Narrative of Travels in Europe, Asia, and Africa, in the Seventeenth Century, Vol. IIEvliya Çelebi
History
Narrative of Travels in Europe, Asia, and Africa, in the Seventeenth Century, Vol. II
Evliya Çelebi
Caucasus, South -- Description and travel; Istanbul (Turkey) -- Description and travel; Turkey -- History
It was built by Zia-ud-dín, the son of Sultán Hassan, and is a square
castle, on the top of a high rock. The camp was fixed at the distance
of a gunshot from the castle, and the siege began immediately. As soon
as the Mussulman victors opened the trenches, all the guns were fired
from the castle, and seventy men fell to the ground as martyrs. The
Commander, Sídí Ahmed Páshá, exhorting the Begs, Beglerbegs, and other
officers, with sweet words and presents and himself making all possible
exertions, brought four cannons on to the heights opposite the eastern
side of the castle, which being fired, killed Chendán Beg, the nephew
of the Beg of the castle. At the same moment a great lamentation arose
in the castle, and the Ottoman victors began to ascend the breaches by
ladders; in short, the siege lasted twenty-four hours, and the next
day the flags of truce were planted on the battlements, and all the
Kurds were crying Amán! Amán! O chosen family of Osmán! The commander,
Sídí Ahmed Páshá, with his first Colonel, went to the gates of the
castle, from which came out seven Kurdish Begs as hostages; they said,
“On this night Mustafa Beg, our Beg, deserted the castle and fled to
the Persians.” Sídí Ahmed Páshá gave no credit to this report, and
told them to find their Beg, lest they might have their hands cut
like sheeps’ feet; he fettered them, put seven hundred men into the
castle, confiscated all the goods found in the palace of the Beg,
disarmed the Kurds, collected three thousand muskets and six thousand
swords and other arms, and sent the merry news to my Lord, Mohammed
Páshá. The same day the Mohammedan shout (Allah) was proclaimed in the
castle; two thousand muskets and many guns were fired as a salute; the
whole district of Shúshík, up to the Persian frontier, was ravaged
and pillaged, and the Moslím victors enriched with the booty of
some hundred thousand sheep, oxen and mules. Men were sent into the
interior of the country in search of the Beg, but only found a spy,
whose nose and ears were in the first place slit, but at the moment
the executioner was about to cut off his head, he implored the Páshá’s
mercy, saying that he had something of importance to communicate to
him. He said that the Beg of Shúshík had fallen into the hands of the
Persian Khán of Magú, and was imprisoned there. Bákí Páshá, Katgáj
Páshá, and Dilawer Páshá, with the Beg of Melázjerd, Mohammed Beg, with
three thousand men, were ordered to go in search of the Beg of Shúshík
at the castle of Magú. I, poor Evliyá, was also in the expedition.
We marched across the Minváldereh amidst the mountains, and at the
end of eight hours, reached the tomb of Tahmúrass Khán, a Persian,
who was killed in the war of Cighálezadeh, and buried at this spot;
here are two hundred Armenian houses, which pay tribute to the Beg of
Shúshík, and to the Persians. We advanced for seven hours through a
woody country, and for two more through flowery fields, and arrived
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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