasan', occur on f. 83b; an inscription of Franz Taeschner with the number 80 is found on f. la.

Cod.Or. 12.400 A collection of poems The collection consists mostly of gazel s written by, it seems, 17th- and early 18th- century poets. The script deteriorates after f. 128b and the verses and annotations in prose on the final pages were, at least in part, added by later owners. Two of the verses by the copyist contain the pen-name of MabtümT (128b, 142b), who does not seem to be known from other sources. The manuscript does not contain a colophon, but it contains two datable poems: a double chronogram by MabtumI (the scribe) on the appointment of Ebübekir Efendi as kazi of Istanbul and Yusuf Efendi to the post of Edime in 1143/1730-1 (‘oldi Istanbul Efendisi Ebübekir beman', 142b-143a), sons of the ser-i tabiban Nüh Efendi (d. 1119/1707, cf. SO 1 2 IV, p. 1260), and a poem on the ascension to the throne of Sultan Mahmud [I], son of Mustafa [II], mentioned in the poem; this happened in 1143/1730 (143b- 144a). We find poems by - in alphabetical order - 1. ‘Abdulgafür er-Racï: a kaside (163b-169a) 2. (Dervïs) Agah: 53 gazels (lb-1 lb, 19a-20a, 33b, 37a-38a, 40b, 41b, 42b, 43a-