Sarı Saltık (alternatively spelled as Sarı Saltuk and also referred as ''Sarı Saltuk Baba'' or ''Dede'', ; meaning 'the blonde', died 1297/98) was a 13th-century
Alevi
Alevism (; ; ) is a syncretic heterodox Islamic tradition, whose adherents follow the mystical Islamic teachings of Haji Bektash Veli, who taught the teachings of the Twelve Imams, whilst incorporating some traditions from shamanism. Differing ...
Turkish dervish
Dervish, Darvesh, or Darwīsh (from ) in Islam can refer broadly to members of a Sufi fraternity (''tariqah''), or more narrowly to a religious mendicant, who chose or accepted material poverty. The latter usage is found particularly in Persi ...
, venerated as a
saint
In Christianity, Christian belief, a saint is a person who is recognized as having an exceptional degree of sanctification in Christianity, holiness, imitation of God, likeness, or closeness to God in Christianity, God. However, the use of the ...
by the
Bektashi
Bektashism (, ) is a tariqa, Sufi order of Islam that evolved in 13th-century western Anatolia and became widespread in the Ottoman Empire. It is named after the wali, ''walī'' "saint" Haji Bektash Veli, with adherents called Bektashis. The ...
Sufi Muslims in the
Balkans
The Balkans ( , ), corresponding partially with the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throug ...
and parts of
Middle East
The Middle East (term originally coined in English language) is a geopolitical region encompassing the Arabian Peninsula, the Levant, Turkey, Egypt, Iran, and Iraq.
The term came into widespread usage by the United Kingdom and western Eur ...
as well as the mainstream Sunni Muslim community.
Historical figure
According to 14th-century Moroccan traveller
Ibn Battuta
Ibn Battuta (; 24 February 13041368/1369), was a Maghrebi traveller, explorer and scholar. Over a period of 30 years from 1325 to 1354, he visited much of Africa, the Middle East, Asia and the Iberian Peninsula. Near the end of his life, Ibn ...
, Saltik was an "ecstatic devotee", although "things are told of him that are reproved by the
Divine Law
Divine law is any body of law that is perceived as deriving from a Transcendence (religion), transcendent source, such as the will of God or godsin contrast to man-made law or to secular law. According to Angelos Chaniotis and Rudolph F. Peters, di ...
".
[Norris, ''Islam in the Balkans'', pp. 146-47.] He is considered by various sources a disciple of Mahmud Hayran, of
Haji Bektash Veli
Haji Bektash Veli (; ; ; ) was an Islamic scholar, Mysticism, mystic, Wali, saint, sayyid, and philosopher from Greater Khorasan, Khorasan who lived and taught in Anatolia.C. Olsen: Celibacy and Religious Traditions. Oxford University Press. 1st ...
, or of one of the successors of
Ahmed ar-Rifa'i
Ahmad () is an Arabic male given name common in most parts of the Muslim world. Other English spellings of the name include Ahmed. It is also used as a surname.
Etymology
The word derives from the root ( ḥ-m-d), from the Arabic (), from ...
. According to the 17th-century traveller
Evliya Çelebi
Dervish Mehmed Zillî (25 March 1611 – 1682), known as Evliya Çelebi (), was an Ottoman Empire, Ottoman explorer who travelled through his home country during its cultural zenith as well as neighboring lands. He travelled for over 40 years, rec ...
, his real name was Mehmed, and he was from
Bukhara
Bukhara ( ) is the List of cities in Uzbekistan, seventh-largest city in Uzbekistan by population, with 280,187 residents . It is the capital of Bukhara Region.
People have inhabited the region around Bukhara for at least five millennia, and t ...
.
[Babinger, ''Ṣari Ṣaltik Dede'', p. 172] Early 20th-century historian
Frederick Hasluck considered him a saint of a
Tatar tribe from
Crimea
Crimea ( ) is a peninsula in Eastern Europe, on the northern coast of the Black Sea, almost entirely surrounded by the Black Sea and the smaller Sea of Azov. The Isthmus of Perekop connects the peninsula to Kherson Oblast in mainland Ukrain ...
