282

THE TAESCHNER COLLECTION (Or. 12.425, cont., 12.426)

by Ya'ldibzade shaykh Mehmed Bïcan (89b); two Arabic prose fragments; a gazel by Fuzülï; a report on the siege of Mostar in Safer 1161 (February 1748), with a list of martyrs (90b); a Persian distich in bold script (91a); eight miifreds (91b); a chronogram on the dismissal of Husam Efendi (92a); five fragments and beyts; calculations (93b); various jottings (93a); a chronogram on the arrival of Ahmed Efendi, with the year 1006 (1597-8); a distich (93b); a fragment of a falname (whereby omens are to be drawn fom the Koran); jottings (94a); a copy of a temessiik concerning a loan of fifty kurus, dated [1]241 (1825-6) - a place name in the first line has been erased.

The manuscript has been rebound in boards in brown with black marbled paper with brown linen backing; glazed cream to light brown paper of poor quality, discoloured and tom in various places and stencilled with double rectangles and various marginal figures in pale green, mostly flowers and crescents; (l)+95+(l) folios; 201x120 mm; various scripts (cf. above), occasional headings and rubrics in red; for copyists and dates, see above; an inscription of ‘Abdullah Efendi Haremfzade (?) occurs on f. 2a; a seal with the year 1027 (1617-8) is found on f. 92a; the inscription ‘Franz Taeschner Ms. Nr. 109’, with a pencil note in his hand ‘acquired 1927’, is found on f. la.

Cod.Or. 12.426 A miscellany A notebook, not completely filled, with annotations nearly all in the same small divanihand, late 18th century to early 19th century. The manuscript contains two seals of isma‘11 Fennf, probably an official who worked for the Porte in Istanbul, with the year 1307/1889-90, on ff. 8a and 216b (see plate). He may be identical with the composer of the same name, but better known as ‘Ertugrul’ (1856-1946), who worked as accountant for the Ottoman Ministries of Finance and the Interior in Istanbul before 1909 (cf. Öztuna I, pp. 263-5). The annotations found in the volume largely consist of (model) letters, or parts of them, arranged in a number of series connected, mostly, by catchwords, with some later additions. These series, apart from the last two, have been foliated in red: 1-70 (ff. 8b-81a); 1-20 (81b-101a); 1-9 (in Persian numbers, 101b-110b); 1-14 (lllb-125a); and 1-20