Poetry anthologies containing important clues about the literary taste and poetry perceptions of the era in which they were compiled are significant works that offer a broad perspective on classical Turkish literature with their rich content. Depending on the personal preferences and literary knowledge of their compilers, these anthologies come in many different forms in terms of structure and content. Musammat anthologies, which are generally composed of poems with a structure of bends, are among these types of anthologies. One of these works, which is classified as a musammat anthology, is registered with the archive number “Y-362” in the Yapı Kredi Sermet Çifter Library. This anthology, which was compiled/copywritten by a poet named Eyyûb b. Yûsuf who used the pseudonym Şehrî on 8 Zilhicce 1081/18 April 1671, consists of 201 pages and was organized according to the huruf-ı heca formation. The collection includes a total of 363 poems, including 145 tahmis, 141 tesdis, 53 muhammes, 18 müseddes, 3 gazels, and 1 terkib-i bend, written by 159 different poets who lived between the 15th and 17th centuries. Among these poems, the unknown verses of poets whose divans are available, such as Revânî, Muhibbî, Fenâyî, Bursalı Rahmî, Bâkî, Bahtî, Behiştî and Hâşimî, and Alî Şîrîn, about whose life there is no information in biographical sources, and the presence of verses by some poets such as Cehdî, Hakîrî, Mehcûrî, Mukîmî, Nehrî, Remîmî, Su‘ûdî, Sünnî, Şuğlî, Şücâ‘î, Zayfî and Ziyâ‘î increases the importance of the collection. The main focus of this study is to make evaluations about the form and content features of the musammat anthology, which has been introduced above, to give examples of the verses it contains, and to classify the poems and poet staff according to MESTAP.
Classical Turkish literature, 17th century, Şehrî, mecmua, musammat.