, which had brought his cult into
Dobruja
Dobruja or Dobrudja (; or ''Dobrudža''; , or ; ; Dobrujan Tatar: ''Tomrîğa''; Ukrainian language, Ukrainian and ) is a Geography, geographical and historical region in Southeastern Europe that has been divided since the 19th century betw ...
, from where it was spread by the Bektashis.
According to the 15th-century ''
Oghuzname'' narrative, in 1261 he accompanied a group of Anatolia
Turkomans into
Dobruja
Dobruja or Dobrudja (; or ''Dobrudža''; , or ; ; Dobrujan Tatar: ''Tomrîğa''; Ukrainian language, Ukrainian and ) is a Geography, geographical and historical region in Southeastern Europe that has been divided since the 19th century betw ...
, where they were settled by the
Byzantine
The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...
Emperor
Michael VIII
Michael VIII Palaiologos or Palaeologus (; 1224 – 11 December 1282) reigned as Byzantine emperor from 1261 until his death in 1282, and previously as the co-emperor of the Empire of Nicaea from 1259 to 1261. Michael VIII was the founder of th ...
to protect the northern frontier of the empire. However, Dobruja was occupied by Tatars in the same period. The same source places him in Crimea after 1265, along the Turkomans transferred there by
Tatar khan
Muhammad Tatar Khan (, ) was the Sultan of North Bengal during 1259-1268 CE after usurping the Governorship of Ijjauddin Balban Iuzbaki.
History
In 1258 CE, Tatar Khan defeated Izzuddin Balban, later building a tomb for his predecessor in 1 ...
Berke
Berke Khan (died 1266/1267; also Birkai; Turki/ Kypchak: برکه خان, , ) was a grandson of Genghis Khan from his son Jochi and a Mongol military commander and ruler of the Golden Horde, a division of the Mongol Empire, who effectively c ...
, and after 1280 mentions him leading the nomads back to Dobruja. After the death of Sari Saltik, some of the Turkomans returned to Anatolia, while other remained and became Christians, becoming the ancestors of the
Gagauz people
The Gagauz (; ) are a Turkic ethnic group native to southern Moldova ( Gagauzia, Taraclia District, Basarabeasca District) and southwestern Ukraine (Budjak). Gagauz are mostly Eastern Orthodox Christians. The term Gagauz is also often used ...
. This migration has characteristics of a folk epic ''
destan'', and its historicity is doubted by some scholars.
Legacy in Babadag
The town of
Babadag (Turkish, Babadağ, ''Mountain of the Baba''), in the
Romanian Dobruja, identified with the town of ''Baba Saltuq'' visited in 1331/1332 by Ibn Battuta, is said to be named after him. The oldest sources about Sari Saltik available place his tomb in the area of the future town. This tomb was visited in 1484/1485 by
Ottoman Sultan
Sultan (; ', ) is a position with several historical meanings. Originally, it was an Arabic abstract noun meaning "strength", "authority", "rulership", derived from the verbal noun ', meaning "authority" or "power". Later, it came to be use ...
Bayezid II
Bayezid II (; ; 3 December 1447 – 26 May 1512) was the sultan of the Ottoman Empire from 1481 to 1512. During his reign, Bayezid consolidated the Ottoman Empire, thwarted a pro-Safavid dynasty, Safavid rebellion and finally abdicated his throne ...
during a military campaign, and, after reporting an important victory, he ordered the building of a religious and educational complex here (including a mausoleum to Saltik, finished in 1488), around which the town developed. According to Evliya Çelebi, a marble sarcophagus was found during the construction, with a Tatar inscription attesting it was the tomb of the saint. However this miraculous discovery is not mentioned in other sources talking about the sultan's passage through the town.
Babadag became an important place of pilgrimage, visited in 1538 by
Suleiman the Magnificent
Suleiman I (; , ; 6 November 14946 September 1566), commonly known as Suleiman the Magnificent in the Western world and as Suleiman the Lawgiver () in his own realm, was the List of sultans of the Ottoman Empire, Ottoman sultan between 1520 a ...
