Narrative of Travels in Europe, Asia, and Africa, in the Seventeenth Century, Vol. IEvliya Çelebi
History
Narrative of Travels in Europe, Asia, and Africa, in the Seventeenth Century, Vol. I
Evliya Çelebi
Caucasus, South -- Description and travel; Istanbul (Turkey) -- Description and travel; Turkey -- History
Eighth. The station of Sheïkh Maksúd Sultán, the companion of Bábá
Ja’fer. These two, with the king’s (_i.e._ the Greek emperor’s)
permission, both offered up prayers on the eastern side of the mosque,
within the sepulchral gate (Turbeh-kapú-sí), at the places now bearing
their name.
Eighth. The station of Salomon, who is said to have offered up prayer
on the ground where Ayá Sófiyah now stands, at the place called the
Green Mihráb, to the right of the Minber.
Ninth. The station of Khizr, beneath the gilt ball in the centre of the
cupola, is a place where some thousands of holy men have enjoyed the
happiness of discoursing with that great prophet.
Tenth. The station of the forty, to the south of the platform of the
Muëzzins, is a place where the ground is paved with forty stones of
various colours, and where forty holy men stood when the extraordinary
accident which happened to Gulábí Aghá took place.
_Narrative of Gulábí Aghá._
Gulábí Aghá, Rikáb dár (stirrup-holder) of Sultán Suleïmán, a pious
man, who died at the age of 151 years, relates that in consequence of
the great plague in the reign of Sultán Selím II., which at Islámból
carried off three thousand souls every day, that prince ordered the
prayer Istiská to be proclaimed during three days; and that the mosque
being much crowded on the holy night Kadr, in order to hear the sermon
of the Sheïkh (_i.e._ Doctor) of the order of Beshiktásh Evliyá Efendí,
the Sultán ordered the people present to be numbered. This Sheïkh, who
was born at Tareb-afzún (Trapezonde), was a foster-brother of Sultán
Suleïmán. The throng to hear his sermon was so great that all the
people of Islámból filled the mosque three days before he preached.
Sheïkh Yahyá being now in the middle of his sermon, and the whole
multitude listening to his admonitions with their utmost attention,
Gulábí Aghá, who was in the midst of the crowd, felt himself much
distressed by a necessity of withdrawing. His body began to swell like
the kettle-drum of Bagdad; he stood up two or three times on tip-toes
to see whether there was no possibility of making his way through the
multitude, but saw that a man must needs be engulfed in this ocean of
men. He was ready to die for shame when he addressed himself to the
forty, on the station of whom he was then standing, and begged of them
to save him from being disgraced by exposure to the crowd. At that
moment he saw a stately man standing near him, in the dress of a Sipáhí
(soldier), who said to him, “I will release thee from thy pain;” and
thus saying, stretched his sleeve over Gulábí’s head, who instantly
found himself transported into a meadow on the bank of the stream
near Kághid-khánah. His pain and distress were removed forthwith; and
in a moment afterwards he was again in the same place in the mosque.
When the sermon was finished all the hundred and one gates were shut
except the large one at the south side, where the Defterdár Dervísh
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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