Yûnus Emre | |
|---|---|
يونس امره | |
 Statue of Yûnus Emre in Karaman, Turkey | |
| Personal | |
| Born | 1238 |
| Died | 1320 |
| Religion | Islam |
| Era | Anatolian Beyliks |
| Known for | Sufism, Diwan in Old Anatolian Turkish |
| Muslim leader | |
| Period in office | 13th and 14th century |
Influenced by | |
Yunus Emre (Turkish pronunciation: [jūˈnus emˈɾe]) also known as Derviş Yûnus (Yûnus the Dervish) (1238–1328) (Old Anatolian Turkish: يونس امره) was a Turkish folk poet and Sufi who greatly influenced Turkish culture. He wrote in Old Anatolian Turkish. His name, Yûnus, is the Arabic equivalent to the English name Jonah. The UNESCO General Conference unanimously passed a resolution declaring 1991 the 750th anniversary of the poet's birth, International Yunus Emre Year.[3]
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Yunus Emre has exercised immense influence on new formed Turkish literature, which was a combination of Persian and Arabic languages from his own day until the present, because Yunus Emre is, after Ahmed Yesevi and Sultan Walad, one of the first known poets to have composed works in the spoken Old Anatolian Turkish of his own age and region rather than in only Persian or Arabic. His diction remains very close to the popular speech of the people in Central and Western Anatolia. This is also the language of a number of anonymous folk-poets, folk-songs, fairy tales, riddles (tekerlemeler), and proverbs.
Like the Oghuz Book of Dede Korkut, an older and anonymous Central Asian epic, the Persian folklore that inspired Yunus Emre in his occasional use of tekerlemeler as a poetic device had been handed down orally to him and his contemporaries. This strictly oral tradition continued for a long while.[4] Following the Mongolian invasion of Anatolia, facilitated by the Sultanate of Rûm's defeat at the 1243 Battle of Köse Dağ, Islamic mystic literature thrived in Anatolia; Yunus Emre became one of its most distinguished poets. The poetry of Yunus Emre — despite being fairly simple on the surface — evidences his skill in describing quite abstruse mystical concepts in a clear way. He remains a popular figure in a number of countries, stretching from Azerbaijan to the Balkans, with seven different and widely dispersed localities disputing the privilege of having his tomb within their boundaries. Yunus Emre's most important book is Risaletu’n Nushiyye.[5]
His poems, written in the tradition of Anatolian folk poetry, mainly concern divine love as well as human destiny:
Yunus'dur benim adım |
My name is Yunus, |
and a poem about Prophet Muhammad, Ali, Hasan and Husayn:
Araya araya bulsam izini |
By constantly searching, I would find the trace of you |
Yunus Emre was the focus of Yunus Emre: Askin Yolculugu, a two-season 44-episode fictional drama based on his life, premiering in 2015 on Turkish National Television (TRT), created by Mehmet Bozdağ, and starring Gökhan Atalay as Yunus Emre. Yunus Emre has also been the focus of a film and a song; his representations in popular culture include:
![Reverse of the 200-lira banknote (2009)[9][10]](/en/File:200_T%C3%BCrk_Liras%C4%B1_reverse.jpg)
![Detail of the Yunus Emre Fountain in the Türkenschanzpark [de], Vienna, Austria](/en/File:Image-Yunus-Emre-Brunnen_Wien-02.jpg)