, and the most important urban centre in 16th-century Dobruja. The town however decayed during the frequent wars that ravaged the region during the 17th century, and was eventually burned down, along with the mausoleum to Saltik, during the
Russo-Turkish Wars
The Russo-Turkish wars ( ), or the Russo-Ottoman wars (), began in 1568 and continued intermittently until 1918. They consisted of twelve conflicts in total, making them one of the longest series of wars in the history of Europe. All but four of ...
. A simple domed
türbe
''Türbe'' refers to a Muslim mausoleum, tomb or grave often in the Turkish-speaking areas and for the mausolea of Ottoman sultans, nobles and notables. A typical türbe is located in the grounds of a mosque or complex, often endowed by the ...
was rebuilt over the grave of the saint in 1828. The mausoleum in Babadag remains of relative importance even nowadays, and was recently renovated, being reinaugurated in 2007 by the then-
Turkish prime-minister
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (born 26 February 1954) is a Turkish politician who is the 12th and current president of Turkey since 2014. He previously served as the 25th prime minister of Turkey, prime minister from 2003 to 2014 as part of the Jus ...
.
Legendary figure
In various
Orthodox Christian legends, he is identified with saints such as
Saint George
Saint George (;Geʽez: ጊዮርጊስ, , ka, გიორგი, , , died 23 April 303), also George of Lydda, was an early Christian martyr who is venerated as a saint in Christianity. According to holy tradition, he was a soldier in the ...
,
Elijah
Elijah ( ) or Elias was a prophet and miracle worker who lived in the northern kingdom of Israel during the reign of King Ahab (9th century BC), according to the Books of Kings in the Hebrew Bible.
In 1 Kings 18, Elijah defended the worsh ...
,
Saint Nicholas
Saint Nicholas of Myra (traditionally 15 March 270 – 6 December 343), also known as Nicholas of Bari, was an early Christian bishop of Greeks, Greek descent from the maritime city of Patara (Lycia), Patara in Anatolia (in modern-day Antalya ...
,
Saint Simeon,
Saint Naum
Naum ( Bulgarian and ), also known as Naum of Ohrid or Naum of Preslav (c. 830 – December 23, 910), was a medieval Bulgarian writer and missionary among the Slavs, considered one of the Seven Apostles of the First Bulgarian Empire. He was a ...
or
Saint Spyridon
Spyridon, also Spyridon of Tremithus (Greek: ; c. 270 – 348), is a saint honoured in both the Eastern and Western Christian traditions.
Life
Spyridon was born in Assia, in Cyprus. He worked as a shepherd and was known for his great piety. ...
. According to a local legend, his body was buried in seven coffins, in remote towns and villages within the lands of the ''
Infidels
An infidel (literally "unfaithful") is a person who is accused of disbelief in the central tenets of one's own religion, such as members of another religion, or irreligion, irreligious people.
Infidel is an Ecclesiology, ecclesiastical term in Ch ...
''.
Nowadays, alleged tombs (
türbe
''Türbe'' refers to a Muslim mausoleum, tomb or grave often in the Turkish-speaking areas and for the mausolea of Ottoman sultans, nobles and notables. A typical türbe is located in the grounds of a mosque or complex, often endowed by the ...
) of his, are found all over the Balkans (
Blagaj, Mostar,
Krujë
Krujë ( sq-definite, Kruja; see also the etymology section) is a town and a municipality in north-central Albania. Located between Mount Krujë and the Ishëm River, the city is 20 km north of the capital of Albania, Tirana.
Krujë was ...
,
Kaliakra) and western
Anatolia
Anatolia (), also known as Asia Minor, is a peninsula in West Asia that makes up the majority of the land area of Turkey. It is the westernmost protrusion of Asia and is geographically bounded by the Mediterranean Sea to the south, the Aegean ...
(
İznik).
Notes
References
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External links
Sari Saltik in Albania
{{DEFAULTSORT:Saltik, Sari
1290s deaths
Year of birth unknown
History of Dobruja